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Selo POETS 


NINETEENTH CENTURY 


SELECTIONS FROM 
WORDSWORTH, COLERIDGE, SCOTT, BYRON, SHELLEY, KEATS, LANDOR, 


TENNYSON, ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING, ROBERT BROWNING, 
CLOUGH, ARNOLD, ROSSETTI, MORRIS, SWINBURNE 


EDITED, WITH REFERENCE LISTS AND NOTES 


BY 


fie tion be iN PAGE, Pr.D.- 


COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 


ob x0AR ahha xokb 


BENJAMIN H. SANBORN & CO., 


BOSTON NEW YORK CHICAGO 


Yoana . oo = 
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COPYRIGHT, 1904, 
By CURTIS HIDDEN PAGE. 


All rights reserved. 


SS reeeny, 
TNITERSTNY OF CLI 
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MAY a0 VTNCHANTIN 
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PREFACE 


This volume makes no attempt to do what has already been so excel- 
lently done in Mr. Stedman’s Victorian Anthology, Ward’s English Poets, 
and other similar collections. It is nota new Anthology of nineteenth 
century poetry. Instead of giving a few “gems,” or “flowers ” from each 
one of several hundred authors, it includes only the fifteen chief poets of 
the century. From each one of these, however, it attempts to give a full 
and adequate selection, sufficient really to represent the man and _ his 
work. | 

The book has been planned, primarily, to give in one volume all the 
material which should be in the hands of the student for a College or 
University course on the British poets of the nineteenth century. Ihave 
therefore tried to include, first, all the poems which would be given as 
prescribed reading in such a course; and, second, a thorough guide to the 
use of a well-equipped college or public library, in connection with that 
reading. I hope the book may also be found useful for more general 
courses on English Literature, for which there is no other collection cov- 
ering exactly this part of the field ; and for any reader who wishes to pos- 
sess in one volume the best work of the chief nineteenth century poets— 
“ Infinite riches in a little room.” 

The selections are very full, and for the most part consist of complete 
poems. They are designed both to give all the best of each poet’s work, 
and also (except for Mrs. Browning) to give some representation of each 
important period and class of his work. Long poems are usually given 
entire, and space has been found for Byron’s Manfred, Shelley’s Prome- 
theus Unbound, Scott’s Marmion, Coleridge’s Ancient Mariner and Chris- 
tabel, Keats’ Hyperion, Tennyson’s Guinevere and Morte d Arthur, 
Browning’s Pippa Passes, Mrs. Browning’s Sonnets from the Portuguese, 
Arnold’s Sohrab and Rustum, Morris’s Atalanta’s Lace, ete., ete. In 
general, extracts from long poems are not given, except in the case of 
single cantos which are complete in themselves, like the last two cantos 
of Childe Harold ; or lyrics, such as the songs from Tennyson’s dramas, 
or the Hymns to Pan and Diana in Keats’ Andymion, which, when de- 


tached, make perfect and independent poems. An exception has been 
Vv 


v1 PREFACE 


made in the case of Byron’s master-work, Don Jwan, which of course could 
not be given in full, and which has been represented by long passages. 

The amount of space given to an author does not necessarily correspond 
with his relative importance or rank as a poet. Some authors can best 
be represented by their shorter poems, while others—Scott, for instance, 
and William Morris—could not be fairly represented at all unless one of 
their longer poems were given. Browning and Byron could not be repre- 
sented without some complete example of their poems in dramatic form, 
while Tennyson’s drama does not hold the same relative importance in 
his work. Byron, in particular, cannot really be known except through 
his longer poems; some example must necessarily be given of the series 
of Oriental Romances, which, with Childe Harold, won him his early 
fame; atleast one Canto of Childe Harold must be given complete; an 
example of the great Satires must be known in the Vision of Judgment ; 
and finally the whole man is summed up in the different aspects of Don 
Juan. Wordsworth, on the other hand, has less space than poets of in- 
ferior rank; but he is represented by a hundred complete poems, the lar- 
gest number given for any author. 

The selection of shorter poems has been made generously inclusive. 
For Browning, more than two-thirds of the Dramatic Lyrics, and more 
than half of the Dramatic Romances and Men and Women, as well as 
representative poems from the other collections, are given. For Keats, 
the entire contents (except one poem) of the volume of 1820 is given, as 
well as full representation of his earlier volumes and of the posthumous 
poems. I have included nearly eighty poems from Landor, and hope that 
this—I think the first—representative selection from his verse may serve 
to make his work as a poet more familiarly known, in the sheer beauty of 
its simplicity and condensation. No apology need be made, I hope, for 
the extent of the Shelley selections, since his Alastor, Lines Written 
among the Euganean [Hills, Epipsychidion, The Sensitive Plant, Adonais, 
etc., as well as the Prometheus Unbound, make his work take a large 
~ amount of space in proportion to the number of titles. For Rossetti, I 
have given more than two-thirds of the sonnets from the /ouse of Life, 
as well as Sister Helen, The Stream’s Secret, Loves Nocturn, The Bur- 
den of Nineveh, The King’s Tragedy, and some thirty or forty of the 
shorter poems. J hope that the space devoted to him will be found to 
represent a true judgment of his great permanent value as a poet; and 
that the same will be true of the still larger amount of space given to 
the poet most different from him, Matthew Arnold. 


PREFACE Vii 


A principal feature of the volume is the classified /teference Lists. I 
have tried to indicate, for each poet, the standard editions, other import- 
ant editions, the best one-volume editions, the standard biography, the 
best brief biography, and all the important essays. The critical essays 
are usually classed in two paragraphs, and, throughout, the most import- 
ant books or essays are indicated by asterisks. 

The Notes have been made as few and brief as possible; and critical 
comment, except that of the poet himself, or, ina few cases, of other 
poets, has been excluded from them. They give only essential facts re- 
garding the poems, or comment and explanation added by the poet him- 
self. 

The poems are arranged in chronological order under each author, ac- 
cording to the dates of writing when these are known, and in other cases 
according to the dates of publication. The dates are given after each 
poem, dates of writing being indicated by italic figures, and dates of pub- 
lication by upright figures. 

It is a pleasure to acknowledge the ready generosity with which critics 
and teachers have given their help in making the selections. My thanks 
are due, in particular, to Mr. Paul E. More of the New York Hvening 
Post, to Professor Stoddard of New York University, Professor Trent 
and Professor Odell of Columbia University, Professor Baker and Pro- 
fessor Sykes of Teachers’ College, Professor Van Dyke of Princeton, 
and Professor Mott of the College of the City of New York. 

It can hardly be hoped that such a book as this will be entirely free 
from errors, especially in the reference lists and dates. Any corrections 
will be gratefully received. Most of the proof has been carefully read 
three times, but—as as my friend Ronsard hath it— 7’ excuseras les fautes 
de imprimeur, car tous les yeux W@W Argus wy verraient assez clair. 





Curtis HippEN Page. 
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, 
September, 1904. 


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Pepe i). iCONTENTS* 


WORDSWORTH 


List of References ...... ae Ghee ots 
LINES LEFT UPON A SEAT IN A YEW- 


LINES COMPOSED A FEW MILES ABOVE 

MaMTERN ABBEY... .....0-.- <i 0 
MRE EPI ON PASS 5 65 6. bo ae oc ene 
INFLUENCE OF NATURAL OBJECTS... . 
MMM WAS A-BOY. .... .. 2. sc cciee v ues 
UE. oo ye oes oe etl sleds 
STRANGE FITS OF PASSION HAVE I 


I TRAVELLED AMONG UNKNOWN MEN.. 
THREE YEARS SHE GREW IN SUN AND 
PSE ONVVBEI IEW. ald <.'c, <5 «, aiafhctd hehe lees ace 


THE FOUNTAIN : A CONVERSATION.... 
LUCY GRAY ; OR, SOLITUDE <a} 
PRCHAHL: A PASTORAL POEM. .: ...s.3 
-THE SPARROW’S NEST............ 
MY HEART LEAPS UP WHEN I BEHOLD. 
WRITTEN IN MARCH....-.... 


emer OAH, BLO WER. o0 6 Se acta dos 
RESOLUTION AND INDEPENDENCE..... 
I GRIEVED FOR BUONAPARTE......... 
COMPOSED UPON WESTMINSTER BRIDGE. 
COMPOSED BY THE SEA-SIDE, NEAR 

SAMO Site vie tan at clls seis ekaba ial ota in pie. « Hq, © 
IT IS A BEAUTEOUS EVENING, CALM 

INDE LOR AH NG sista Rafe) = « Snetena tor'a' sho Gh p's 
ON THE EXTINCTION OF THE VENETIAN 

ESPEN Eal Cera stall os 0/5, 0» Bisdeidiral« <a & ds!" ° 


PAGE 


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Co WO Ww WO © CO DHFS Sd Or Ot 


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26 
27 
27 
28 
30 
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PAGE 
TO TOUSSAINT L’OUVERTURE. . pees ele 
NEAR DOVER, SEPTEMBER 1802. . ce ee 
WRITTEN IN LONDON, SEPTEMBER ‘1802 sl aha 
BRIM DON GL S02 6 osm a ete» ee eee 33 
GREAT MEN HAVE BEEN AMONG US.... 33 
Mis NOGTOLBE THOUGHS OF yaalwe. ay 
WHEN I HAVE BORNE IN MEMORY..... 33 
TO HARTLEY COLERIDGE, SIX YEARS 
OT Dies eee as des duane #6 ipl hn ates 33 
TAT LRAIS Vee eee eto cists Caegais LeReeeetS 3 
TO THE SAME FLOWER.......... rah iat 30 
Wee TTI LEA Sy us oi ao Rie ho ent 2 ee 30 
ENE Sa Ty ANNIE nar eats ow os cree cscs 35 
ik ale ne oe eae ene SY 36 
AT THE OBA VE OF BUBNS.. 2. ).:5 0's 2 dete 36 
GS she CINSTE LAND? GAL Lee ocrs acre eo pcr une aaa Sit 
STEPPING WESTWARD........cc¢ec000 38 
Tie SOLIEARY: REAPERS + ds 6.625 kot es 38 
Som ELE CAM LEDC VELNE TOIL dictate dyer: « <raacerth cds 39 
ODE: INTIMATIONS OF .IMMORTALITY.. 389 
OG TEE OO iso rec est cet eee Tas 42 
SHE WAS A PHANTOM OF DELIGHT.... 42 
I WANDERED LONELY AS A CLOUD.... 43 
THE AFFLICTION OF MARGARET....... 3 
ODE DO DPT ocean eit xo oe ie at et 
MMe ASICS TLR RK gore alee Fae xc tna Secatre 45 
ELEGIAC STANZAS, SUGGESTED BY A 
PICTURE OF PEELE CASTLE....... 45 
PCP PAsae COLINGY ERE ig eas awe bos 6 46 


FRENCH REVOLUTION, ASIT APPEARED 
TO ENTHUSIASTS AT ITS .cOM- 


WA CIN STE Mane Tne cee cg oe asp 46 
CHARACTER OF THE HAPPY WARRIOR. 47 
YES, IT WAS THE MOUNTAIN ECHO.... 48 
NUNS FRET NOT AT THEIR CONVENT'S 

UATE VO? ROOM He. ss. oo aga gD 
BERGON Ate T Adolk @ tau ow. «: « ans. ehcsetee 49 
THE WORLD IS TOO MUCH WITH US.... 50 
POY EGP che Glee & decree are ape Jee <tokk SE 
BO HEM CER CUED 0. 2 ow pyar gh SR re 4° 50 
THOUGHT OF A BRITON ON THE SUB- 

JUGATION OF SWITZERLAND.....- 50 
HERE PAUSE: THE POET CLAIMS AT 

TRAST: THIS. PEARSE ate cl. Cieiice & Nex 51 
Mek OVIYA MLA... <lvie Meena eda dia alk “deli 51 
ik FERC VN, VISIT Helier it in dah < ase icpaim boas <a 54. 
1 SO RA Wa geo nce ee ee 55 
PY CE ME, eee ahd in sckeavay » S5+ axe © 5d 


1 The poems of each author are arranged in chronological order. Exact dates will be found at 


the end of each poem. 


x 


a TABLE OF CONTENTS 





SURPRISED BY JOY IMPATIENT AS 
THE Ree a yeliens ee Rr oe tepswene eee 


COMPOSED UPON AN EVENING OF EX- 
TRAORDINARY SPLENDOR AND 


ae) 6) eels, | 6) e 06 ene 


INSIDE OF KING’S COLLEGE CHAPEL, 

CAMBRIDGE .isicrcis sects te 
NEEM O RYaieegctanicy sie cunts cere tot sieumer ten eneterere thets 
TLORAMSEY UA RE ce. stare aisteist eta eiiersit ociecs 


oe eres te 


eeeree eee ee eee eee 


IF THOU INDEED DERIVE THY LIGHT 
FROM HEAVEN? f2n ko ee 
IF THIS GREAT WORLD OF JOY AND 
BAIN Gt Se eee eee 
‘““THERE! ” SAID A STRIPLING, POINT- 
ING WITH MEET PRIDE: ° 27-0 
MOST SWEET IT IS WITH UNUPLIFTED 
EVES@Re else sl eo eee eee eee 
EXTEMPORE EFFUSION UPON THE 
DEATH OF JAMES HOGG. 
A PORT !—HE HATH PUT HIS HEART TO 
SQHOOLN een 
SO FAIR, 


SO SWEET, WITHAL SO SENSI- 
THE UNREMITTING VOICE OF NIGHTLY 
SEU GAUL S eee re Peewen eee te 


cece. ee tos Oe 


i 


LTR eee emis eatolG otc liens. 

LEWTI, OR THE CIRCASSIAN LOVE 
CHUA NU eerie teeeicin nets! ier atevsters fore 

LAS HA VET PEs peecRonsl ters Sexenats ete operons 

REFLECTIONS ON HAVING LEFT A PLACE 
OR RE TURE M Bin iereer eters cs enete stances 


THIS LIME-TREE BOWER MY PRISON... 
KUBDA KEAN, |<.) cts caeiienenensieme tet tet tei ete tsa 


THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER.. 
CHRISTABEL.. 
FRANCE: AN ODE 


ee © @ 8 © 9 © @ 66 0's 
Cn cence & C0 ee Os 6 5 2 5 6 68 


LOVE 
THE BALLAD OF THEDARK LADIE..... 
LINES WRITTEN IN THE ALBUM AT 

ELBINGERODE...... 


Ss @. enous spe 


PAGE 
55 
55 
55 
56 


57 


ov 
o7 
58 
58 
59 
59 
60 
61 
61 
61 
61 
61 


62 


63 
63 


ODE TO TRANQUILLITY . hie . 
DEJECTION : AN ODE.... . 
HYMN PEFORE SUNRISE, IN THE VALE 

OF CHAMOUNI....... 


oe © ce & 6 6s ae 


ee eeee 


THE GARDEN OF BOCCACCIO.......... 
PHANTOM OR BACT 3. -o.0aeeee . 


ee es 8 2 6 


SCOTT 


List of References ..3s.2se ee 
WILLIAM AND HELEN. 2.25 225) eee 
THE VIOLET: . \\.. 2: 200 eee ee 


e016 tts € oe wa ame 


CADYOW CASTLED . 2. .% Sareata ewsanenenenans 
THE MAID OF NEIDPAT EH een 
HUNTING SONG sc 2 2 = oc onetmnene 
MARMION® 2.0 toce ce /o "oie teee eee) air 
SOLDIER, REST! THY WARFARE O’ER. 
HAIL TO THE CHIEF WHO IN TRIUMPH 


oes ee eer eee 


BRIGNALL BANKS. ¢.): Jiao eee oA 
ALLEN-A-DALE. . o:°75, eit eee 
HIE AWAY, HIE - AWAY... ...4% - eaten 
TWIST YE, TWINE YE! EVEN SO...... 


WASTED, WEARY, WHEREFORE STAY.. 
JOCK 0’ HAZELDEAN...,..5).. 02 : 
PIBROCH OF DONALD DHU........ iL 
TIME) i .55 00344004 00544550 m 
CAVALIER SONG. .:..2::..:0. 50 
CLARION: 0. cide ce sees. shale 
THE SUN UPON THE WEIRDLAW HILL.. 
PROUD MAISIB. .,...|. )2 ee i 
TRUE-LOVE, AN THOU BE TRUE....... 
REBECCA’S HYMN :.... 00 apne 
BORDER BALLAD. |.) /+).272en eee 
LUBE, oro che 'e ci ce or’ ere © colette en one ne c 
COUNTY GUY... ... 50a ee ent nee . 


BONNY “DUNDEE <>". :0.teeenenemrcasns 
HERE’S A HEALTH TO KING CHARLES. 


BYRON 


List‘ of References sis sea. we 
LACHIN’Y GAIRG\ 0s. (-. ene 
MAID OF ATHENS, ERE WE PART...... 
AND THOU ART DEAD, AS YOUNG AND 


oe @ te © os 6 0 @ 8-8 Bye eon 


104 
105 
108 


108 
111 
113 
118 
114 
159 


159 
160 
160 
161 
161 
162 
162 
162 
162 
163 
168 


163 
164 
164 


164. 
165 | 
165 
165 
. 165 
. 166 


TABLE OF CONTENTS | x1 


PAGE 
ODE TO NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE...... 184 
Berry AtikSs IN BEAUTY... 0.0.05... 0... 186 
OH! SNATCHED AWAY IN BEAUTY'S 
TOOM. oo as 5 De ee re ok 186 
THE DESTRUCTION OF SENNACHERIB.. 187 
SONG OF SAUL BEFORE HIS LAST BAT- 
Pi eS. 187 
STANZAS FOR MUSIC (THERE’S NOT A 
Es ena ile lire ten A ar ar 187 
Wemiperreeate WEI... ttt een eee 188 
STANZAS FOR MUSIC (THERE BE NONE 
OF BEAUTY’S DAUGHTERS)....... 189 
CHILDE HAROLD’S PILGRIMAGE, CANTO 
et ek wees 189 
SONNET ON CHILLON. ed ee eee 206 
THE PRISONER OF CHILLON..... ..... 206 
memeneas TO) AUGUSTA..... 2c. cece wees 209 
memerise TO AUGUSTA. ...., 0.00.50: 210 
STANZAS FOR MUSIC (THEY SAY THAT 
SR stk, c's os we eee 2 212 
RO es soe 5 Arachne bo 212 
MIRE ERIE te se cs casa cues ees 213 
Speer a) GARE LEMAN...........08 214 
MMM cP ec ons cs se eects 214 
wr) Teas MOORE. ...0.5....0....... 234 
FROM CHILDE HAROLD, CANTOIV..... 234 
FROM DON JUAN 
RD alg. oe ww e'e s  Sle cee 240 
FROM CANTO I 
POETICAL COMMANDMENTS....... 242 
TOeUNTUR, ANNI... 6c. eee eas 242 
FROM CANTO II 
TI WRECK... ee ee 243 
5 Pg A RE 244 
FROM CANTO III 
THE ISLES OF GREECE,.........-. 249 
CONCLUSION OF CANTO III........ 250 
Renee POET Vee  'a:. Sa ec ce es 253 
FROM CANTO XI: LONDON LITERA- 
TURE AND SOCIETY....... 253 
THE VISION OF JUDGMENT .......... 207 
DEEMEIMOETTTIN:. . ow oe ae ces . 270 
STANZAS WRITTEN ON THE ROAD BE- 
TWEEN FLORENCE AND PISA.. Qik 
ON THIS DAY I COMPLETE MY THIRTY- 
eee AN, pas nhe bases ene 272 
SHELLEY 
eet? INEZCTENCES. .... +> ee ean eee 
SPANZAS—APRIL 1814......... ee FED 
REE IS er os a ite ws 3s 2 ack an 8 275 
BEI IVER TE os . cog akon 80 0.8 276 
NE ain nee taki eg Nas © 27 
HYMN TO INTELLECTUAL BEAUTY..... 287 
BUPTTOBGANC. 00. cnn ne se pe neet ee? 288 
TO MARY —— ——: DEDICATION OF 


THE REVOLT OF ISLAM.......--++ 291 





PAGE 
OZ MANODIASS toate «cece. chon beaesk 293 
OW A BADED. VIOLET: 2. t,o oeeete et 29 
LINES WRITTEN AMONG THE EU- 
GANBAN Hibbs. 1) oS, See 293 
STANZAS WRITTEN IN DEJECTION, NEAR 
WAPDRSyces te aces ce eared ts stalty 296 
SONNET: ENGLAND IN 1819.......... 297 
ODE TO THE WEST WIND:.......¢...4 297 
THE INDIAN SHRENADION st. cess oss 20 299 
HOVE & PHILOSOPH Yi+ stu ost cee ee 299 
PROMETHEUS UNBOUND.............. 299 
THE SENSITIVE PLANT SO. be ctkre ele. 338 
Mi CLAUD so) cde s st 2 oe Ce 3438 
WRICAS DIK VGA Koo ask a yt eee a ere 344 
TO —— (I FEAR THY KISSES)......... 345 
BELTON Peet cet as «ee oe oe -- 346 
YM OFOPANI Coe eee eee ee 346 
THe, WUPATION © We oc an ts bak & te elee oe 046 
SUING ae eS ek eR Weel be Obs ek 347 
oe Tt MOON. cons ee eS 348 
THE WORLD’S WANDERERS..... ..... 348 
TIME DONG PASTS: ooo. 2c fe eee lnes 348 
BPIPEVCUMIDION:, 222. oes ool ess ovals 348 
WES NUIT Orc occ ee eae ele whe eee 307 
TIM ree oe eters eek loan 307 
SONNET: POLITICAL GREATNESS. . 358 
MOTABILEE Ger? er ae OA 358 
A LAMENT. eee tres sek eek. 358 
. 858 
VR ATE ho Sv tl cee eee Oe erie 358 
LIFE MAY CHANGE, BUT IT MAY FLY 
WOR eg Se A ck hb Cees 366 
WORLDS ON WORLDS ARE ROLLING 
RVG... eee este Clee eee 366 
SONGS PROM HELLA AA ote is re 367 
THE WORLD’S GREAT AGE BEGINS 
ANEW rok eee a ie wk Ca eee ewes 367 
TO2MORROW wee Pea hess leeein soe ed 368 
TO —— (ONE WORD IS TOO OFTEN),... 368 
WITH A GUITAR, TOJANE .... 34... 368 
LINES : WHEN THE LAMP IS SHAT- 
TRI Cire ke ofc 's aie 369 
SONG FROM CHARLES THE FIRST...... 369 
PAV IEG Waa oo ns Bia. dv. <0 0 n'a apernteea 369 
KEATS 
Bot op feferences: Steamed s .eor0 
IMITATION OF SPENSER.... ......e20:- ne 
TOU SOLITUDEL . 0's Lee ee a te ele 372 
HOW MANY BARDS GILD THE LAPSES OF 
WIM fee, toe tet 37 
KEEN FITFUL GUSTS ARE WHISPERING 
TERE: AND THERM el eee rs cr ens 373 
TO ONE WHO HAS BEEN LONG IN CITY 
PRINT oe ee lee eo hte nes 373 
ON FIRST LOOKING INTO CHAPMAN’S 
HOMER Ser caedccuceiicsces Pee. Ole 


Xll TABLE OF CONTENTS 





PAGE 
GREAT SPIRITS NOW ON EARTH ARE 
SOJOURNING... us «Peep wareees 373 
ON THE GRASSHOPPER AND CRICKET.. 374 
SrEamP AND POETRY. ...a<cleya: ie FAG a4 
AFTER DARK VAPORS HAVE OPPRESSED 
OUR) PLAINS A... aaee Phe seer OOU 
TO LEIGH HUN; !ESQ:0- 2... ave pe a0 
ON SEEING THE ELGIN MARBLES ...... 380 
ON A PICTURE OF LEANDER .......... 380 
ON°*THE SBAs 220s 20s Ue eget 380 
WHEN I HAVE FEARS THAT I MAY 
CEASE ‘16 ‘BE*+ < Bc: 462 ees oe 381 
FROM ENDYMION : 
PROEM! Stes OP. selena ek Cree 381 
WYMN TO PAN iste e sen Re be wae 382 
THE: COMING OF DIANTHes . 2.3 sm tay 383 
INVOCATION TO THE POWER OF LOVE. 385 
ROUNDELAY 33.5047 ..2 ee 386 
THE FRASTSOR: DIAN: ix, aoe Pulticeee 1 pe7 
ROBIN HOOD tee ics aa ee 388 
IN A DREAR-NIGHTED DECEMBER...... 389 
POCATISA ROCK). ss oso eRe ren ES 389 
THE HUMAN - SEASONS. os. coe ten deeee 389 
TOPHOMERS Sees. oo eae, So eee 389 
LINES ON THE MERMAID TAVERN. 390 
RANCY he Peck ete detent ae es Fe 390 
ISABELLA ; OR, THE POT OF BASIL.... 391 
SHE EVE OF ST. AGNES i... . coe eke 398 
THE EVE.OF- ST *MARKS4e. ice sec 404. 
ODL *ON INDOLENCE, (3s pee ces eee 405 
ODE (BARDS. OF PASSION). ....0. 6.5. 406 
Cie eTO!PSV CHE 41>... eee eee 406 
ODE\ONiA GRECTANJURN: hh des ou sea 407 
ODE TO A NIGHTINGALE.............- 408 
OBE ON MELANCHOLY .224. htop 409 
TO |“ AWTUMN. Gaye. 2. fa dhn .ee eeee 409 
IEP ERION s seioh Spire Ab cious cleus eee 410 
LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI......... 22 
OME A MEP Brac iy WES Ae. Sort pats 428 
TASTE Seta ois = Slt Cle tA ee Ao: 
BRIGHT STAR ! WOULD I WERE STEAD- 
FASTMUASSTHOULART 3.4; >... 423 
LANDOR 
Tast.of Referencosmin saan... 2 ee 42 
GEBIR Gs 3: Pee 1 oh ce ae a ore 425 
ROSE AYLMER.. 2.2260 see eee GA. 428 
REGENERATION... 2 ee ee i> 429 


CHILD OF A DAY, THOU KNOWEST NOT. 430 
LYRICS, TO IANTHE : 
AWAY MY VERSE ; AND NEVER FEAR. 430 
WHEN HELEN FIRST SAW WRINKLES 
IN HER) FACE. 2.35: ee eee 430 
IANTHE ! YOU ARE CALLED TO GROSS 
THE SHAIIG8s took .n 7 eee ee 431 
I HELD HER HAND, THE PLEDGE OF 
BLISS et -eee sy 3 


PAGE 
PLEASURE ! WHY THUS DESERT THE | 
HEART... . 5. s« 0+ + ange 431 
MILD IS THE PARTING YEAR, AND 
SWEET... 0.50... Oe 431 
PAST RUINED ILION HELEN LIVES... 481 
FIESOLAN ID Yio..2us sate tele | a oe wae. 
FOR AN EPITAPH AT FIESOLE......... 432 
UPON A SWEET-BRIAR......---cee acne 
THE MAID’S LAMENT... sc. 550. s <eee 433 
THE SHADES OF AGAMEMNON AND 
IPHIGENELA,«.405 eee 4383 
THE DEATH OF ARTEMIDOR4... ae 436 
CORINNA TO TANAGRA, FROM ATHENS. 436 
SAPPHO TO HESPERUS. u5 ¢ae ane 437 
LITTLE AGLAE...... 4: oan ane ee 437 
DIRCE,. ©. 6 sive ow rales 2 epee pee ne 437 
CLEONE TO ASPASLA. «see eee 437 
ON LUCRETIA BORGIA’S HAIR.......--« 438 
TO WORDSWORTH... s:. c piste ein eee 438 
TO JOSEPH: ABLETT,, «is. 225 0) eee 438 
TO:-MARY. LAMB.:... ). sesso sn 440 
ON HIS OWN IPHIGENEIA AND AGA- 
MEMNON.. . » «> ¢ obutcipeeheis eee 440 
FAREWELL TO ITALY. .. asc . 440 
WHY, WHY REPINE..... «sacs ee 440 
MOTHER, I CANNOT MIND MY WHEEL.. 440 
TO A BRIDE ié7n. 0.0 ee én ea eee 441 
LYRICS 
DO YOU REMEMBER ME? OR ARE 
YOU. PROUD..¢5515 ee oe 441 
NO, MY OWN LOVE OF OTHER 
YEARS |....... 985 pea 441 
ONE YEAR AGO MY PATH WAS 
GREEN. «. . «+ «0 seeienie « 441 
YES; I WRITE VERSES NOW AND 
THEN? . os sievalegs Se wee opel ee 441 
WITH ROSY HAND A LITTLE GIRL 
PRESSED DOWN. ...«.< ose 442 
YOU SMILED, YOU SPOKE, AND I 
BELIEVED «« 6:4 :0\</ems «er 442 
REMAIN, AH NOT IN YOUTH ALONE.. 442 
SOON, O IANTHE.! LIFE IS O’ER..... 442 
TO A.CYCLAMEN,.. 2... =. oe 
GIVE ME THE EYES THAT LOOK ON 
MINE... «.«. « :0cvseeyesene ices ae 442 
TWENTY YEARS HENCE... sen 442 


PROUD WORD YOU NEVER SPOKE... 448 
ALAS, HOW SOON THE HOURS ARE 


OVER:..;. . See Meher 443 
QUATRAINS 
ON THE SMOOTH BROW AND CLUS- 
TERING HAIR. .~ ...* oe 443 
MY HOPES RETIRE... '... . eee 443 
VARIOUS THE ROADS OF LIFE....... 443 
IS IT NOT BETTER AT ‘AN EARLY 
HOUR.« « +0 sci Pec 3 he 443 


I KNOW NOT WHETHER I AM PROUD... 443 
THE DAY RETURNS, MY NATAL DAY... 4438 


TABLE OF CONTENTS 








PAGE 
HOW MANY VOICES GAILY SING...... 443 
TOSROBERT BROWNING... <....0..00.: 443 
NEG FE LLGNICS 2 fatets o's oo ake ee ec oie 444 
THRASYMEDES AND EUNOE........... 444 
IPHIGENEIA AND AGAMEMNON........ 445 
ETE 446 
AG@ON AND RHODOPE. ..... 600. ..000%50- 450 
MENELAUS AND HELEN AT TROY...... 452 
AESCHYLOS AND SOPHOCLES.......... 454 
SHAKESPEARE AND MILTON........... 454 
RNIN a4 . calc cla’ «Sle oe ela 454 
OS ene ee 455 
THE CHRYSOLITES AND RUBIES BAC- 
0 a (Cn 455 
SO THEN I FEEL NOT DEEPLY......... 455 


YEARS, MANY PARTI-COLORED YEARS. 455 
I WONDER NOT THAT YOUTH REMAINS. 455 


NN Reet SLOSS ET, fap, ba) odie) « duclate d's 455 
ROSE AYLMER’S HAIR, GIVEN BY HER 
RN Sr bo aS Shin San GG AMIE 456 
DEATH STANDS ABOVE ME............ 456 
ON HIS SEVENTY-FIFTH BIRTHDAY.... 496 
ON THE DEATH OF SOUTHEY.......... 456 
ON SOUTHEY'S DEATH........<... sae ADR 
SEES a i a ne 457 
Meeerenecr ROSES. cick Gas he ag a cae 457 


LATELY OUR SONGSTERS LOITERED IN 


eA NES. Py ale pe eh ok ep SE 457 
THESEUS AND HYPPOLYTA........... 457 
AN AGED MAN WHO LOVED TO DOZE 

SE Fo Oy, Ler edb 458 
WELL I REMEMBER HOW YOU SMILED. 458 
Tipe OMINTH DECADE...,..,--:ssec00 458 

TENNYSON 

SE Eel CY EULER i hbk Sa de Wee 459 
ES Ee OR a 461 
ree PONENT ods i! oo lw Suhsal’ die clw 461 
See AY.OF SHALOTT........0. vasa 462 
SONG : THE MILLER’S DAUGHTER..... 463 
I , s a.- p che hich bad ade hh 464 
Ts uc: a soa ako SE on 467 
See AACR -OF ART. 2: Sh Lai aldw clea 468 
Breer EATERS ... ...,qcls delsle ald besa 472 

eee CIS... sw a nterecele w cle 2 erGhe 472 
A DREAM OF FAIR WOMEN............ 47 
LO i a 479 
YOU ASK ME WHY, THOUGH ILL AT 

eo eee «kitede FS) 79 
OF OLD SAT FREEDOM ON THE HEIGHTS. 479 
LOVE THOU THY LAND..... sae: 480 
MORTE D’ARTHUR......... oT ori) PS 
Sere ee Liat ohs is 484. 
eS a eco art acl a ae 487 
MT SLE AT Ls.e 0 cu c er coe ewe cies 488 
re eae SST ES CLK 492 


SEPTATE ATY. (0) VLE hay teens a 493 


LYRICS FROM THE PRINCESS 
PEARS, IDLE. TEABB AYO. oY Hea 
O SWALLOW, SWALLOW, FLYING, 
FLYING SOUTH. 
AS THROUGH THE LAND AT EVE WE 


S WaT A. ND SUOMWiiaie eee ter iets t.ts < <he.e 
THE SPLENDOR FALLS ON CASTLE 

LV 7A LIT iis paced naa ach eR eemnetene tele 2) She 
THY VOICE IS HEARD THROUGH 


ROLLING DRUMS; © <0. simepetors @ tele 


HOME THEY BROUGHT HER WAR- 
DIO RPBAIM etfs Nachle 
SSK ME NO.MORBILI fee sucht ee 
TREMEMORLAM. al cbt OG khid iw om an BREESE 
DOUTHE OUR: < Ads Fhe se. nae 
THE EAGLE..... ce ey Gees eee, P 
COME NOT, WHEN I AM DEAD. 
ODE ON THE DEATH OF THE DUKE OF 
WALLIN GUON Meth ic) PE his dc aide 
BANDS ALT eo ROUND ics. DR BO Sided 
THE CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE.. 
Poe CROOK a Gbce comes Game TAG 
LYRICS FROM MAUD 
PART I, V. A VOICE BY THE CEDAR 


ly O LED eli eS SOLED 
GROEN Darter erat tere ere 
XII. BIRDS IN THE HIGH 
EA L-GARDEN( ae sees 


XVH-4GO NOT, HAPPN DAY. oO 


XVIII. I HAVE LED HER 


XXI. RIVULET CROSSING MY 

GR OUND Passov tema! 2S estat 

XXII. COME INTO THE GAR- 

DENS SAUD <i a ot oto de deh 

PART II, Il. SEE WHAT A LOVELY 


REM Yocceascravgs 00 3:5. Sth aed «de Cs 
ENID’S SONG (MARRIAGE OF GERAINT). 
VIVIEN’S SONG (MERLIN AND VIVIEN). 
ELAINE’S SONG (LANCELOT AND 

AUST DGA > 0. in JS abet ot ah oe 
GUINEVERE.... «..,..0.«.., «skaters xk as 
REE TLON Be ooeccss 0:1 speeds 
THE SAILOR BOY..... Seer eh he ELLE 
BULOON.... £01: cak ee edie ND Ak 
TEE  VOWAGIS 2 ote a 
NORTHERN FARMER (OLD STYLE)...... 
THEAMLOMW BReieolien. Sasi Wie each 
IN THE VALLEY OF CAUTERETZ....... 


498 


513 
514 
514 


514 
517 
518 
518 


5386 
5387 
5388 
539 


X1V TABLE OF CONTENTS 


PAGE PAGE 

AS DEDICATION .« .« iia ies ses (etudnjeifavete te leis 539 EARTH’S IMMORTALITIES..........- .. 605 
IVVPASG EDS 2 ioe (nice io ww he tolve, is love Jo (che Rodetts hehe efataiseels Fe 540 MEETING AT NIGHT. .....2./0)2 2 605 
FROM THE COMING OF ARTHUR PARTING AT MORNING............-.-- 600 
MERLIN’S RIDDLE,.....2 Pees avtee 540 SONG : NAY BUT YOU, WHO DO NOT ; 
TRUMPET SONGU2A LEE Bae oe 540 LOVE HER eee , SOs 
THE HIGHER PANTHEISM............. 540 | HOME-THOUGHTS FROM “ABRO ‘hips fees 


FLOWER IN THE CRANNIED WALL.... 541 | HOME-THOUGHTS FROM THE SEA...... 605 


NORTHERN FARMER (NEW STYLE)..... 541 | TIME’S REVENGES................---- 606 
ENGLAND AND AMERICA IN 1782...... 542 THE ITALIAN IN ENGUAND: <=... .0nonan 606 
THE-VOICE AND THE PHAK..... Seu." .. 042. | PICTOR IGNOTUS .L/ 0 eee .. 608 
LYRICS FROM QUEEN MARY THE BISHOP ORDERS HIS TOMB AT 
MILKMAID’S SONG........0% eee 3 eo 543 SAINT PRAXED’S CHURCH........ 609 
LOW, LUTE, LOW........... teens 043. | SCATTER FOUL 2 eee eee ae 611 
MONTENEGRO: . (2902 | Bi ae et oe 543 | A WOMAN’S LAST WORD -flogDL 617 
THE REVENGE So «Sie vee ~#.. 049 | BVELYN HOPE |... 009 0) 618 
THE DEFENCE OF LUCKNOW.......... 546 | LOVE AMONG THE RUINS............- 618 
RIZPAH) ss ss area Sea ee 548 | UP AT A VILLA—DOWN IN THE CITY.. 619 
SONG FROM THE SISTERS........-...- 549 | A TOCCATA OF GALUPPI'’S......«-..2 621 
TOLVIRGIL ears seh eee i 314. AE ae 550 | OLD PICTURES IN FLORENCE..........- 622 
FRATER AVE ATQUE VALE............ 050) | DE GUSTIBUS. Aer ene oh se 626 
EPILOGUE TO THE CHARGE OF THE MY STAR. ..ciss +00 eee . 626 
HEAVY. BRIGADE: 4..{.228078 saree 550 | ANY WIFE TO ANY HUSBAND. ....... 626 
VASTNESSY 4e: BILE ic. RRR), Beet Re 550 | Two IN THE CAMPAGNA........<. .’. a e88 
MERLIN AND THE GLEAM............. 591 | MISCONCEPTIONS....... Jt. ee 629 
PAR-FAR-A WA Veco. octets Fee 553 | ONE WAY OF LOVE) ...<:5. ue 629 
THE THROSTEE. Mts.) EE ee Sh 553 | ANOTHER WAY OF LOVE VU . 629 
SHE OAK oc on eae ies SE Cee ee his RESPECTABILITY |...) Se 630 
CROSSING THE BARs.. 36056, Misia 553 | LOVE IN.A.LIFE:.....<1 oe 630 
LIFE IN. As LOVE. Soa lik Be 630 
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING | IN THREE DAYS...............2-000: 631 
THE GUARDIAN ANGEL... ......500) eee 
LAist Of References PRR 6d ee = 504 | MEMORABILIA, :.. 0 202 aneeeee fh ee 632 
SONNETS FROM THE PORTUGUESE..... 55) | POPULARITY... .s <a 7s seen 6382 
THE. PATRIOT)... c's = le ee 633 
ROBERT BROWNING A LIGHT WOMAN.......... 5.0. 
THE LAST RIDE TOGETHER. .... .. ee 634 
Wrest: Of Reser ences Grek. ve as ee 065 | A GRAMMARIAN’S FUNERAL... ...... 635 
SONGS FROM PARACELSUS THE STATUE AND: THE BUST. .... see 637 
HEAP CASSIA, SANDAL-BUDS ....... 568 CHILDE ROLAND TO THE DARK TOWER 
OVER THESEA OUR GALLEYS WENT.. 568 GAME ... ise.) 2 641 
PORPH VERE SELOVER :cco ie hohe eee 569 | FRA LIPPO’ LIPPI)/.) .. 73g 644 
PIPP A TEASE ES ee Be Ese. wc are o/0 | ANDREA, DEL SARTO. i. Jug 650 
CAVALIER TUNES. ONE WORD MORE. . .-. <.-.0ueee eee 654 
I. MARCHING ALONG. ..........- 592 | BEN KERSHOOK’S WISDOM........+.--+ 657 
Il; GIVE, AUROUSE Stee a kno so ek 593 | AMONG: THE ROCKS... ./s00n. ace 657 
HiT.) BOOTLA NDS Ai tte te eicee 593. || ABT VOGLER... ..2te Secews Sto ee . 657 
THROUGH THE METIDJA TO ABD-EL- RABBI BEN EZRA . )\000 0 yee . 659 
KADR ). [SA ee eee 593 | GALIBAN UPON SETEBOS....20) eens 661 
GRISTTINGA . 9d. eee cee . 094 || CONFESSIONS!) 0.10!) 20545 Se 666 
INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP ®.... 594 | YOUTHLAND ART. .......2. 1.000 666 
MY:« LAST DUCHESS; .. se beeee ene 595 | A PACH US ee See 667 
EN VA GONDOLA ns: 4 oc. Syste ab me nl ate 596. || PROSPICH.s ... .i..c015 Ul at bs Cle 667 
THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN........ 598 | EPILOGUE TO DRAMATIS PERSONAE... 668 
RUDEL TO THE LADY OF TRIPOLI..... 602 | FROM THE RING AND THE BOOK 
THERE’S A WOMAN LIKE A DEWDROP.. 602 DEDICATION si icvure eid eas ee eer GRS 
THE LOSTMGHADERG HS: AUGER G03 || HERVE: RIEL. . .......:<,..00 osteo 669 
HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD NEWS FIFINE AT THE FAIR 
FROM GHENT TO AIX ..........-..-- 603 PROLOGUE—AMPHIBIAN...,....... 671 


TABLE OF 








PAGE 
EPILOGUE—THE HOUSEHOLDER.... 671 
EE ec ee Pe tien ihe boost ws . 672 
mates AND SCRUPLES.. <6 os is sec. ee 673 
MRA LNA CHG ee face go cohetss Sukh oui tele 67 
MPO AT, NATURE. co. . ec el eee ee 674 
MPRA ANG. 2 6 ore 8 eee ee 674 
EPILOGUE TO THE PACCHIAROTTO 
MEMENTO 2s’... 6 Bhotel elev Oh Greve se 674 
LA SAISIAZ 
BORON, c.g vs cos Gigs od diete@'’ was O77 
THE TWO POETS OF CROISIC 
a ee pe O77 
EME ho asc wiwinl's ol w WG bie aie 67 
I gg kay 0 oR ils e's ou Sela 67 
or ee re 67 
TOUCH HIM NE’ER SO LIGHTLY........ 680 
MENTING IS—WHAT?.....0c680.5 000 680 
Mee LIATH AND EVE) . ise. . cis ife 0% 680 


NEVER THE TIME AND THE PLACE..... 681 
SONGS FROM FERISHTAH’S FANCIES 


ROUND US THE WILD CREATURES... 681 
WISH NO_WORD UNSPOKEN......... OSL 
wees IN THE FLINT: 2c. .av.caees 681 
VERSE-MAKING WAS LEAST OF MY 
NRE ke eS es SEGRE S 6G 681 
ASK NOT ONE LEAST WORD OF 
OY ihe DENS Bo ae 682 
WHY FROM THE WORLD............- 682 
Mea A LIBERAL. . 2%. ciesies ek wh es 682 
es 26s 6k osx do olt'e San ale 682 
SE eh so oc g 5 odo 0s Gi pele alale’s 683 
Mayme - BONUM... 2... ce cede ee debe 68: 
NEPA GIR Ds bos 0 oiele a slaw aleieste o's 683 
MOCKULM-MOUTH MEG. oo. s cs. ease es 683 
Oe 0 a 684 
MPILOGUE TO ASOLANDO: so... i<eecelee 686 
CLOUGH 
WeMEMMICEPETENCES 2,2... Ue. lies 687 
Mee LCTURE-ROOM..... 26.50 eee os 688 
IPR INE OMISGIVINGS, ....... «cc cvecee's 688 
co. sr gnenstarnha’e edict ote she 688 
Pia URSUM VENTUS...10. uel. 688 
MEET IN AL. cee. ets eed c's we wna e's 689 
THE QUESTIONING SPIRIT............ 690 
MMPHESOA, (A SEQUEL) cj: 0s. fs. e es at 691 
FROM AMOURS DE VOYAGE 
RTE Seo ot, at ww che eae as ae dns be 691 
oo) S20 2 RR be, SE ea 692 
THE PANTHEON...... a A hehe Oe 692 
ON MONTORIO’S HEIGHT............ 692 
Mr REAL, QUESTION... 05% s/s estes a 693 
MERA, cs das ae rete en owe teats 693 
MEMRMEOE Aetna t ots cides eer ey a's sé ies 693 
NE ESTA peor phat ala’ ste sin 8 ddtere’e hg fae 693 
PIN AM PARTEM, ... . 0% os ce cs so 6 cn 694 
Pee DEPTHS. .5 0. eee Pat oo 1694 


CONTENTS xv 
PAGE 
THE LATEST DECALOGUE.......... 694 
FROM DIPSYCHUS 
‘“ THERE IS NO GOD,” THE WICKED 
ATT ET, stern oc cree AE 694 
OUR GAIETIES, OUR LUXURIES...... 695 


THIS WORLD IS VERY ODD WE SEE.. 695 
WHERE ARE THE GREAT J)... 0.. 0%). 
WHEN THE ENEMY IS NEAR THEE... 
SAY NOT THE STRUGGLE NOUGHT 


AV ATLETH $s aerate oe ote elt 695 
EASTER DAY, NAPLES, 1849.......... 696 
ERSTER DAV ST tits sor, Fe ireit 697 
HOPE EVERMORE AND BELIEVE....... 698 


UIVOO CONDOR. Fe Fe bg i Ss MER OMA 699 
THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY.......... 699 
H! YET CONSIDER IT AGAIN........ 700 
SONGS IN ABSENCE Oo. sbi. oes 700 
COME HOME, COME HOME.......... 700 
GREEN FIELDS OF ENGLAND........ 700 
COME BACK, COME BACK....:.. 3.7%): 700 
EiME-FULUBE DA Yeo... oS Se 701 
WHERE LIES THE LAND... ite Re Se 701 
WREE YOU WITH ME. sis se wove 702 
PPMHIPs BEIPL SHIP ys oe ds as Sie 702 
Te STREAM OF LIVE, % 2. ft ores 702 
WITH WHOM IS NO VARIABLENESS.... 702 
ITE DOMUM SATUR, VENIT HESPERUS 702 
QURRENTE.CALAMO, cy iies cde cc cals HOC 703 
eT, PORTS COMB: Pes .5 chi eh 704 
TH BLDDENLLOV Eins S45 We aoe 704 
PERCHE PENSA? PENS ‘ANDO S’ INVEC- 
CE OLS ee oe ees eee ORS ON 704 
LIP BR IS STRUGGEE rs AG eis one 8 705 
SONNETS ON THE THOUGHT OF DEATH. 705 
INA. LONDON: BQUARE: ; een a in 705 
Tr aw lly gow les oss SUR, CO 705 
ARNOLD 
PRG. OF VGLET EILCES: : SR ela te wn Le este 706 
CoRe yD, WIR oer ea dia ws nn a ss cee 708 
POR A RPL ELS Oy hac ek ool so a ee 2/08 
EPPA We SP TOAT 082% ola aloe lane's, asl cco eee 708 
THE FORSAKEN MERMAN... ........- 708 
THE STRAYED REVELLER ....<...-..<. 710 
MEMORIAL “VERSES. ’.:.:.).: Uo eee eee W138 
EmLE-DECEPTION -.:.\./.°.°. ./vslete ete « Pre 
THE SECOND BEST. -..02°S eo ee ne 714 
LYRIC STANZAS OF EMPEDOCLES...... TaD 
CALLIOLES” SONG). os ee bdeito es cs 7Tt9 
THE YOUTH OF NATURE... ...:........ 719 
SELLE -DEPENDENOE fe tiene. see ee na bok 
MORALATY «oF nae eee okies cs biaa oes 721 
AVGUMMER NIGHT str oss oc ets ee ee 721 
THE BURIED AMEE tee ec eee ck eee es (23 


LINES WRITTEN IN KENSINGTON GAR- 
DENG Paere ceeicoes veers. 724 


xvi TABLE OF CONTENTS 





PAGE PAGE 
WE RUTURE s «300 Dee 42k | SUDDEN LIGHT. {5.22 05, ..eee ~eenes 788 
STANZAS IN MEMORY OF THE AUTHOR THE WOODSPURGE ........... os de eee 
OR OBRROANN 705! :0T Re eee 725 | THE HONEYSUCKLE..... os Ooh ae sno COO 
FEROULESOAT So) a ntacdec edd ae entree 727 | A LITTLE WHEGESs2:.5... 0). eee “5 01b0 
SOHRAB AND RUSTUM.........0:.000- 728 | TROY ‘TOWNS 015 eee . (5 Tee 
PHILOMEDLAA, 9.00% F208 7 Ge ee 741 | THE STREAM’S. SECRET.....«... 00" --- 489 
TH SCHOLAR-GIPSY.) . . vik ae eee 741 | LOVE-LIEY 4374... 7 eee BAA 
BALDER DEAD (SECTION III)....:..... 745 | THE HOUSE OF LIFE 
STANZAS FROM THE GRANDE CHAR- THE SONNET. .......onneee ssccec teens 
TREUSE..c3 4442 o owned Oe ee ae 754 LOVE ENTHRONED..... oecetlee eee 
FROM SWITZERLAND BRIDAL BIRTH fie Wess cee ttl 
ISOLATION. TO MARGUERITE....... 756 LOVE’S TESTAMENT. 4. sees. one . 193 
TO MARGUERITE—CONTINUED...... 757 LOVESIGHT ».4.345 4h Seek eee 794. 
TEV RSIS i .sss0f hoi M ie ale vs, ae CO Or te 757 HEART'S. HOPE; : «4 5023 ee . 794 
YOUTH AND OADM as tye erac cr cer eee 761 LOVE’S LOVERS: 2. oe: ee eee eee . 794 
AUSTERITY. OF PORTER foeee eee ok 761 PASSION AND WORSHIP ..........-:; 794 
WORLDLY PLACE...... SOTTO Te TA. 761 THE PORTRAIT -« s425500% 0 eee 794 
PAST LONDON Gade vue snc eens Poe 761 THE LOVE-LETTER’. 35.2455 .0020050 - %95 
WHST,s LONDON. Wee eect ed coe tere 762 THE LOVERS’ WALK....... a . 795 
BAST AND. .WESESoty oat coe cele as eateree 762 YOUTH’S ANTIPHONY........ 1: Se 
THE BETTER. PART.2640 1120) RGSS oe 162 YOUTH’S SPRING-TRIBUTE......... - 195 
TMMORTALILY sro a derce Woe ee he ene 762 THE BIRFH-BOND: Yoo), So eee Seams . 796 
DOVER BEACH...... et TUS Sal SR 8 BEAUTY’S PAGEANT | >... clo. o aoe 796 
GRO WINGSOLD. ..s eee. eee 3.) 768 GENIUS IN BEAUTY. .\. 227.0 eee 796 
Hodes A Vil Ure ary ately o 0.2 ER Es et: See TBS SILENT NOONG: 650 08e oe vu eee . 796 
Pi LAST! WORD. os «0 orca ot ee .. 164 LOVE-SWEETNESS: ::3..0252..0 000m 797 
BACCHANALIA ; OR, THE NEW AGE.... 764 PRIDE OF YOUTH... #5422292 ee tot 
PANG Eat, A oc. 4 chic tiene ae . %65 MID-RAPTURE: {947052 See outer 
NOW ISI oh ea oitcte's ss is sly CEA PEROT HEART’S COMPASS ::!24... 252. ee 797 
FEU BY) CHUA PEE J ove bette ee ake ce 766 HER: GIFTS; i. 426 eee Oe bs Sate Oe 
HEINE (FROM HEINE’S GRAVE)........ 768 EQUAL TROTH. «.:.5 4345) 250 oe eee 
OBERMANN ONCE MORE.............- . 768 VENUS VIOTRIX:; 2.22202 oe o. Oe ye ane 
THE DARK GLASS«: say eee eee te See 
ROSSETTI SEVERED SELVES...)/:. 25 sae oe tO 
THROUGH DEATH TO LOVE..... weee Oe 
Bets 0) CIE] CTEnces eet UND Fite eee 773 DEATH-IN-LOVE: <0, ©. ose o Sree 799 
MY SISTHR'S SLEEP... .:.-.25a0e 14 89 774 WILLOWWOOD, I-IV........:.5see 799 
THE BLESSED DAMOZEL..ccsssn- ese ne 774 WITHOUT HERtE SN eee + ck ee 
ATEEUMN sSONGHE AD TORE Sod os cance et cn 776 STILLBORN LOVE... «. . sss .. 800 
THE PORT RAT Oscice ssh heen hoe 776 TRUE WOMAN 
NHR OAR DeaDEATLER .< - )s eecienty sto ae TTT HERSELF .... .... dees .. 801 
AT THE SUNRISE IN -1848. ..... . cieseee CE HER LOVE... ..« . inane 801 
ON REFUSAL OF AID BETWEEN NA- HER HEAVEN... ... 2000000 801 
TIONS jonsceee tae 12s eG Reo 778 LOVE’S LAST GIFT) 3) oe . 801 
MARY'S GIRLHOOD Wy ero aes ee ais deme 778 TRANSFIGURED LIFE..... ...-.+eee UM 
FOR A VENETIAN PASTORAL.......... 779 THE SONG-THROE..........cece; .-. 802 
THE SHA-LIMITS -. 4 eee pene E is, wee 779 KNOWN IN VAIN.....2 «see oe .- 802 
THE. MIRROR... ... . 7. cee eh ey ys Br 779 THE HEART OF THE NIGHT........ . 802 
ASYOUNG FIR-WOOD,7.. eee eee 779 THE LANDMARK......s00e . «1h aee ee .. 802 
PENUMBR Acc. « siaidsts ieee i PR EAA eH Ti 780 THE HILL SUMMIT... 5... 2 -. hee 
SISTER HELEN........ 0.0m mot tee, fe sre 780 THE CHOICE, I-ITl......% Sonne 
THE BURDEN OF NINEVEH............ 783 OLD AND NEW ART 
MARY MAGDALENE AT THE DOOR OF ST. LUKE THE: PAINTER... ....5 oa QU 
SIMON THE PHARISER, .... pee ere 785 NOT AS THESE... cue £1. oe eee 
ASPECTA MEDUSA........% shee Gee 786 THE HUSBANDMEN....... 25 804 
LOVE S-NOCTURN.......<s.4 eee eee 786 SOUL’S BEAUTY ......0.. 2 nee 804 
FIRST LOVE REMEMBERED............ 787 BODY'S BEAUTY. »....¢s5) eee 805 


PRIGHTED PROMISE.......<0s. eens eI OO MEMORIAL THRESHOLDS.......-.-.- 805 


FABLE OF CONTENTS 


F PAGE 
A gS : > 805 
Benmore SPRING. ic cs. cc ee ee 805 
FAREWELL TO THE GLEN..... ..... 806 
ERC ee te esc te 806 
THE TREES OF THE GARDEN........ 806 
Pett MHAGATHANA ..) 0... 5.....06 806 
mer ON Bote SIDES.....:......... 806 
MICHEUANGEIIO'S KISS............. 807 
TiVM THIOEELOVED..-....0......00 807 
EP EELY TION... 3 cc. co cee 807 
NEWBORN DEATH, I-Il....... 807 
eemeerePOPE. 2.2... ec ee ee 808 

THe eEOUD CONFINES................ 808 
PUPA WS)... cee tc eee 809 
CT scl, Cee we ve oe 809 
Rt was sles seca ess 809 
a 810 
SERTNNEIO case ec ee . OLL 
FIVE ENGLISH POETS 
epee CHATTERTON.«..... 0.0.00 811 
i a 811 
SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE....... 812 
a 812 
PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY .......... 812 
ermemrts SOTRAGEDY... 0... cece ees 812 
MORRIS 
ME MICETCTENICES. 2. ck ween eens 823 
eG 824 
MUIMMePROGRTHER... on. . 000s ees ce ses 825 
THE CHAPELLIN LYONESS............ 826 
OE 827 
ee 827 
OE 827 
THE DEFENCE OF GUENEVERE........ 828 
THE GILLIFLOWER OF GOLD.......... 852 
MRM AUDA TH. 0... 30's. ec a eu oss 833 
CE rrr 834 
THE SAILING OF THE SWORD......... 83 
SU TMEIPOC GET... vcs tc asec nuvees 835 


THE HAYSTACK IN THE FLOODS... .... 836 
TWO RED ROSES ACROSS THE MOON... 83 


Beemer ey ARR-SONG.... 5. cw cae ccene 838 
MOUINMAT AON... o.oo oe ce cts skeen ee 83 
RE ew. cased pea ein ess 83 
FROM THE LIFE AND DEATH OF JASON 
Se oe oe 835 
THE NYMPH’S SONG TO HYLAS...... 839 
ORPHEUS’ SONG OF TRIUMPH....... 840 
SONGS OF ORPHEUS AND THE SIRENS. 840 
INVOCATION TO CHAUCER.......... 842 
FROM THE EARTHLY PARADISE 
TEE e.g woe» via a dias 6 a0 tee 842 
CAMP ORAQE,. . oc ccc ese a sss 843 
SONG FROM THE STORY OF CUPID 
BMDPEL CHE, 6.0). . cae eine 894. 


xvil 


PAGE 
BAIS ES, Foe re eee oe tts stove ere ae 855 
SONG FROM OGIER THE DANE....... 855 
SONG FROM THE STORY OF ACON- 


TIUS AND CYDIPPE.: i: 740! 855 
CO TONV OL Se pears et eke aoe sae ee 856 
PEti SEASON teeter tes ee cee as 857 
PRRs AND Licineseeeces cc eke cee 6 857 
FROM LOVE IS ENOUGH 
THECDAY OF elec rite. we ce 858 
PINAL? CHORUS: tee Ae ers wets ced 859 
THE VOICE OF TOIL... eee apes ges 859 
PMA RTE S22 te font eee Pe ee 860 
Pri Pwvy 1s COMING. (AS ee 860 
THRDAVS THAT WERE.) 27.320 Sa: 861 
Trin DAY OM DAVS: - 5 tz) a 861 
THe BURGHERD BATTL&:. 2: fk 862 
AGNES AND. THE HILL-MAN..... ..... 862 
Tee AND FIRST SEEM f2 oe bic Saas 86: 
TO THE MUSE OF THE NORTH......... 864 
DRAWING NEAR THE LIGHT..... ..... 864 
SWINBURNE 
USO PIV CTET GHOES isnaT nde w bs wate nn 9 865 
A SONG IN TIME OF ORDER........... 866 
CHORUSES FROM ATALANTA IN CALY- 
DON 
THE YOUTH OF THE YEAR..... Si aos OG 
ree LIE OF MA N@ Ss,» cir oe op So 867 
Levi AND LOVE'S MATES... <<. cus 868 
PEA Ure eter. etd rr ak bce hada e 868 
Fane eG oe te cette, PAS Sees ek 869 
THE DEATH OF MELEAGER......... 869 


PINAL ONORUS £ pina Dake bos «a's S71 
SONGS FROM CHASTELARD 


MARY BEATON’S BONG............-. S71 

BOVE St NF sos ein Pores Se 372 

THE QUEEN'S SONG..... ..-ceeccee 872 
EVM TO PROGHEEPINIG is Cue oss 3 oe 72 
SMELL Mires te nae aes he ey LO PS ad a ate 874 
AC BALLAD- OF BURDENS. one's so ess ee 875 
Bt ee ae eee ens wh wicn 87 
IN MEMORY OF WALTER SAVAGE LAN- 

PS Ree kc wick 76 
THE GARDEN OF PROSERPINE......... 877 
TRIVIA TOA eae. os ocean 878 
BAPE RICHIMe: «hoes duc «dee 87 
DEDICATION (POEMS AND BALLADS, 

PIBSE SERIES ). «+ sia serene Bae 79 
ATE TA lai oc oe «x Oe Se ea ons 881 
MERTR Al. . os « <5 SR es 882 
THEO PIDGRIMS, . .:.\ « sagen ake. o-<fate bs 884. 
TO WALT WHITMAN IN AMERICA...... 886 
FROM MATER TRIUMPHALIS.......... 887 
Wh CORDIUM ... mr eterna tek a's eea'cherene 888 
NOM. DOLET) sete ee wr aero ce ws 889 
THE: OBLATIONG gw Ptr silahkan oe ce 889 
As WORSAKEN: GARDEING. oa ciledco ou cales 889 


TABLE OF CONTENTS 








XVill 
PAGE 
A UBALLAD OF DREAMLAND) .0..eueee 890 
A BALLAD OF FRANCOIS VILLON...... 891 
TO: LOUIS, KOSSUTH: due year dee eee sol 
GHILD'S SONG. i... «he eee eee 892 
PRTC DS Oo Sree ede ae ecto bee 892 
ONiTHE CLIPFSH. 8G. ... coe) ee eee 892 
ON THE DEATHS OF THOMAS CARLYLE 
AND GEORGE ELIOT. ion Gee 899 
SONG FROM MARY STUART............ 899 
HOPE. AND FEARS. oe 2 ces ok 899 
WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE. ....eew se ‘899 
GHILDRENsGe sk oc ee eee 900 
A OHILD’S LAUGHTER.) {eerie we ont 900 
THE SALT OPJTHE PAR SHe tee aise n 900 
CHILD AND PORT. eee 900 
ASCHILD ’S: FUTURE: pew hud andere 901 
PRUDE REALISTH oa acts cee eee 901 
IN GUERNSEY Sst oe Ge eras eee 901 


PAGE 
A SINGING LESSON....:... 45 ane ' 902 
THE ROUNDEL.......... <n 902 
A SOLITUDE. .... .... .-. oct gene 902 
ON A COUNTRY ROAD...... se 903 
THE SEABOARD... i... .. «0:0 a Oe 
THE CLIFFSIDE PATH........ see 904 
IN: THE WATER. 0 - eee oo se 905 
THE SUNBOWS.. ......6 ose * 7 905 
ON THE VERGE...... - suo. ee 906 
ON THE MONUMENT ERECTED TO MAZ- 
ZINI AT GENOA,..¢. eee ee 907 
THE INTERPRETERS. . . =n 907 
A WORD WITH THE WIND. .3.. .44 908 
IN TIME OF MOURNING. (eee 909 
SEQUENCE OF SONNETS ON THE DEATH 
OF ROBERT BROWNING........... 909 
INDEXES,...6. 2 sas s's a ate Se Lee 
’ 


WORDSWORTH 
LIST OF REFERENCES 
EpItrions 


Tue standard edition of Wordsworth is that edited by ** W. Knight, 
1882-1886, Poetical Works, 8 volumes; Prose Works, 2 volumes. 

There is a good edition of the * Poetical Works, complete in 1 volume, 
with Wordsworth’s Prefaces, published by The Macmillan Co. at $1.75. 


BrioGRAPHY 


* Kniaut (W.), William Wordsworth, 8 volumes, 1889 (the standard 
biography.) Worpswortu (Chr.), Memoirs of William Wordsworth, 2 
volumes, 1851. Hoop (KE. P.), William Wordsworth; A Biography, 1856. 
SyminGcton (A. J.), William Wordsworth; A Biographical Sketch, with 
Selections from his Writings in Poetry and Prose, 2 volumes, 1881. 
* Myers (F. W. H.), William Wordsworth, English Men of Letters’ Se- 
ries, 1881 (the best brief biography, with adequate criticism). Surn- 
ERLAND (J. M.), William Wordsworth ; the Story of his Life, with criti- 
eal remarks on his Writings, 1887. ENcycLtopapra Brirannica, Words- 
worth, by Prof. W. Minto, Vol. XXIV, pp. 668-676, 1888. WorpswortrH 
(Elizabeth), William Wordsworth, 1891. Gornery (M.), Wordsworth, 
sein Leben, seine Werke, Halle, 1898. Rarteran (W. A.), Wordsworth, 
1903. See also Ler (Edmund), Dorothy Wordsworth. 


PERSONAL REMINISCENCES AND CONTEMPORARY CRITICISM 


* WorpswortnH, The Prelude, the Preface to the Lyrical Ballads, ete. 
* Worpswortu (Dorothy), Journal, and Recollections of a Tour made in 
Scotland. *Cotrertmer (S. T.), Biographia Literaria; Chap. 4, 5, 
14, 17, 19, 20, and especially 22. CoLertpGr (8S. T.), Poems ; To 
William Wordsworth. Corrie (J.), Early Recollections of 8. T. Coler- 
idge. Soutnery (R.), Life and Correspondence: Chap. 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 
15,19, 26, 32, 36. Tatrourp (T. N.), Memorials of Lamb: especially 
Chap.6and 7. Jerrrey (Lord Francis), Edinburgh Review, No. 21, 
art. 14, Wordsworth’s Poems; * No. 47, art. 1, Wordsworth’s Excursion, 
a Poem; No. 50, art. 4, Wordsworth’s White Doe of Rylstone: also in 
his Critical Essays. Hazuirr, (William), * My First Acquaintance with 
Poets; The Spirit of the Age. Hunt (Leigh), The Seer, I., 204: Words- 

I 


2 WORDSWORTH 





worth and Milton. Der Quincry (Thomas), Works, edited by David 
Masson; Vols. II and III, Recollections of Wordsworth, etc.; Vol. V, On 
Wordsworth’s Poetry ; and especially Vol. XI, Wordsworth (Essay of 
1845): Lanpor (W.5.), Imaginary Conversations ; Southey and Porson. 
* Roprnson (H. C.), Diary, passim (see Index). Procror (B. W.), Auto- 
biographical Fragment. Mirrorp (M. R.), Recollections of a Literary 
Life. CariyLE, Reminiscences. Durry (C. Gavan), Conversations with 
Carlyle. Minn (J.8.), Autobiography, Chapter V. CoLrrick (Sara), Me- 
moirs and Letters. Wuiison (John), Essays. Taytor (H), Critical 
Kssays on Poetry. 


LATER CRITICISM 


Knicut (W.), Wordsworthiana; Selection from Papers read by The 
Wordsworth Society. Kniegur (W.), Studies in Philosophy: Nature as 
Interpreted by Wordsworth. Taine (H.), History of English Literature, 
Vol.IV. ** Arnoxp (M.), Essays in Criticism, Second Series. * STEPHEN 
(Leslie), Hours in a Library, Vol. WH. * Moriey (John), Studies in Lit- 
erature. * Hurron (R. H.), Literary Essays. *Carrp (Edward), Litera- 
ture and Philosophy, Vol. I. * Parer (Walter), Appreciations. * Swin- 
BURNE (A. C.), Miscellanies : Wordsworth and Byron. Lowr1u (J. &.), 
Prose Works, Vols. 1V and VI. Woopzsrrry (G. E.), Studies in Letters: 
Sir George Beaumont, Coleridge and Wordsworth. Woopsrrry (G. E.), 
Makers of Literature. Manre (H. W.), Backgrounds of Literature: 
Wordsworth and the Lake Country. * Lecouis (Emile), La Jeunesse de 
William Wordsworth, 1770-98: Etude sur le “Prelude.” The same, 
translated by J. W. Matthews, with prefatory note by Leslie Stephen. 
STEPHEN (Leslie), Studies of a Biographer, Vol. I: Wordsworth’s Youth 
(on Legouis’ book). Txrxre (Joseph), Etudes de Littérature européene : 
Wordsworth et la poésie lakiste en France. Dowpnrn (Edward), Studies 
in Literature: The French Revolution and Literature; The Transcen- 
dental Movement and Literature. Dowprn (Edward), The French Rev- 
olution and English Literature; Essay V. Hancock (A. E.), The French 
Revolution and the English Poets. DarmerstTeTER (J.), English Studies: 
Wordsworth and the French Revolution. Symons (A.), Fortnightly Re- 
view, 1902. CHurcu (R. W.), Dante and Other Essays... Macponatp (G.), 
Imagination and Other Essays: Wordsworth’s Poetry. Rossrerri(W. M.), 
Lives of Famous Poets. ScuHEerEeR (Edmond), Etudes, Vol. VII; the same 
essay, translated, in his Essays on English Literature. Snarrp (J. C.), 
Aspects of Poetry: “The Three Yarrows;” “ White Doe of Rylstone.” 
Suarrp (J. C.), Studies in Poetry and Philosophy: Wordsworth, the Man 
and the Poet. Criouau (A. H.), Prose Remains. Dr VERE (Aubrey), 
Essays, Chiefly on Poetry: The Genius and Passion of Wordsworth ; 
The Wisdom and Truth of Wordsworth’s Poetry; Recollections of 
Wordsworth. Hare (J. C. & A. W.), Guesses at Truth, Vol. II. Mas- 
son (D.), Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats, and Other Essays. STaNLEy 


LIST OF REFERENCES 3 


(H. M.), Essays on Literary Art: Some Remarks on Wordsworth. Daw- 
son (W. J.), Makers of Modern English. ** Bagrnor (Walter), Literary 
Studies, Vol. I: Wordsworth, Tennyson and Browning. 

ALGER (W. R.), Solitudes. Bett (C. D.), Some of our English Poets. 
Brimtey (G.), Essays. Brooker (Stopford <A.), Theology in the English 
Poets. Brooks (S. W.), English Poetry and Poets. Burrovcus (John), 
Fresh Fields: Country of Wordsworth. Caine (T. H.), Cobwebs of 
Criticism. CuENry (J. V.), That Dome in Air. Cuorury (IH. F.), Authors 
of England. Courrnorr (V. J.), Liberal Movement in English Literature : 
Wordsworth’s Theory of Poetry. Drvry (J.), Comparative Estimate of 
Modern English Poets. Dixon (W.4M.), English Poetry, Blake to Brown- 
ing. Freips (J. T.), Yesterdays with Authors. Frorurycuam (O. B.), 
Transcendentalism in New England. Gives (I1.), Illustrations of Genius. 
GRAVES (R. P.), Afternoon Lectures: Wordsworth and the Lake Country. 
Hamixtton (Walter), Poets Laureate. Hawers (H. R.), Poets in the Pul- 
pit. Howrrr (W.), Homes of the British Poets, Vol. Il. Hupson (H.N.), 
Studies in Wordsworth. INeGiesy (C. M.), Essays. Jounson (C. F), 
Three Americans and Three Englishmen. Reep (I.), Lectures on British 
Poets, Vol. Il. McCormick (W.S.), Three Lectures on English Litera- 
ture. Macponatp (G.), England’s Antiphon. Minro (W.), Literature of 
the Georgian Era. Mircneuy (D. G.), English Lands, Letters and Kings, 
Vol. III. Morr (D. M.), Lectures on Poetical Literature. Rawnsiery 
(H. D.), Literary Associations of the English Lakes, Vol. V. Rosperrson 
(F. W.), Lectures and Addresses. .Rusuron (W.), Afternoon Lectures, 
Vol. I. Saunpers (F.), Famous Books. ScuppEr (V. D.), Life of the 
Spirit in Modern English Poetry: Wordsworth and the new Democracy. 
Swanwick (A.), Poets the Interpreters of their Age. TuckERMAN (H. T.), 
Thoughts on the Poets. Winter (William), Gray Days and Gold: 
Lakes and Fells of Wordsworth. Wutppie (E. P.), Essays and Reviews. 
Wuippte (HE. P.), Literature and Life. 


Mermoriat VERSES, ETC. 


** Watson (William), Wordsworth’s Grave. * Arnotp (M.), Memorial 
Verses, April 1850. Suretiey, Poems: Sonnet to Wordsworth (arraign- 
ment of Wordsworth for apostasy to the cause of liberty). PaLGRave 
(F. T.), William Wordsworth (in Stedman’s Victorian Anthology, p. 240). 
* Wuirtier, Poems: Wordsworth. Lowe, Poetical Words, Vol. I. 
SaintE-Breuve, Poésies: Trois sonnets imités de Wordsworth. 


* An asterisk marks the most important books and essays. 


WORDSWORTH 


LINES 


Left upon a Seat in a Yew-tree, which stands 
near the lake of Esthwaite, on a desolate part 
of the shore, commanding a beautiful prospect. 


Composed in part at school at Hawkshead. 
The tree has disappeared, and the slip of Com- 
mon on which it stood, that ran parallel to the 
lake and lay open to it, has long been enclosed ; 
so that the road has lost much of its attraction. 


This spot was my favorite walk in the evenings 


during the latter part of my school-time. 
(Wordsworth’s note.) 


Nay, Traveller ! rest. 
tree stands 

Far from all human dwelling: what if 
here 

No sparkling rivulet spread the verdant 
herb ? 

What if the bee love not these barren 
boughs ? 

Yet, if the wind breathe soft, the curling 
waves, 

That break against the shore, shall lull 
thy mind 

By one soft: impulse saved from vacancy. 

— Who he was 

That piled these stones and with the 
mossy sod 

First covered, and here taught this aged 
Tree 

With its dark arms to form a circling 
bower, 

I well remember.—He was one who 
owned 

No common soul. 
nursed, 

And led by nature into a wild scene 

Of lofty hopes, he to the world went 
forth 

A favored Being, knowing no desire 

Which genius did not hallow; ’gainst 
the taint 

Of dissolute tongues, and jealousy, and 


This lonely Yew- 





In youth by science 


hate, 
And scorn,—against all enemies pre- 
pared, 


All but neglect. 
thought, 

Owed him no service; wherefore he at 
once 

With indignation turned himself away, 

And with the food of pride sustained his 
soul 

In solitude.—Stranger! these gloomy 
boughs 

Had charms for him; and here he loved 
to sit, 

His only visitants a straggling sheep, 

The stone-chat, or the glancing sand- 
piper : 

And on these barren rocks, with fern 
and heath, 

And juniper and thistle, sprinkled o’er, 

Fixing his downcast eye, he many an 
hour 

A morbid pleasure nourished, tracing 
here 

Anemblem of his own unfruitful life: 

And, lifting up his head, he then would 


The world, for so it 


gaze 

On the more distant scene,—how lovely 
tis 

Thou seest,—and he would gaze till it 
became 

Far lovelier, and his heart could not sus- 
tain 


The beauty, still more beauteous ! 
that time, 

When nature had subdued him to her- 
self, 

Would he forget those Beings to whose 
minds, 

Warm from the labors of benevolence, 

The world, and human life, appeared a 
scene 

Of kindred loveliness: then he would 
sigh, 

Inly disturbed, to think that others felt 

What he must never feel: and-so, lost 
Man ! 

On visionary views would fancy feed, 

Till his eye streamed with tears. In this 
deep vale 


Nor, 


WORDSWORTH 5 


He died,-—this seat his only monument. 
If Thou be one whose heart the holy 

forms 

Of young imagination have kept pure, 

Stranger! henceforth be warned; and 
know that pride, 

Howe’er disguised in its own majesty, 

Is littleness; that he, who feels con- 
tempt 

For any living thing, hath faculties 

Which he has never used ; that thought 
with him 

Is in its infancy. The man whose eye 

Is ever on himself doth look on one, 

The least of Nature’s works, one who 
might move 

The wise man to that scorn which wis- 
dom holds 

Unlawful, ever. O be wiser, Thou! 

Instructed that true knowledge leads to 
love; 

True dignity abides with him alone 


Who, in the silent hour of inward 
thought, 

Can still suspect, and still revere him- 
self, 


In lowliness of heart. 1795. 1798.1 


THE REVERIE OF POOR SUSAN 


This arose out of my observation of the affect- 
ing music of these birds hanging in this way in 
the London streets during the freshness and 
stillness of the Spring morning.—( Wordsworth. ) 


AT the corner of Wood Street, when day- 
light appears, 

Hangs a Thrush that sings loud, it has 
sung for three years ; 

Poor Susan has passed by the spot, and 
has heard 

In the silence of morning the song of 
the Bird. 


’Tis a note of enchantment; what ails 
her? She sees 

A mountain ascending, a vision of trees ; 

Bright volumes of vapor through Loth- 
bury glide, 

And ariver flows on through the vale 
of Cheapside. 


Green pastures she views in the midst 
of the dale, 


1JItalic figures indicate the year of writing ; 
upright figures the year of publication. The 
dates for Wordsworth are taken from the biblio- 
graphical tables in Vol. VIII of Knight’s edition 
of the Poems. 


Down which she so often has tripped 
with her pail ; 

And a single small cottage, a nest like a 
dove’s, 

The one only dwelling on earth that she 
loves. 


She looks, and her heart is in heaven: 
but they fade, 

The mist and the river, the hill and the 
shade: — 

The stream will not flow, and the hill 
will not rise, 

And the colors have all passed away 
from her eyes! L797. 1800. 


A NIGHT-PIECE 


Composed on the road between Nether Stowey 
and Alfoxden, extempore. I distinctly recollect 
the very moment when]! was struck, as described 
—‘ He looks up—the clouds are split,” ete. 
(Wordsworth) 

‘Wordsworth particularly reeommended_ to 
me among his Poems of Imagination, Yew 
Trees,and a description of Night. These, he 
says, are amongst the best for the imaginative 
power displayed in them.” (Diary of Henry 
Crabb Robinson, May 9, 1815.) 





THE sky is overcast 

With a continuous cloud of texture close, 

Heavy and wan, all whitened by the 
Moon, 

Which through ‘that veil is indistinctly 
seen, 

A dull, contracted circle, yielding light 

So feebly spread, that not a shadow falls, 

Chequering the ground—from rock, 
plant, tree, or tower. 

At length a pleasant instantaneous gleam 

Startles the pensive traveller while he 

treads 

His lonesome path, with unobserving 
eye 

Bent earthward ; 
clouds are split 

Asunder,—and above his head he sees 

The clear Moon, and the glory of the 


he looks up—the 


heavens. 

There, in a black-blue vault she sails 
along, 

Followed by multitudes of stars, that, 
small 

And sharp, and bright, along the dark 
abyss 


Drive as she drives: 
wheel away, 
Yet vanish not !—the wind isin the tree, 
But they are silent ;—still they roll along 
Immeasurably distant ; and the vault, 


how fast they 


4 


6 ENGLISH POETS 





Built round by those white clouds, enor- 
mous clouds, 

Still deepens its unfathomable depth. 

At length the Vision closes; and the 
mind, 

Not undisturbed by the delight it feels, 

Which slowly settles into peaceful calm, 

Is left to muse upon the solemn scene. 

1798. 1815. 


WE ARE SEVEN 


—A SIMPLE Child, 

That lightly draws its breath, 
And feels its life in every limb, 
What should it know of death ? 


I met a little cottage Girl: 

She was eight years old, she said ; 
Her hair was thick with many a curl 
That clustered round her head. 


She had a rustic, woodland air, 
And she was wildly clad : 

Her eyes were fair, and very fair ; 
—Her beauty made me glad. 


‘* Sisters and brothers, little Maid, 

How many may you be ?” 

‘**How many? Seven in all,” she said 
And wondering looked at me. 


‘* And where are they ? I pray you tell.” 
She answered, ‘‘Seven are we ; 

And two of us at Conway dwell, 

And two are gone to sea. 


‘* Two of us in the church-yard lie, 

My sister and my brother ; 

And in the church-yard cottage, I 
Dwell near them with my mother.” 


** You say that two at Conway dwell, 
And two are gone to sea, 

Yet ye are seven !—I pray you tell, 
Sweet Maid, how this may be.” 


Then did the little Maid reply, 

‘* Seven boys and girls are we ; 
Two of us in the church-yard lie, 
Beneath the church-yard tree.” 


‘* You run about, my little Maid, 
Your limbs they are alive ; 

If two are in the church-yard laid, 
Then ye are only five.” 


‘‘Their graves are green, they may be 
seen,” 


The little Maid replied, 





‘* Twelve steps or more from my mother’s 
door, 
And they are side by side. 


‘* My stockings there I often knit, 
My kerchief there I hem ; 

And there upon the ground I sit, 
And sing a song to them, 


‘* And often after sunset, Sir, 
When it is ight and fair, 

I take my little porringer, 
And eat my supper there. 


**The first that died was sister Jane; 
In bed she moaning lay, 

Till God released her of her pain ; 
And then she went away. 


‘*So in the church-yard she was laid ; 
And, when the grass was dry, 
Together round her grave we played, 
My brother John and I. 


_‘* And when the ground was white with 


snow, 
And I could run and slide, 
My brother John was forced to go, 
And he lies by her side.” 


‘‘How many are you, then,” said I, 
‘Tf they two are in heaven ? ” 
Quick was the little Maid’s reply, 
‘*O Master! we are seven.” 


‘* But they are dead ; those two are 
dead ! 
Their spirits are in heaven !” 
‘Twas throwing words away; for still 
The little Maid would have her will, 
And said, ‘‘ Nay, we are seven !” 
L798... 1793S. 


SIMON LEE 
THE OLD HUNTSMAN ; 


WITH AN INCIDENT IN WHICH HE WAS 
CONCERNED. 


This old man had been huntsman to the squires 
of Alfoxden. .. . The fact was as mentioned in 
the poem ; andI have, after an interval of forty- 
five years, the image of the old man as fresh 
before my eyes as if Thad seen him yesterday. 
The expression when the hounds were out, ‘‘I 
dearly love their voice,’? was word for word 
from his own lips. (Wordsworth.) 


In the sweet shire of Cardigan, 
Not far from pleasant Ivor-hall, 


WORDSWORTH ; 


An old Man dwells, a little man,— 

*Tis said he once was tall. 

Full five and thirty years he lived 

A running huntsman merry ; 

' And still the centre of his cheek 
Is red as a ripe cherry. 


No man like him the horn could sound, 
And hill and valley rang with glee 
When Echo bandied, round and round, 
The halloo of Simon Lee. 

In those proud days. he little cared 

For husbandry or tillage ; 

To blither tasks did Simon rouse 

The sleepers of the village. 


He all the country could outrun, 

Could leave both man and horse behind : 
And often, ere the chase was done, 

He reeled and was stone-blind. 

And still there’s something in the world 
At which his heart rejoices ; 

For when the chiming hounds are out, 
He dearly loves their voices! ~ 


But, oh the heavy change !—bereft 

Of health, strength, friends, and kindred, 
see ! 

Old Simon to the world is left 

In liveried poverty. 

His Master’s dead,—and no one now 

Dwells in the Hall of Ivor ; 

Men, dogs, and horses, all are dead ; 

He is the sole survivor. 


And he is lean and he is sick ; 

His body, dwindled and awry, 
Rests upon ankles swoln and thick ; 
His legs are thin and dry. 

One prop he has, and only one, 

His wife, an aged woman, 

Lives with him, near the waterfall, 
Upon the village Common. 


Beside their moss-grown hut of clay, 
Not twenty paces from the door, 

A scrap of land they have, but they 
Are poorest of the poor. 

This scrap of land he from the heath 
Enclosed when he was stronger ; 

But what to them avails the land 
Which he can till no longer? 


Oft, working by her Husband’s side, 
Ruth does what Simon cannot do ; 

For she, with scanty cause for pride, 

Is stouter of the two. 

And, though you with your utmost skill 
From labor could not wean them, 


’Tis little, very little—all 
That they can do between them. 


Few months of life has he in store 

As he-to you will tell, 

For still, the more he works, the more 
Do his weak ankles swell. 

My gentle Reader, I perceive 

How patiently you've waited, 

And now I fear that you expect 

Some tale will be related. 


O Reader! had you in your mind 

Such stores as silent thought can bring, 
O gentle Reader! you would find 

A tale in every thing. 

What more I have to say is short, 

And you must kindly take it : 

It is no tale ; but, should you think, 
Perhaps a tale you'll make it. 


One summer-day I chanced to see 
This old Man doing all he could 
To unearth the root of an old tree, 
A stump of rotten wood. 

The mattock tottered in his hand ; 


So vain was his endeavor, 


That at the root of the old tree 
He might have worked for ever. 


‘*You’re overtasked, good Simon Lee, 
Give me your tool,” to him I said ; 
And at the word right gladly he 
Received my proffered aid. 

I struck, and with a single blow 

The tangled root I severed, 

At which the poor old Man so long 
And vainly had endeavored. 


The tears into his eyes were brought, 
And thanks and praises seemed to run 
So fast out of his heart, I thought 

They never would have done. 

—I’ve heard of hearts unkind, kind deeds 
With coldness still returning ; 

Alas! the gratitude of men 

Hath oftener left me mourning. 


1798. 1798. 


LINES WRITTEN IN EARLY 
SPRING 


I HEARD a thousand blended notes, 

While in a grove I sate reclined, 

In that sweet mood when _ pleasant 
thoughts 

Bring sad thoughts to the mind. 





8 BRISGLS Cem 


To her fair works did Nature link 

The human soul that through me ran ; 
And much it grieved my heart to think 
What man has made of man. 


Through primrose tufts, in that green 
bower, 

The periwinkle trailed its wreaths ; 

And ’tis my faith that every flower 

Enjoys the air it breathes. 


The birds around me hopped and played, 
Their thoughts I cannot measure :— 
But the least motion which they made 
It seemed a thrill of pleasure. 


The budding twigs spread out their fan, 
To catch the breezy air ; 

And I must think, do all I can, 

That there was pleasure there. 


If this belief from heaven be sent, 
If such be Nature’s holy plan, 
Have I not reason to lament 
What man has made of man? 


1798. 1798. 


TO MY SISTER 


It is the first mild day of March : 
Each minute sweeter than before 

The redbreast sings from the tall larch 
That stands beside our door. 


There is a blessing in the air, 

Which seems a sense of joy to yield 
To the bare trees, and mountains bare, 
And grass in the green field. 


My sister! (‘tis a wish of mine) 

Now that our morning meal is done, 
Make haste, your morning task resign ; 
Come forth and feel the sun. 


Edward will come with you ;—and, pray, 
Put on withspeed your woodland dress ; 
And bring no book: for this one day 
We’ll give to idleness. 


No joyless forms shall regulate 

Our living calendar : 

We from to-day, my Friend, will date 
The opening of the year. 


Love, now a universal birth, 

From heart to heart is stealing, 

From earth to man, from man to earth: 
—It is the hour of feeling. 


One moment now may give us more 
Than years of toiling reason : 

Our minds shall drink at every pore 
The spirit of the season. 


Some silent laws our hearts will make, 
Which they shall long obey : 

We for the year to come may take 
Our temper from to-day. 


And from the blessed power that rolls ~ 
About, below, above, 

We'll frame the measure of our souls : 
They shall be tuned to love. 


Then come, my Sister! come, I pray, _ 
With speed put on your woodland dress ; 
And bring no book: for this one day 
We'll give to idleness. 1798. 1798. 


A WHIRL-BLAST FROM BEHIND 
THE HILL 


A WHIRL-BLAST from behind the hill 
Rushed o’er the wood with startling 
sound ; 
Then—all at once the air was still, 
And showers of hailstones pattered 
round. 

Where leafless oaks towered high above, 
T sat within an undergrove 
Of tallest hollies, tall and green ; 
A fairer bower was never seen. 
From year to year the spacious floor 
With withered leaves is covered o’er, 
And all the year the bower is green. 
But see! where’er the hailstones drop 
The withered leaves all skip and hop ; 
There’s not a breeze—no breath of air— 
Yet here, and there, and every where 
Along the floor, beneath the shade 
By those embowering hollies made, 
The leaves in myriads jump and spring, 
As if with pipes and music rare 
Some Robin Good-fellow were there, 
And all those leaves, in festive glee, 
Were dancing to the minstrelsy. 

1798. 1800. 


EXPOSTULATION AND REPLY 


‘‘Wuy, William, on that old gray stone 
Thus for the length of half a day, 
Why, William, sit you thus alone, 

And dream your time away ¢ 





WORDSWORTH 9 


*¢ Where are your books ?—that light be- 
queathed 

To Beings else forlorn and blind! 

Up! up! and drink the spirit breathed 

From dead men to their kind. 


*“*You look round on your Mother Earth, 
As if she for no purpose bore you; 

As if you were her first-born bir th, 

And none had lived before you !” 


One morning thus, by Esthwaite lake, 
When life was sweet, I knew not why, 
To me my good friend Matthew spake, 
And thus I made reply : 


‘The eye—it cannot choose but see ; 
We cannot bid the ear be still ; 

Our bodies feel, where’er they be, 
Against or with our will. 


‘Nor less I deem that there are Powers 
Which of themselves our minds impress ; 
That we can feed this mind of ours 

In a wise passiveness. 


“Think you, ’mid all this mighty sum 
Of things for ever speaking, 

That nothing of itself will come, 

But we must still be seeking ? 


**__Then ask not wherefore, here, alone, 
Conversing as I may, 
I sit upon this old gray stone, 
And dream my time away.” 
L798. 1198. 


THE TABLES TURNED 


AN EVENING SCENE ON THE SAME 
SUBJECT 


Up !up! my Friend, and quit your books ; 

Or surely you'll grow double : 

Up! up! my Friend, and clear 
looks ; 

Why all this toil and trouble ? 


your 


The sun, above the mountain’s head. 

A freshening lustre mellow 

Through all the long green fields has 
spread, 

His first sweet evening yellow. 


Books! ’tis a dull and endless strife: 
Come, hear the woodland linnet, 
How sweet. his music! on my life, 
There’s more of wisdom in it, 


And hark ! how blithe the throstle sings ! 
He, too, is no mean preacher : 

Come forth into the light of things, 

Let Nature be your teacher. 


She has a world of ready wealth, 
Our minds and hearts to bless— 
Spontaneous wisdom breathed by health, 
Truth breathed by cheertulness. 


One impulse from a vernal wood 
May teach you more of man, 

Of moral evil and of good, 

Than all the sages can. 


Sweet is the lore which Nature brings ; 

Our meddling intellect 

Mis-shapes the beauteous 
things : 

We murder to dissect. 


forms of 


Enough of Science and of Art ; 

Close up those barren leaves ; 

Come forth, and bring with you a heart 
That watchesand receives. 1798. 1798. 


LINES 


COMPOSED A FEW MILES ABOVE TINTERN 
ABBEY, ON REVISITING THE BANKS OF THE 
WYE DURING A TOUR. JULY 13, 1798. 


No poem of mine was composed under circum- 
stances more pleasant for me to remember than 
this. I began it upon leaving Tintern, after 
crossing the Wye, and concluded it justas I was 
entering Bristol in the evening, after a ramble 
of four or five days, with my sister. Not a line 
of it was altered, and not any part of it written 
down till I reached Bristol. It was published 
almost immediately after in the little volume of 
which so much has been said in these Notes. 
(Wordsworth. The volume referred to is The 
Lyrical Ballads, as first published at Bristol by 
Cottle. ) 

FIVE years have past; five summers, 
with the length 

Of five long winters! and again I hear 

These waters, rolling from their moun- 

tain-springs 

a soft inland 

again 

Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs, 

That on a wild secluded scene impress 

Thoughts of more deep seclusion ; and 
connect 

The landscape with the quiet of the sky. 

The day is come when I again repose 


With murmur.1—Once 


1The river is not affected by the tides a few 
miles above Tintern. 


IO BRITISH POETS 





Here, under this dark sycamore, and 
view 

These plots of cottage-ground, these 
orchard-tufts, 

Which at this season, with their unripe 


fruits, 

Are clad in one green hue, and lose 
themselves 

"Mid groves and copses. Once again I 
see 


These hedge-rows, hardly hedge-rows, 
little lines 

Of sportive wood run wild: these pas- 
toral farms, 

Green to the very door; and wreaths of 
smoke 

Sent up, in silence, from among the 
trees ! 

With some uncertain notice, as might 
seem 

Of vagrant dwellers in the houseless 
woods, 

Or of some Hermit’s cave, where by his 
fire 

The Hermit sits alone. 

These beauteous forms, 

Through a long absence, have not been 
to me 

As is a landscape to a blind man’s eye: 

But oft, in lonely rooms, and ’mid the 
din 

Of towns and cities, [have owed to them 

In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, 

Felt in the blood, and felt along the 
heart ; 

And passing even into my purer mind, 

With tranquil restoration :—feelings too 

Of unremembered pleasure: such, per- 
haps, 

As have no slight or trivial influence 

On that best portion of a good man’s life, 

His little, nameless, unremembered acts 

Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I 
trust, 

To them IT may have owed another gift, 

Of aspect more sublime; that blessed 
mood, 

In which the burthen of the mystery, 

In which the heavy and the weary 
weight 

Of all this unintelligible world, 

Is lightened :—that serene and blessed 
mood, 

In which the affections gently lead us 
on,— 

Until, the breath of this corporeal frame 

And even the motion of our human 
blood 

Almost suspended, we are laid asleep 


In body, and become a living soul : 
While with an eye made quiet by the 
power 
Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, 

We see into the life of things. 
If this 


Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! how oft— 

In darkness and amid the many shapes 

Of Jy daylight ; when the fretful 
stir 

Unprofitable, and the fever of the world, 

Have hung upon the beatings of my 
heart— 

How oft, in spirit, have I turned to 
thee, 

O sylvan Wye! thou wanderer thro’ the 
woods, 

How often has my spirit turned to thee! 

And now, with gleams of half-extin- 

guished thought, 

With many recognitions dim and faint, 

And somewhat of a sad perplexity, 

The picture of the mind revives again: 

While here I stand, not only witht the 
sense 

Of present pleasure, but with pleasing 
thoughts 

That in this moment there is life and 
food 

For future years. 
hope, 

Though changed. no doubt, from what I 
was when first 

I came among these hills; when like a 


And so I dare to 


roe 

I bounded o’er the mountains, by the 
sides 

Of the deep rivers, and the lonely 
streams, 

Wherever nature led : more like a man 

Flying from something that he dreads, 
than one 

Who sought the thing he loved. For 
nature then 

(The coarser pleasures of my boyish 
days, 

And their glad animal movements all 
gone by) 
To me was all in all.—I cannot paint 
What then Iwas. The sounding cata- 
ract ’ 
Haunted me like a passion: the tall 
rock, 

The mountain, and the deepand gloomy 
wood, 

Their colors and their forms, were then 
to me 

An appetite ; a feeling and adove, 

That had no need of a remoter charm, 


WORDSWORTH | II 


By thought supplied, nor any interest 

Unborrowed from the eye.—That time 
is past, 

And all itsaching joys are now no more, 

And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this 

Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur; other 


gifts 

Have followed; for such loss, I would 
believe, 

Abundant recompense. For I have 
learned 


To look on nature, not as in the hour 

Of thoughtless youth ; but hearing often- 
times 

The still, sad music of humanity, 

Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample 

; power 

To chasten and subdue. And I have 

felt 


A presence that disturbs me with the — 


O 

Of Bvatod thoughts ; a sense sublime 

Of something far more deeply inter- 
fused, 

Whose dwelling is the light of setting 
suns, 

And the round ocean and the living air, 

And the blue sky, and in the mind of 
man ; 

A motion and a spirit, that impels 

All thinking things, all objects of all 
thought, 

And rolls through all things. 
am I still 

A lover of the meadows and the woods, 

And mountains; and of all that we be- 
hold 

From this green earth ; of all the mighty 
world 

Of eye, and ear,—both what they half 
create, 

And what perceive; well pleased to 
recognize 

In nature and the language of the sense, 

The anchor of my purest thoughts, the 
nurse, 

The guide, the guardian of my heart, 
and soul 

Of all my moral being. 


Therefore 


Nor perchance, 

If I were not thus taught, should I the 
more 

Suffer my genial spirits to decay : 

For thou art with me here upon the 
banks 

Of this fair river; thou my dearest 
Friend, 

My dear, dear Friend ; and in thy voice 
I catch 





The language of my former heart, and 


read 

My former pleasures in the shooting 
lights 

Of thy wild eyes. Oh! yet a little 
while 


May I behold in thee what I was once, 

My dear, dear Sister! and this prayer I 
make, 

Knowing that Nature never did betray 

The heart that loved her ; ’tis her privi- 


ege, 

Through all the years of this our life, to 
lead 

From joy to joy: for she can so inform 

The mind that is within us, so impress 

With quietness and beauty, and so feed 

With lofty thoughts, that neither evil 
tongues, 

Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish 
men, 

Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor 
all 

The dreary intercourse of daily life. 

Shall e’er prevail against us, or disturb 

Our cheerful faith, that all which we 
behold 

Is full of blessings. 
moon 

Shine on thee in thy solitary walk ; 

And let the misty mountain-winds’ be 
free 

To blow against thee : and, in after years, 

When these wild ecstasies shall be 
matured 

Into a sober pleasure ; when thy mind 

Shall be a mansion for all lovely forms, 

Thy memory be as a dwelling-place 

For’ all sweet sounds and harmonies ; 
ol! then, 

If solitude, or fear, or pain, or grief, 

Should be thy portion, with what heal- 
ing thoughts 

Of tender joy wilt thou remember me, 

And these my exhortations! Nor, per- 
chance— 

If I should be where I no more can hear 

Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild eyes 
these gleams 

Of past existence—wilt thou then forget 

That on the banks of this delightful 
stream 

We stood together ; and that I, so long 

A worshipper of Nature, hither came 

Unwearied in that service : rather say 

With warmer love—oh ! with far deeper 
zeal 

Of holier love. 
get, 


Therefore let the 


Nor wilt thou then for- 


12 BEUTUS Ee BO EES 





That after many wanderings, many years 

Of absence, these steep woods and lofty 
cliffs, 

And this green pastoral landscape, were 
to me 

More dear, both for themselves and for 
thy sake! J/de wie (Oo, 


THE SIMPLON PASS 





Brook and road 
Were fellow-travellers in this gloomy 


aEPE) 

And with them did we journey several 
hours 

At a_ slow step. 
height 

Of woods decaying, never to be decayed, 

The stationary blasts of waterfalls, 

And in the narrow rent, at every turn, 

Winds thwarting winds bewildered and 
forlorn, 

The torrents shooting from the clear 
blue sky, 

The rocks that muttered close upon our 


The immeasurable 


ears, 
Black drizzling crags that spake by the 
wayside 


As if a voice were in them, the sick sight 

And giddy prospect of the raving stream, 

The unfettered clouds and region of the 
heavens, 

Tumult and peace, the darkness and the 
hght— 

Were all like workings of one mind, the 
features 

Of the same face, blossoms upon one 
tree, 

Characters of the great Apocalypse, 

The types and symbols of Eternity, 

Of first, and last, and midst, and with- 
out end. 1799, 1845. 


INFLUENCE OF NATURAL 
OBJECTS 


IN CALLING FORTH AND STRENGTHENING 
THE IMAGINATION IN BOYHOOD AND 
EARLY YOUTH 


WIspoM and Spirit of the universe! 

Thou Soul, that art the Eternity of 
thought ! 

And giv’st to formsand images a breath 

And everlasting motion ! not in vain, 

By day or star-light, thus from my first 
dawn 


Of childhood didst thou intertwine for — 
me 

The ae that build up our human 
soul ; 

Not with the mean and vulgar works of 
Man, 

But with high objects, with enduring 
things, 

With life and nature; purifying thus 

The elements of feeling and of thought, 

And sanctifying by such discipline 

Both pain and fear,—until we recognize 

A. grandeur in the beatings of the heart. 

Nor was this fellowship vouchsafed to 


me 
With stinted kindness. In November 
days 


When vapors rolling down the valleys 
made : 

A. lonely scene more lonesome ; among 
woods 

At noon; and ’mid the calm of summer 
nights, 

ere the margin of the trembling 
ake, 

Beneath the gloomy hills, homeward I 
went 


In solitude, such intercourse was mine: 

Mine was it in the fields both day and 
night, 

And by the waters, all the summer long. 

And in the frosty season, when the sun 

Was set, and, visible for many a mile, 

The cottage-windows through the twi- 
light blazed, 

I heeded not the summons: happy time 

It was indeed for all of us; for me 

It was a time of rapture! Clear and loud 

The village-clock tolled six—I wheeled 
about, 

Proud and exulting like an untired horse 

That cares not for his home.—AI shod 
with steel 

We hissed along the polished ice, in 
games 

Confederate, imitative of the chase 

And woodland pleasures,—the resound- 
ing horn, 

The pack loud-chiming, and the hunted 
hare. 

So through the darkness and the cold 
we flew, 

And not a voice was idle: with the din 

Smitten, the precipices rang aloud ; 

The leafless trees and every icy crag 

Tinkled like iron; while far-distant hills 

Into the tumult sent an alien sound 

Of melancholy, not unnoticed while the 
stars, 





WORDSWORTH 13 





Eastward, were sparkling clear, and in 
the west 

The orange sky of evening died away. 

Not seldom from the uproar I retired 

Into a silent bay, or sportively 

Glanced sideway, leaving the tumult- 
uous throng, 

To cut across the reflex of a star ; 

Image, that, flying still before me, 
gleamed 

Upon the glassy plain: and oftentimes, 

When we had given our bodies to the 
wind, 

And all the shadowy banks on either 
side 

Came sweeping through the darkness, 
spinning still 

The rapid line of motion, then at once 

Have I, reclining back upon my heels, 

Stopped short ; yetstill the solitary cliffs 

Wheeled by me—even as if the earth 
had rolled 

With visible motion her diurnal round! 

Behind me did they stretch in solemn 


train, 

Feebler and feebler, and I stood and 
watched 

Till all was tranquil as a summer sea. 


1799. 1809. 


THERE WAS A BOY 


Written inGermany. This is an extract from 
the poem on my own poetical education. ( Words- 
worth. The poem referred to is The Prelude.) 


THERE wasa Boy ; ye knew him well, ye 
cliffs 

Andislands of Winander !—many atime, 

At evening, when the earliest stars began 

To move along the edges of the hills, 

Rising or setting, would he stand alone, 

Beneath the trees, or by the glimmering 
lake ; 

And there, with fingers interwoven, both 
hands 

_ Pressed closely palm to palm and to his 
mouth 

Uplifted, he, as through an instrument, 

Blew mimic hootings to the silent owls, 

That they might answer him.—And they 
would shout 

Across the watery vale, and shout again, 

Responsive to his call,—with quivering 

eals, 

And long halloos, and 
echoes loud 
Redoubled and redoubled ; 

wild 


screams, and 


concourse 


Of jocund din! And, when there came 
a pause 

Of silence such as baffled his best skill, 

Then, sometimes, in that silence, while 
he hung 

Listening, a gentle shock of mild surprise 

Has carried far into his heart the voice 

Of mountain-torrents ; or the visible 
scene 

Would enter unawares into his mind 

With all its solemn imagery, its rocks, 

Its woods, and that uncertain heaven 
received 

Into the bosom of the steady lake. 

This boy was taken from his mates, 

and died 

In childhood, ere he was full twelve years 
old. 

Pre-eminent in beauty is the vale 

Where he was born and bred : the church- 
yard hangs 

Upona slope above the village-school ; 

And through that church-yard when my 
way has led 

On summer-evenings, I believe, that 
there 

A long half-hour together I have stood 

Mute—looking at the grave in which he 
lies ! 1799, 1800. 


NUTTING 


Written in Germany ; intended as part of a 
poem on my own life, but struck out as not 
being wanted there. .... (Wordsworth). 








IT seems a day 

(I speak of one from many singled out) 

One of those heavenly days that cannot 
die ; 

When, in the eagerness of boyish hope, 


I left our cottage-threshold, sallying 
forth 

With a huge wallet o’er my shoulders 
slung, 

A nutting-crook in hand; and turned 
my steps 

Tow’rd some far-distant wood, a Figure 
quaint, 

Tricked out in proud disguise of cast-off 
weeds ° 

Which for that service had been hus- 
banded, 


By exhortation of my frugal Dame— 

Motley accoutrement, of power to smile 

At thorns, and brakes, and brambles—— 
and, in truth, 

More ragged than need O’er 
pathless rocks, 


was! 


14 3 BRITISH POETS 





Through beds of matted fern, and tan- 
gled thickets, 

Forcing my way, [came to one dear nook 

Unvisited, where not a broken bough 

Drooped with its withered leaves, un- 
gracious sign 

Of devastation ; but the hazels rose 

Tall and erect, with tempting clusters 
hung, 

A virgin scene !—A little while I stood, 

Breathing with such suppression of the 
heart 

As joy delights in; and, with wise re- 
straint 

Voluptuous, fearless of a rival, eyed 

The banquet ;—or beneath the trees I 
sate 

Among the flowers, and with the flowers 
I played ; 

A temper known to those, who, after 
long 

And weary expectation, have been blest 

With sudden happiness beyond all hope. 

Perhaps it was a bower beneath whose 
leaves 

The violets of five seasons re-appear 

And fade, unseen by any human eye; 

Where fairy water-breaks do murmur on 

For ever; and I saw the sparkling foam. 

And—with my cheek on one of those 
green stones 

That, fleeced with moss, under the shady 
trees, 

Lay round me, scattered like a flock of 
sheep-- 

I heard the murmur and the murmuring 
sound, 

In that sweet mood when pleasure loves 
to pay 

Tribute to ease ; and, of its joy secure, 

The heart luxuriates with indifferent 
things, 

Wasting its kindliness on stocks and 
stones 

And on the vacantair. Then up I rose, 

And dragged to earth both branch and 
bough, with crash 

And merciless ravage: and the shady 
nook 

Of hazels, and the green 
bower, 

Deformed and sullied, patiently gave up 

Their quiet being: and, unless I now 

Confound my present feelings with the 
past ; 

Ere from the mutilated bower I turned 

Exulting, rich beyond the wealth of 
kings, 

I felta sense of pain when I beheld 


and mossy 


The porn trees, and saw the intruding 
sky.— 
Then, dearest Maiden, move along these 
shades 
In gentleness of heart ; with gentle hand 
Touch—for there is a spirit in the woods. 
1799. 1800. 


STRANGE FITS OF PASSION HAVE 
I KNOWN 


The next three poems were written in 
Germany. (Wordsworth. ) 


STRANGE fits of passion have I known: 
And I will dare to tell, 

But in the Lover’s ear alone, 

What once to me befell. 


When she I loved looked every day 
Fresh as a rose in June, 

I to her cottage bent my way, 
Beneath an evening-moon. 


Upon the moon I fixed my eye, 

All over the wide lea ; 

With quickening pace my horse drew 
nigh 

Those paths so dear to me. 


And now we reached the orchard-plot ; 
And, as we climbed the hill, 

The sinking moon to Lucy’s cot 

Came near, and nearer still. 


In one of those sweet dreams I slept, 
Kind Nature’s gentlest boon ! 

And all the while my eyes I kept 

On the descending moon. 


My horse moved on; hoof after hoof 
He raised, and never stopped : 

When down behind the cottage roof, 
At once, the bright moon dropped. 


What fond and wayward thoughts will 
slide 

Into a Lover’s head ! 

‘*O mercy !” to myself I cried, 

‘‘ Tf Lucy should be dead !” 


1799. 1800. 


SHE DWELT AMONG THE UNTROD- 
DEN WAYS 


SHE dwelt among the untrodden ways 
Beside the springs of Dove, 

A Maid whom there were none to praise 
And very few to love: 


WORDSWORTH Ls 


A violet by a mossy stone 
Half hidden from the eye! 
—Fair as a star, when only one 
Is shining in the sky. — 


She lived unknown, and few could know 
When Lucy ceased to be ; 
But she is in her grave, and, oh, 


The difference to me! 1799, 1800. 


I TRAVELLED AMONG UNKNOWN 
MEN 


I TRAVELLED among unknown men, 
In lands beyond the sea ; 

Nor, England! did I know till then 
What love I bore to thee. 


Tis past, that melancholy dream ! 
Nor will I quit thy shore 

A second time ; for still I seem 
To love thee more and more. 


Among the mountains did I feel 
The joy of my desire ; 

And she I cherished turned her wheel 
Beside an English fire. 


Thy mornings showed, thy nights con- 
cealed 
The bowers where Lucy played ; 
And thine too is the last green field 
That Lucy’s eyes surveyed. 
L799. 1807. 


THREE YEARS SHE GREW IN SUN 
AND SHOWER 


THREE years she grew in sun and shower, 
Then Nature said, ‘‘ A lovelier flower 
On earth was never sown ; 

This Child I to myself will take ; 

She shall be mine, and I will make 

A Lady of my own. 


** Myself will to my darling be 

Both law and impulse: and with me 

The Girl, in rock and plain, 

In earth and heaven, in glade and 
bower, 

Shall feel an overseeing power 

To kindle or restrain. 


*¢ She shall be sportive as the fawn 
That wild with glee across the lawn, 
Or up the mountain springs ; 

And hers shall be the breathing balm, 
And hers the silence and the calm 

Of mute insensate things. 


‘‘The floating clouds their state shall 
lend 

To her ; for her the willow bend; 

Nor shall she fail to see 

Even in the motions of the Storm 

Grace that shall mould the Maiden’s 
form 

By silent sympathy. 


‘* The stars of midnight shall be dear 

To her ; and she shall lean her ear 

In many a secret place 

Where rivulets dance their wayward 
round, 

And beauty born of murmuring sound 

Shall pass into her face. 


** And vital feelings of delight 

Shall rear her form to stately height, 

Her virgin bosom swell ; 

Such thoughts to Lucy I will give 

While she and I together live 

Here in this happy dell.” 

Thus Nature spake.—The work was 
done— 

How soon my Lucy’s race was run! 

She died, and left to me 

This heath, this calm and quiet scene ; 

The memory of what has been, 


And never more will be. 1799. 1800. 


A SLUMBER DID MY SPIRIT SEAL 


A SLUMBER did my spirit seal ; 
IT had no human fears : 

She seemed a thing that could not feel 
The touch of earthly years. 


No motion has she now, no force; 
She neither hears nor sees ; 
Rolled round in earth’s diurnal course, 
With rocks, and stones, and trees. 
1799. 1800. 


A POET’S EPITAPH 


ART thou a Statist in the van 

Of public conflicts trained and bred ? 
—First learn to love one living man ; 
Then may’st thou think upon the dead. 


A Lawyer art thou ?—draw not nigh ! 
Go, carry to some fitter place 

The keenness of that practised eye, 
The hardness of that sallow face. 


16 BRITISH “POETS 


Art thou a Man of purple cheer ? 
A rosy Man, right plump to see? 
Approach ; yet, Doctor, not too near, 
This grave no cushion is for thee. 


Or art thou one of gallant pride, 
A Soldier and no man of chaff? 
Welcome !—but lay thy sword aside, 
And lean upon a peasant’s staff. 


Physician art thou? one all eyes, 
Philosopher ! a fingering slave, 
One that would peep and botanize 
Upon his mother’s grave ? 


Wrapt closely in thy sensual fleece, 
O turn aside,—and take, I pray, 
That he below may rest in peace, 
Thy ever-dwindling soul away ! 


A Moralist perchance appears ; 

Led, Heaven knows how! to this poor 
sod : 

And he has neither eyes nor ears ; 

Himself his world, and his own God; 


One to whose smooth-rubbed soul can 
cling 

Nor form, nor feeling, great or small ! 

A reasoning, self-sufficing thing, 

An intellectual All-in-all ! 


Shut close the door; press down the 
latch ; 

Sleep in thy intellectual crust ; 

Nor lose ten tickings of thy watch 

Near this unprofitable dust. 


But who is he, with modest looks, 
And clad in homely russet brown ? 
He murmurs near the running brooks 
A music sweeter than their own. 


Tle is retired as noontide dew, 

Or fountain in a noon-day grove ; 

And you must love him, ere to you 
He will seem worthy of your love. 


The outward shows of sky and earth, 
Of hill and valley, he has viewed ; 
And impulses of deeper birth 

Have come to him in solitude. 


In common things that round us lie 
Some random truths he can impart,— 
The harvest of a quiet eye 

That broods and sleeps on his own heart. 





But he is weak ; both Man and Boy, 
Hath been an idler in the land ; 
Contented if he might enjoy 

The things which others understand. 


—Come hither in thy hour of strength ; 
Come, weak as is a breaking wave! 
Here stretch thy body at full length ; 
Or build thy house upon this grave. 
1799. . 18005 


MATTHEW 


In the School of ——-— is a tablet, on which are' 
inscribed in gilt letters, the Names of the sev- 
eral persons who have been Schoolmasters there 
since the foundation of the School, with the 
time at which they entered upon and quitted 
their office. Opposite to one of those names the 
Author wrote the following lines. 

Such a Tablet as is here spoken of continued 
to be preserved in Hawkshead School, though 
the inscriptions were not brought down to our 
time. This and other poems connected with 
Matthew would not gain by a literal detail of 
facts. Like the Wanderer in ‘‘ The Excursion,”’ 
this Schoolmaster was made up of several both 
of his class and men of other occupations. Ido 
not ask pardon for what there is of untruth in 
such verses, considered strictly as matters of 
fact. It is enough if, being true and consistent 
in spirit, they move and teach in a manner not 
unworthy of a Poet’s calling. (Wordsworth. ) 


Ir Nature, for a favorite child, 

In thee hath tempered so her clay, 
That every hour thy heart runs wild, 
Yet never once doth go astray, 


Read o’er these lines ; and then review 
This tablet, that thus humbly rears 

In such diversity of hue 

Its history of two hundred years. 


—When through this little wreck of 
fame, 

Cipher and syllable! thine eye 

Hlas travelled down to Matthew’s name. 

Pause with no common sympathy. 


And, if a sleeping tear should wake, 
Then be it neither checked nor stayed : 
For Matthew a request I make 
Which for himself he hath not made. 


Poor Matthew, all his frolics o’er, 

Is silent as a standing pool ; 

Far from the chimney’s merry roar, 
And murmur of the village school. 


The sighs which Matthew heaved were 
sighs 
Of one tired out with fun and madness ; 


WORDSWORTH ty 


The tears which came to Matthew’s 
eyes 
Were tears of light, the dew of gladness. 


Yet, sometimes, when the secret cup 
Of still and serious thought went round, 
It seemed as if he drank it up— 

He felt with spirit so profound. 


—Thou soul of God’s best earthly mould! 
Thou happy Soul! and can it be 
That these two words of glittering gold 
Are all that must remain of thee? 

1799. 1800. 


THE TWO APRIL MORNINGS 


WE walked along, while bright and red 

Uprose the morning sun ; 

And Matthew stopped, he looked, and 
said 

“The will of God be done ! ” 


A village schoolmaster was he, 
With hair of glittering gray ; 

As blithe a man as you could see 
On a spring holiday. 


And on that morning, through the grass, 
And by the steaming rills, 

We travelled merrily, to pass 

A day among the hills. 


**Our work,” said I, ‘‘ was well begun, 
Then, from thy breast what thought, 
Beneath so beautiful a sun, 

So sad a sigh has brought ?” 


‘A second time did Matthew stop ; 
And fixing still his eyé 

Upon the eastern mountain-top, 
To me he made reply : 


** Yon cloud with that long purple cleft 
Brings fresh into my mind 

A day like this which I have left 

Full thirty years behind. 


** And just above yon slope of corn 
Such colors, and no other, 

Were in the sky, that April morn, 
Of this the very brother. 


“ With rod and line I sued the sport 

Which that sweet season gave, 

And, to the church-yard come, stopped 
short 

Beside my daughter’s grave. 


‘‘ Nine summers had she scarcely seen, 

The pride of all the vale ; 

And then she sang ;—she would have 
been 

A very nightingale. 


‘* Six feet in earth my Emma lay ; 
And yet I loved her more, 

For so it seemed, than till that day 
I e’er had loved before. 


‘* And, turning from her grave, I met, 
Beside the church-yard yew, 
A blooming Girl, whose hair was wet 
With points of morning dew, 


** A basket on her head she bare ; 
Her brow was smooth and white: 
To see a child so very fair, 

It was a pure delight ! 


‘*No fountain from its rocky cave 
E’er tripped with foot so free ; 
She seemed as happy as a wave 
That dances on the sea; 


‘There came from me a sigh of pain 
Which I could ill confine ; 

I looked at her, and looked again: 
And did not wish her mine!” 


Matthew is in his grave, yet now, 
Methinks, I see him stand, 

As at that moment, with a bough 

Of wilding in his hand. 1799. 1800. 


THE FOUNTAIN 
A CONVERSATION 


We talked with open heart, and tongue 
Affectionate and true, 

A pair of friends, though I was young, 
And Matthew seventy-two, 


We lay beneath a spreading oak, 

Beside a mossy seat ; 

And from the turf a fountain broke, 
And gurgled at our feet. 


‘*Now, Matthew! ” said I, ‘* let us 
match 

This water’s pleasant tune 

With some old border-song, or catch 

That suits a summer’s noon ; 


‘Or of the church-clock and the chimes 
Sing here beneath the shade, 


18 BRITISH. POETS 





That half-mad thing of witty rhymes 
Which you last April made!” 


In silence Matthew lay, and eyed 
The spring beneath the tree ; 

And thus the dear old Man replied, 
The gray haired man of glee : 


** No check, no stay, this Streamlet 
fears ; 

How merrily it goes ! 

’T will murmur on a thousand years, 

And flow as now it flows. 


** And here, on this delightful day, 
I cannot choose but:think 

How oft, a vigorous man, I lay 
Beside this fountain’s brink. 


‘¢ My eyes are dim with childish tears, 
My heart is idly stirred, 

For the same sound is in my ears 
Which in those days I heard, 


‘‘Thus fares it still in our decay : 
And yet the wiser mind 

Mourns less for what age takes away 
Than what it leaves behind. 


‘*The blackbird amid leafy trees, 

The lark above the hill, 

Let loose their carols when they please 
Are quiet when they will. 


“With Nature never do they wage 
A foolish strife; they see 

A happy youth, and their old age 
Is beautiful and free : 


‘* But we are pressed by heavy laws ; 
And often, glad no more, 

We wear a face of joy, because 

We have been glad of yore. 


‘Tf there be one who need bemoan 

His kindred laid in earth, 

The household hearts that were his own ; 
It is the man of mirth. 


‘* My days, my Friend, are almost gone, 
My life has been approved, 

And many love me; but by none 

Am I enough beloved.” 


‘* Now both himself and me he wrongs, 
The man who thus complains ; 

I live and sing my idle songs 

Upon these happy plains ; 


‘“ And, Matthew, for thy children dead 
I'll be a.son to thee!” 

At this he grasped my hand, and said, 
** Alas! that cannot be.” 


We rose up from the fountain-side ; 
And down the smooth descent 

Of the green sheep-track did we glide ; 
And through the wood we went ; 


And, ere we came to Leonard’s rock, 
He sang those witty rhymes 

About the crazy old church-clock, 
And the bewildered chimes. 


L799, 1a 


LUCY GRAY 
OR, SOLITUDE 


Written at GoslarinGermany. It was founded 
on a circumstance told me by my Sister, of a 
little girl who, not far from Halifax in Yorkshire, 
was bewildered in a snow-storm. Her footsteps 
were traced by her parents to the middle of the 
lock of a canal, and no other vestige of her, 
backward or forward, could be traced. The 
body however was found in the canal. The way 
in which the incident was treated and the spirit- 
ualizing of the character might furnish hints for 
contrasting the imaginative influences which I 
have endeavored to throw over common life 
with Crabbe’s matter of fact style of treating 
subjects of the same kind. This is not spoken 
to his disparagement, far from it, but to direct 
the attention of thoughtful readers, into whose 
hands these notes may fall, to a comparison that 
may both enlarge the circle of their sensibilities, 
and tend to produce in them a catholic judg- 
ment. ( Wordsworth.) 

See also Henry Crabb Robinson’s Diary, Sept. 
11, 1816. 


Ort I had heard of Lucy Gray: 
And, when I crossed the wild, 

I chanced to see at break of day 
The solitary child. 


No mate, no comrade Lucy knew ; 
She dwelt on a wide moor, 

—The sweetest thing that ever grew 
Beside a human door! 


You yet may spy the fawn at play, 
The hare upon the green ; 

But the sweet face of Lucy Gray 
Will never more be seen. 


“To-night will be a stormy night— 
You to the town must go ; 
And take a lantern, Child, to ight 


Your mother through the snow.” 


‘That, Father! will I gladly do: 

’Tis scarcely afternoon— 

The minster-clock has just struck two, 
And yonder is the moon !” 


WORDSWORTH 19 


At this the Father raised his hook, 
And snapped a fagot band ; 

He plied his work ;—and Lucy took 
The lantern in her hand. 


Not blither is the mountain roe : 
With many a wanton stroke 

Her feet disperse the powdery snow, 
That rises up like smoke. 


The storm came on before its time : 
She wandered up and down; 

And many a hill did Lucy climb: 
But never reached the town. 


The wretched parents all that night 
Went shouting far and wide ; 

But there was neither sound nor sight 
To serve them for a guide. 


At daybreak on the hill they stood 
That overlooked the moor 

And thence they saw the bridge of wo ood, 
A furlong from their door. 


They wept—and, turning homeward, 
cried, 

**In heaven we allshall meet ;” 

—When in the snow the mother spied 

The print of Lucy’s feet. 


Then downwards from the steep hill’s 


edge 

They tracked the footmarks small ; 

And through the broken hawthorn 
hedge, 

And by the long stone-wall ; 


And then an open field they crossed: 
The marks were still the same ; 

They tracked them on, nor ever lost ; 
And to the bridge they came. 


They followed from the snowy bank 
Those footmarks, one by one, 
Into the middle of the plank ; 
And further there were none ! 


—Yet some maintain that to this day 
She is a living child ; 

That you may see sweet Lucy Gray 
Upon the lonesome wild. 


O’er rough and smooth she trips along, 
And never looks behind ; 

And sings a solitary song 

That whistles in the wind. 


1799, 1800. 


MICHAEL 
A PASTORAL POEM 


Written at Town-end, Grasmere, about the 
same time as ‘‘ The Brothers.’’ The Sheepfold, 
on which so much of the poem turns, remains, or 
rather the ruins of it. The character and cir- 
cumstances of Luke were taken from a family 
to whom had belonged, many years before, the 
house we lived in at Town-end, along with some 
fields and woodlands on the eastern shore of 
Grasmere. The name of the Evening Star was not 
in fact given to this house, but to another on 
the same side of the valley, more to the north. 

(Wordsworth. ) 


Ir from the public way you turn your 


steps 

Up the tumultuous brook of Greenhead 
GhyH, 

You will suppose that with an upright 
path 

Your feet must struggle; in such bold 
ascent 

The pastoral mountains front you, face 
to face. 

But, courage! for around that boister- 
ous brook 

The mountains have all opened out them- 
selves, 


And made a hidden valley of their own. 

No habitation can be seen; but they 

Who journey thither find themselves 
alone 

With a few sheep, with rocks and stones, 
and kites 

That overhead are sailing in the sky. 

It is in truth an utter solitude ; 

Nor should I have made mention of this 
Dell 

But for one object which you might pass 

Va 

Might see and notice not. Beside the 
brook 

Appears a straggling heap of unhewn 
stones ! 

And to that simple object appertains 

A story—unenriched with strange 
events, 

Yet not unfit, I deem, for the fireside, 

Or for the summer shade. It was the first 

Of those domestic tales that spake to me 

Of shepherds, dwellers in the valleys, 
men 

Whom I already loved ; not verily 

For their own sakes, but for the fields 
and hills 

Where was their occupation and abode. 

And hence this Tale, w hile Iwas yeta 


Boy 
Careless of books, yet having felt the 
power 


fr 


20 


Of Nature, by the gentle agency 

Of natural objects, led me on to feel 

For passions that were not my own, and 
think 

(At random and imperfectly indeed) 

On man, the heart of man, and human 
life. 

Therefore, although it be a history 

Homely and rude, [ will relate the same 

For the delight of a few natural hearts ; 

And, with yet fonder feeling, for the 
sake 

Of youthful Poets, whoamong these hills 

Will be my second self when I am gone. 

UPON the forest-side in Grasmere Vale 

There dwelt aShepherd, Michael was his 
name ; 

An old man, stout of heart, and strong 
of limb. 

His bodily frame had been from youth 
to age 

Of an unusual strength: his mind was 
keen, 

Intense, and frugal, apt for all affairs, 

And in his shepherd’s calling he was 
prompt 

And watchful more than ordinary men. 

Hence had he learned the meaning of all 
winds, 

Of blasts of every tone ; and, oftentimes, 

When others heeded not, He heard the 
South 

Make subterraneous music, like the noise 

Of bagpipers on distant Highland hills. 

The Shepherd, at such warning, of his 
flock 

Bethought him, and he to himself would 
Say, 

‘The winds are now devising work for 
me!” 

And, truly, at all times, the storm that 
drives 

The traveller to shelter, summoned him 

Up to the mountains: he had been alone 

Amid the heart of many thousand mists, 

That came to him, and left him, on the 
heights. 

So lived he till his eightieth year was 
past. 

And grossly that man errs, who should 
suppose 

That the green valleys, and the streams 
and rocks, 

Were things indifferent to the Shep- 
herd’s thoughts. ; 

Fields, where with cheerful spirits he had 
breathed 

The common air; hills, which with vig- 
orous step 


BRITISH POETS 


He had so often climbed; which had 
impressed 

So many incidents upon his mind 

Of hardship, skill or courage, joy or 


ear ; 
Which, like a book, preserved the mem- 


ory 

Of the dumb animals, whom he had 
saved, 

Had fed or sheltered, linking to such 
acts 

The certainty of honorable gain ; 

Those fields, those hills—what could they 
less ? had laid 

Strong hold on his affections, were to 
him 

A pleasurable feeling of blind love, 

The pleasure which there is in life itself. 

His days had not been passed in sin- 

gleness. 

His Helpmate was a comely matron, 

- old— 

Though younger than himself full twenty 
years. 

She was a woman of a stirring life, 

Whose heart was in her house: 
wheels she had 

Of antique form: this large, for spinning 
wool ; 

That small, for flax ; and if one wheel 
had rest 

It was because the other was at work. 

The Pair had but one inmate in their 


two 


house, 

An only Child, who had been born to 
them 

When Michael, telling o’er his years, 
began 


To deem that he was old,—in_ shep- 
herd’s phrase, 

With one foot in the grave. 
Son, 

With two brave sheep-dogs tried in many 
a storm, 

The one of an inestimable worth, 

Made all their household. I may truly 
say, 

That ie were as a proverb in the vale 

For endless industry. When day was 
gone, 

And from their occupations out of doors 

The Son and Father were come home, 
even then, 

Their labor did not cease ; unless when 


This only 


all 

Turned to the cleanly supper-board, and 
there, 

Each with a-mess of pottage and 


skimmed milk, 


WORDSWORTH 21 





Sat round the basket piled with oaten 
cakes, 

And their plain home-made cheese. Yet 
when the meal 

Was ended, Luke (for so the Son was 
named) 

And his old Father both betook them- 
selves 

To such convenient work as might em- 


ploy 
Their hands by the fireside ; perhaps to 


card 

Wool for the Housewife’s spindle, or 
repair 

Some injury done to sickle, flail, or 
scy the, 


Or other implement of house or field. 
Down from the ceiling, by the chim- 

ney’s edge, 

That in our ancient uncouth country 
style 

With huge and black projection over- 
browed 

Large space beneath, as duly as the light 

Of day grew dim the Housewife hung a 
lamp ; 

An aged utensil, which had performed 

Service beyond all others of its kind. 

Early at evening did it burn—and late, 

Surviving comrade of uncounted hours, 

Which, going by from year to year, had 
found, . 

And left, the couple neither gay perhaps 

Nor cheerful, yet with objects and with 
hopes, 

Living a life of eager industry. 

And now, when Luke had reached his 
eighteenth year, 

There by the light of this old lamp they 
sate, 

Father and Son, while far into the night 

The Housewife plied her own peculiar 


work, 

Making the cottage through the silent 
hours 

Murmur as with the sound of summer 
flies. 

This light was famous in its neighbor- 
hood, 


And was a public symbol of the life 

That thrifty Pair had lived. For, as it 
chanced, 

Their cottage on a plot of rising ground 

Stood single, with large prospect, north 
and south, 

High into Easedale, up to Dunmail- 
Raise, 

And westward to the village near the 
lake ; 


And from this constant light, so regular 

And so far seen, the House itself, by all 

Who dwelt within the limits of the vale, 

Both old and young, was named THE 
EVENING STAR. 

Thus living on through such a length 

of years, 

The Shepherd, if he loved himself, must 
needs 

Have loved his Helpmate; but to Mi- 
chael’s heart 

This son of his old age was yet more 
dear— 

Less from instinctive tenderness, the 
same 

Fond spirit that blindly works in the 
blood of all— 

Than that a child, more than all other 
gifts 

That earth can offer to declining man, 

Brings hope with it, and forward-look- 
ing thoughts, 

And stirrings of inquietude, when they 

By tendency of nature needs must fail. 

Exceeding was the love he bare to him, 


His heart and his heart’s joy! For 
oftentimes 

Old Michael, while he was a babe in 
arms, 


Had done him female service, not alone 
For pastime and delight, as is the use 
Of fathers, but with patient mind en- 


forced 

To acts of tenderness; and he had 
rocked 

His cradle, as with a woman’s gentle 
hand. 


And, in a later time, ere yet the Boy 

Had put on boy’s attire, did Michael 
love, 

Albeit of a stern unbending mind, 

To have the Young-one in his sight, 
when he 

Wrought in the field, or on his shep- 
herd’s stool 

Sate with a fettered sheep before him 
stretched 

Under the large old oak, that near his 
door 

Stood single, and, from matchless depth 
of shade, 

Chosen for the Shearer’s covert from the 
sun, 

Thence in our rustic dialect was called 

The CLIPPING TREE,! a name which yet 
it bears. 


1 Clipping is the word used in the North of 
England for shearing. (Wordsworth.) 


22 BRITISH POETS ‘ 


There, while they two were sitting in 
the shade, 

With others round them, earnest all and 
blithe, 

Would Michael exercise his heart with 
looks 

Of fond correctionand reproof bestowed 

Upon the Child, if he disturbed the 
sheep 

By catching at their legs, or with his 
shouts 

Scared them, while they lay still be- 
neath the shears. 

And when by Heaven’s good grace the 

boy grew up 

A healthy Lad, and carried in his cheek 

Two ence, roses that were five years 
old ; 

Then Michael from a winter coppice cut 

With his own hand a sapling, which he 
hooped 

With iron, making it throughout in all 

Due requisites a perfect shepherd's staff, 

And gave it to the Boy; wherewith 


equipt 

He as a watchman oftentimes was 
placed 

At gate or gap, to stem or turn the 
flock ; 


And, to his office prematurely called, 

There stood the urchin, as you will di- 
vine, 

Something between a hindrance anda 
help ; 

And for this cause not always, I believe, 

Receiving from his Father hire of praise ; 

Though nought was left undone which 
staff, or voice, 

Or looks, or threatening gestures, could 
perform. 

But soon as Luke, full ten years old, 

could stand 

Against the mountain blasts ; and to the 
heights, 

Not fearing toil, nor length of weary 
ways, 

He with his Father daily went, and they 

Were as companions. why should I relate 

That objects which the Shepherd loved 
before 

Were dearer now? that from the Boy 
there came 

Feelings and emanations—things which 
were 

Light to the sun and music to the wind ; 

And that the old Man’s heart seemed born 
again ? 

Thus in his Father’s sight the Boy grew 

up: 


And now, when he had reached his eigh- — 
teenth year, 
He was his comfort and his daily hope. 
While in this sort the simple house- 
hold lived 
From day to day, to Michael’s ear there 


came 
Distressful tidings. Long before the 
time 
Of which I speak, the Shepherd had been 
bound 


In surety for his brother’s son,.a man 

Of an industrious life, and ample means ; 

But unforeseen misfortunes suddenly 

Had prest upon him; and old Michael 
now 

Was suinmoned to discharge the forfeit- 
ure, 

A grievous penalty, but little less 

Than half hissubstance. This unlooked- 
for claim, 

At the first hearing, for a moment took 

More hope out of his life than he sup- 


posed 

That any old man ever could have 
lost. 

As soon as he had armed himself with 
strength 


To look his trouble in the face, it seemed 

The Shepherd’s sole resource to sell at 
once 

A portion of his patrimonial fields. 

Such was his first resolve ; he thought 


again, 

And his heart failed him. ‘* Isabel,” said 
he, 

Two evenings after he had heard the 
news, 

‘*T have been toiling more than seventy 


years, 

And in the open sunshine of God’s love 

Have we all lived; yet if these fields of 
ours ‘ 

Should pass into a stranger’s hand, I 
think 

That I could not lie quiet in my grave. — 

Our lot isahard lot; the sun himself 

Has scarcely been more diligent than I ; 

And I have lived to be a fool at last 

To my own family. An evil man_ 

That was, and made an evil choice, if he 

Were false to us; and if he were not 
false, 

There are ten thousand to whom loss like 
this 

Had been no sorrow. 
but 

*Twere better to be dumb than to talk 
thus. 


I forgive him ;— 


WORDSWORTH 23 


**When I began, my purpose was to 

speak 

Of remedies and of a cheerful hope. 

Our Luke shall leave us, Isabel; the land 

Shall not go from us, and it shall be free ; 

He shall possess it, free as is the wind 

That passes over it. We have, thou 
know’st, 

Another kinsman—he will be our friend 

In this distress. He isa prosperous man, 

Thriving in trade—and Luke to him 

shall go, 

And with his kinsman’s help and his own 
thrift 

He quickly will repair this loss, and then 

He may returntous. If here he stay, 

What can bedone? Where every oneis 


poor, 

‘What can be gained ?”. 

At this the old Man paused, 

And Isabel sat silent, for her mind 

Was busy, looking back into past times. 

There’s Richard Bateman, thought she to 
herself, 

He was a parish-boy—at the church-door 

They made a gathering for him, shil- 
lings, pence 

And halfpennies, wherewith the neigh- 
bors bought 

A basket, which they filled with pedlar’s 
wares ; 

And, with this basket on his arm, the lad 

Went up to London, found a master 
there, 

Who, out of many, chose the trusty boy 

To go and overlook his merchandise 

Beyond the seas; where he grew won- 
drous rich, 

And left estates and monies to the poor 

And, at his birthplace, built a chapel, 
floored 

With marble which hesent from foreign 
lands. 

These thoughts, and many others of like 
sort. 

Passed quickly through the .mind of 
Isabel, 

And her face brightened. The old Man 
was glad. 

And thus resumed :— ‘“ Well, 
this scheme 

These two days, 
drink to me. 

Far more than we have lost is left us yet. 

—We have enough—I wish indeed that I 

Were younger ;—but this hope is a good 


Isabel ! 


has been meat and 


hope. 
—Make ready Luke’s best garments, of 
the best 


Buy for him more, and let us send him 
forth 


| To-morrow, or the next day, or to-night : 


—If he could go, the boy should go to- 

night.” 
Here Michael ceased, and to the fields 

went forth 

With a light heart. 
five days 

Was restless morn and night, and all day 
long 

Wrought on with her best fingers to pre- 


The Housewife for 


pare 

Things needful for the journey of her 
son. 

But Isabel was glad when Sunday came 

Tostop her in her work: for, when she lay 

By Michael’s side, she through the last 
two nights 

Heard him, how he was troubled in his 
sleep : 

And when they rose at morning she 
could see 

That all his hopes were gone. 
at noon 

She said to Luke, while they two by 
themselves 

Were sitting at the door, 
not go: 

We have no other child but thee to lose, 

None to remember—do not go away, 

For if thou leave thy Father he will die.” 

The Youth made answer with a jocund 
voice ; 

And Isabel, when she had told her fears, 

Recovered heart. That evening her 
best fare 

Did she bring forth, and all together sat 

Like happy people round a Christmas 
fire. 


That day 


‘*Thou must 


With daylight Isabel resumed her 
work ; 
And all the ensuing week the house 
appeared 
As cheerful as a grove in Spring: at 
length 
The expected letter from their kinsman 
came, 


With kind assurances that he would do 

His utmost for the welfare of the Boy ; 

To which, requests were added, that 
forthwith 

He might be sent to him. 
more 

The letter was read over; Isabel 


Ten times or 


Went forth to show it to the neighbors 


round ; 
Nor was there at that time on English 
land 


24 BRITISH POETS 





A prouder heart than Luke’s. When 
Isabel 

Had to her house returned, the old Man 
said, 

“He shall depart to-morrow.” To this 
word 

The Housewife answered, talking much 
of things 


Which, if at suchshort notice he should 


gO, 

Would surely be forgotten. But at 
length 

She gave consent, and Michael was at 
ease. 

Near the tumultuous brook of Green- 

head Ghyll, 

In that deep valley, Michael had de- 
signed 

To build a Sheepfold; and, before he 
heard 

The tidings of his melancholy loss, 

For this same purpose he had gathered 
up 

A heap of stones, which by the stream- 
let’s edge 

Lay thrown together, ready for the work. 

With Luke that evening thitherward he 
walked : 

And soon as they had reached the place 
he stopped, 

And thus the old Man spake to him :— 
‘*My Son, 

To-morrow thou wilt leave me: with 
full heart 

I look upon thee, for thou art the same 

That wert a promise to me ere thy birth, 

And all thy life hast been my daily joy. 

{ will relate to thee some little part 

Of our two histories ; ‘twill dothee good 

When thou art from me, evenif I should 
touch 

On things thou canst not know of.—— 
After thou 

First cam’st into the world—as oft befalls 

To new-born infants—thou didst sleep 


away 

Two days, and blessings from thy 
Father’s tongue 

Then fell upon thee. Day by day passed 


And still I loved thee with increasing 
love. 

Never to living ear came sweeter sounds 

Than when I heard thee by our own fire- 
side 

First uttering, without words, a natural 
tune ; 

While thou, a feeding babe, didst in thy 
JOY 


Sing at thy Mother's breast. Month fol- 
lowed month, 

And in the open fields my life was passed 

And on the mountains; else I think that 
thou 

Hadst been brought up upon thy Father’s 
knees. 

But we were playmates, Luke: among 
these hills, 

As well thou knowest, in us the old and 
young 

Have played together, nor with me didst 
thou 

Lack any pleasure which a boy can 
know.” 

Luke had a manly heart; but at these 
words 

He sobbed aloud. 
his hand, | 

And said, ‘*‘ Nay, donot take it so— I see 

That these are things of which I need 
not speak. 

—Even tothe utmost Ihave been to thee 

A kind and a good Father: and herein 

I but repay a gift which I myself 

Received at others’ hands; for, though 
now old 

Beyond the common life of man, I still 

Remember them who loved me in my 


The old Man grasped. 


youth. 

Both of them sleep together: here they 
lived, 

As all their Forefathers had done; and 
when 


At length their time was come, they 
were not loth 

To give their bodies to the family mould. 

I wished that thou should’st live the life 
they lived : 

But, tis a long time to look back, my 
Son, 

And see so little gain from threescore 
years. 

These fields were burthened when they 
came to me: 

Till I was forty years of age, not more 

Than half of my inheritance was mine. 

I toiled and toiled ; God blessed me in 
my work, 

And till these three weeks past the land 
was free. 

—It looks as if it never could endure 

Another Master. Heaven forgive me, 
Luke, 

If I judge ill for thee, but it seems good 

That thou should’st go.” 

At this the old Man paused ; 

Then, pointing to the stones near which 

they stood, 


WORDSWORTH 25 


Thus, after a short silence, he resumed : 
‘This was a work for us; and now, my 
. Son, : 
It isaworkforme. But, lay one stone— 
Here, lay it for me, Luke, with thine 
own hands. 
Nay, Boy, be of good hope ;—we both 
may live 
To see a better day. At eighty-four 
I still am strong and hale ;—do thou thy 
part ; 
I will do mine.-—I will begin again 
With many tasks that were resigned to 
thee : 
Up to the heights, and in among the 
storms, 
Will I without thee go again, and do 
All works which I was wont to do alone, 
Before I knew thy face.—Heaven bless 
thee, Boy! 
Thy heart these two weeks has been 
beating fast 
With many hopes; it should be so—yes— 
es— 
I knew that thou could’st never have a 
wish 
To leave me, Luke: 
bound to me 
Only by links of love: when thou art 
gone, 
What will be left to us !—But, I forget 
My purposes. Lay now the corner-stone, 
As | requested ; and hereafter, Luke, 
When thou art gone away, should evil 
men 
Be thy companions, think of me, my Son, 
And of this moment: hither turn thy 
thoughts, 
And God will strengthen thee: amid all 
fear 
And all temptation, Luke, I pray that 
thou 
May’st bear in mind the life thy Fathers 
lived, 
Who, being innocent, did for that cause 
Bestir them in good deeds. 
thee well— 
When thou return’st, thou in this place 
wilt see 
A work which is not here: a covenant 
*T will be between us ; but, whatever fate 
Befall thee, I shall love thee to the last, 
And bear thy memory with me to the 
grave.” 
The Shepherd ended here ; and Luke 
stooped down, 
And, as his Father had requested, laid 
The first stone of the Sheepfold. At the 
sight 


thou hast been 


Now, fare ~ 





The old Man’s grief broke from him ; to 
his heart 

He pressed his Son, he kisséd him and 
wept ; 

And to the house together they returned. 

—Hushed was that House in peace, or 
seeming peace, 

Ere the night fell :—with morrow’s dawn 
the Boy 

Began his journey, and when he had 
reached 

The public way, he put on a bold face ; 

And all the neighbors, as he passed their 
doors, 

Came forth with wishes and with fare- 
well prayers, 

That followed him till he was out of 
sight. 

A good report did from their Kinsman 

come, | 

Of Luke and his well-doing : and the Boy 

Wrote loving letters, full of wondrous 
news, 

Which, as the Housewife phrased it, 
were throughout 

‘* The prettiest letters that were ever 
seen.” 

Both parents read them with rejoicing 
hearts. 

So, many months passed on: and once 
again 

The Shepherd went about his daily work 

With confident and cheerful thoughts ; 
and now ' 

Sometimes when he could find a leisure 
hour 

He to that valley took his way, and there 

Wrought at the Sheepfold. Meantime 
Luke began 

To slacken in his duty; and, at length, 

He in the dissolute city gave himself 

To evil courses : ignominy and shame 

Fell on him. so that he was driven at last 

To seek a hiding-place beyond the seas. 

There is a comfort in the strength of 

love ; oe 

‘Twill make a thing endurable, which 
else 

Would overset the brain, or break the 
heart : 

I have conversed with more than one 
who well 

Remember the old Man, and what he was 

Years after he had heard this heavy 


news. 

His bodily frame had been from youth 
to age 

Of an unusual strength. Among the 
rocks 


bk BRITISH POETS 


He went, and still looked up to sun and 
cloud, 

And listened to the wind ; and, as before, 

Performed all kinds of labor for his 
sheep, 

And for the jand, his small inheritance. 

And to that hollow dell from time to time 

Did he repair, to build the Fold of which 

His flock had need. ’Tis not forgotten yet 

The pity which was then in every heart 

For the old Man—and ‘tis believed by all 

That many and many a day he thither 
went, 

And never lifted up a single stone. 

There, by the Sheepfold, sometimes 

was he seen 

Sitting alone, or with his faithful Dog, 

Then old, beside him, lying at his feet. 

The length of full seven years, from 
time to time, 

He at the building of this Sheepfold 
wrought, 

And left the work unfinished when he 
died. 

Three years, or little more, did Isabel 

Survive her Husband: at her death the 
estate 

Was sold, and went into a stranger’s 
hand. 

The Cottage which was named the EVEN- 
ING STAR 

Is gone—the ploughshare 
through the ground 

On which it stood; great changes have 
been wrought 

In all the neighborhood :—yet the oak is 
left 

That grew beside their door; and the 
remains 

Of the unfinished Sheepfold may be seen 

Beside the boisterous brook of Green- 
head Ghyll. 1800. 1800. 


THE SPARROWS’ NEST 


Written in the Orchard, Town-end, Grasmere. 
At the end of the garden of my father’s house 
at Cockermouth was a high terrace that com- 
manded a fine view of the river Derwent and 
Cockermouth Castle. This was our favorite 
play-ground. The terrace-wall, a low one, was 
covered with closely-clipt privet and roses, 
which gave an almost impervious shelter to 
birds that built their nests there. The latter of 
these stanzas alludes to one of those nests. 
(Wordsworth. ) 


BEHOLD, within the leafy shade, 
Those bright blue eggs together laid! 
On me the chance-discovered sight 
Gleamed like a vision of delight. 

I started—seeming to espy 

The home and sheltered bed, 


has been 





The Sparrow’s dwelling, which, hard b 
My Father’s house. in wet or dry 
My sister Emmeline! and I 
Together visited. 
She looked at it and seemed to fear it ; 
Dreading, tho’ wishing, to be near it: 
Such heart was in her, being then 
A little Prattler among men. 
The Blessing of my later years 
Was with me when a boy: 
She gave me eyes, she gave me ears ; 
And humble cares, and delicate fears ; 
A heart, the fountain of sweet tears ; 
And love, and thought, and joy. 
ISO1. 1807. 


MY HEART LEAPS UP WHEN I 
BEHOLD 


My heart leaps up when I behold 
A rainbow in the sky: 
So was it when my life began ; 
So is it now lam aman; 
So be it when I shall grow old, 
Or let me die! 
The Child is father of the Man ; 
And I could wish my days to be 
Bound each to each by natural piety. 
1802, 1807. 


WRITTEN IN MARCH 


WHILE RESTING ON THE BRIDGE AT THE 
FOOT OF BROTHER’S WATER 


Extempore. This little poem was a favorite 
with Joanna Baillie. (Wordsworth) 

Compare the description of the same scene by 
Wordsworth’s sister: ‘‘ There was the gentle 
flowing of the stream, the glittering, lively lake, 
green fields without a living creature to be seen 
on them; behind us, a flat pasture with forty- 
two cattle feeding ; to our left, the road leading 
to the hamlet. No smoke there, the sun shone 
on the bare roofs. The people were at work 
ploughing, harrowing, and sowing; ...a dog 
barking now and then, coeks crowing, birds 
twittering, the snow in patches at the top of the 
highest hills, yellow palms, purple and green 
twigs on the birches, ashes with their glittering 
spikes, stems quite bare. The hawthorn a 
bright green, with black stems under the oak. 
The moss of the oak glossy. We wenton... 
William finished his poem before we got to the 
foot of Kirkstone.” (Dorothy Wordsworth’s Jour- 
nal, April 16, 1802.) 


THE Cock is crowing, 
The stream is flowing, 
The small birds twitter, 
The lake doth glitter, 


1 Dorothy Wordsworth, called Emmeline also 
in the poem Toa Butterfly. See the beautiful 
lines To my Sister, p. 8, the last lines of the 
Sonnet p. 31, and notes on the Sonnets of 1802. 


WORDSWORTH 27 





The green field sleeps in the sun ; 
The oldest and youngest 
Are at work with the strongest ; 
The cattle are grazing, 
Their heads never raising ; 
There are forty feeding like one! 


Like an army defeated 
The snow hath retreated, 
And now doth fare ill 
On the top of the bare hill: 
The ploughboy is whooping—anon— 
anon : ' 
There’s joy in the mountains ; 
There’s life in the fountains ; 
Small clouds are sailing, 
Blue sky prevailing : 
The rain is over and gone! 
1802. 1807. 


TO THE SMALL CELANDINE 


Written at Town-end, Grasmere. It is re- 
markable that this flower, coming out so early 
in the spring as it does, and so bright and beauti- 
ful, and in such profusion, should not have been 
noticed earlier in English verse. What adds 
much to the interest that attends it is its habit 
of shutting itself up and opening out according 
to the degree of light and temperature of the 
air. (Wordsworth.) 


PANSIES, lilies, kingcups, daisies, 
Let them live upon their praises ; 
‘Long as there’s asun that sets, 
Primroses will have their glory ; 
Long as there are violets, 

They will have a place in story : 
There’s a flower that shall be mine, 
’Tis the little Celandine. 


Eyes of some men travel far 

For the finding of a star ; 

Up and down the heavens they go, 
Men that keep a mighty rout! 

I’m as great as they, I trow, 

Since the day I found thee out, 
Little Flower !—I’ll make a stir, 
Like a sage astronomer. 


Modest, yet withal an Elf 

Bold, and lavish of thyself ; 

Since we needs must first have met 
I have seen thee, high and low, 
Thirty years or more, and yet 
*Twas a face I did not know ; 

Thou hast now, go where I may, 
Fifty greetings in a day. 


Ere a leaf is on a bush, 
In the time before the thrush 


Has a thought about her nest, 
Thou wilt come with half a call, 
Spreading out thy glossy breast 
Like a careless Prodigal ; 

Telling tales about the sun, 

When we've little warmth, or none. 


Poets, vain men in their mood! 
Travel with the multitude : 
Never heed them ; I aver 

That they all are wanton wooers ; 
But the thrifty cottager, 

Who stirs little out of doors, 
Joys to spy thee near her home ; 
Spring is coming, Thouart come! 


Comfort have thou of thy merit, 
Kindly, unassuming Spirit ! 
Careless of thy neighborhood, 
Thou dost show thy pleasant face 
On the moor, and in the wood, 

In the lane ; there’s not a place, 
Howsoever mean it be, 

But *tis good enough for thee. 


Ill befall the yellow flowers, 
Children of the flaring hours! 
Buttercups, that will be seen, 
Whether we will see or no; 
Others, too, of lofty mien ; 

They have done as worldlings do, 
Taken praise that should be thine, 
Little, humble Celandine ! 


Prophet of delight and mirth, 
Ill-requited upon earth ; 

Herald of a mighty band, 

Of a joyous train ensuing, 

Serving at my heart’s command, 
Tasks that are no tasks renewing, 

I will sing, as doth behove, 

Hymns in praise of what I love! 
1802. 1807. 


TO THE SAME FLOWER 


PLEASURES newly found are sweet 
When they lie about our feet : 
February last, my heart 

First at sight of thee was glad ; 

All unheard of as thou art, 

Thou must needs, I think, have had, 
Celandine ! and long ago, 

Praise of which I nothing know. 


I have not a doubt but he, 
Whosoe’er the man might be, 
Who the first with pointed rays 
(Workman worthy to be sainted) 


28 BRITISH POETS 





Set the sign-board in a blaze, 
When the rising sun he painted, 
Took the fancy from a glance 
At thy glittering countenance. 


Soon as gentle breezes bring 

News of winter’s vanishing, 

And the children build their bowers, 
Sticking *kerchief-plots of mould 

All about with full-blown flowers, 
Thick as sheep in shepherd's fold! 
With the proudest thou art there, 
Mantling in the tiny square. 


Often have I sighed to measure 
By myself a lonely pleasure. 
Sighed to think I read a book 
Only read, perhaps, by me ; 
Yet I long could overlook 

Thy bright coronet and Thee, 
And thy arch and wily ways, 
And thy store of other praise. 


Blithe of heart, from week to week 
Thou dost play at hide-and-seek ; 
While the patient primrose sits 
Like a beggar in the cold, 

Thou, a flower of wiser wits, 
Slipp’st into thy sheltering hold ; 
Liveliest of the vernal train 

When ye all are out again. 


Drawn by what peculiar spell, 
By what charm of sight or smell, 
Does the dim-eyed curious Bee, 
Laboring for her waxen cells, 
Fondly settle upon Thee 

Prized above all buds and bells 
Opening daily at thy side, 

By the season multiplied ? 


Thou are not beyond the moon, 

But a thing ‘‘ beneath our shoon: ” 

Let the bold Discoverer thrid 

In his bark the polar sea ; 

Rear who willa pyramid ; 

Praise it is enough for me, 

If there be but three or four 

Who will love my little Flower. 
1802. 1807. 


RESOLUTION AND INDEPENDENCE 


This poem was originally known as The Leech 
Gatherer, and is still often called by that title. 
Compare the account of its origin, in Dorothy 
Wordsworth’s Journal : 

‘* When Wiliam and I returned, we met an old 
man almost double. He had on a coat, thrown 
over his shoulders, above his waistcoat and coat. 


Under this he carried a bundle, and had an apron 
on and a night-cap. His face was interesting. 
He had dark eyes and along nose. John, who 
afterwards met him at Wytheburn, took him for 
a Jew. He was of Scotch parents, but had been 
borninthe army. He had had a wife, and ‘she 
was a good woman, and it pleased God to bless us 
with ten children.’ All these were dead but one, 
of whom he had not heard for many years, a 
sailor. His trade was to gather leeches, but now 
leeches were scarce, and he had not strength for 
it. Helived by begging, and was making his way 
to Carlisle, where he should buy a few godly 
books to sell. He said leeches were very scarce, 
partly owing to this dry season, but many years 
they have beenscarce. He supposed it owing to 
their .being much sought after, that they did not 
breed fast, and were of slow growth. Leeches 
were formerly 2s. 6d. per 100; they are now 30s. 
He had been hurt in driving a cart, his leg broken, 
his body driven over, his skull fractured. He 
felt no pain till he recovered from his first insen- 
sibility. ...It was then late in the evening, 
when the light was just going away.” (Dorothy 
Wordsworth’s Journal, October 3, 1800.) 


THERE was a roaring in the wind all 
night ; 

The rain came heavily and fellin floods ; 

But now the sun is rising calm and 
bright ; 

The birds aré singing in the distant 
woods ; 

Over his own sweet voice the Stock-dove 
broods ; 

The Jay makes answer as the Magpie 
chatters ; 

And all the air is filled with pleasant 
noise of waters. 


All things that love the sun are out of 
doors ; 

The sky rejoices in the morning’s birth ; 

The grass is bright with rain-drops ;—on 
the moors 

The hare is running races in her mirth ; 

And with her feet she from the plashy 
earth 

Raises a mist, that, glittering in the sun, 

Runs with her all the way, wherever she 
doth run. 


I was a Traveller then upon the moor, 

I saw the hare that raced about with 
JOY ; 

I heard the woods and distant waters 
roar ; 

Or heard them not, as happy as a boy : 

The pleasant season did my heart em- 
ploy : 

My old remembrances went from me 
wholly ; 

And all the ways of men, so vain and 
melancholy. 


WORDSWORTH 29 





But, as it sometimes chanceth, from the 
might 

Of joy in minds that can no further go, 

As high as we have mounted in delight 

In our dejection do we sink as low ; 

To me that morning did it happen so; 

And fears and fancies thick upon me 
came ; 

Dim sadness—and blind thoughts, I 
knew not, nor could name. 


T heard the skylark warbling in the sky ; 
And I bethought me of the playful hare : 
Even such a happy Child of earth am 1; 
Even as these blissful creatures do I fare ; 
Far from the world I walk, and from all 
care ; 
But there may come another day to me— 
Solitude, pain of heart, distress, and 
poverty. 


My whole lifeI have lived in pleasant 
thought, 

As if life’s business were a summer 
mood ; 

As if all needful things would come un- 
sought 

To genial faith, still rich in genial good ; 

But how can he expect that others 
should 

Build for him, sow for him, and at his 
call 

Love him, who for himself will take no 
heed at all? 


I thought of Chatterton, the marvellous 


Boy, 

The sleepless Soul that perished in his 
pride ; 

Of him who walked in glory and in joy 

Following his plough, along the moun- 
tain-side : 

By our own spirits are we deified : 

We Poets in our youth begin in glad- 
Ness ; 

But thereof come in the end desponden- 
cy and madness. 


Now, whether it were by peculiar grace, 

A leading from above, a something 
given, 

Yet it befell, that, in this lonely place, 

When I with these untoward thoughts 
had striven, 

Beside a pool bare to the eye of heaven 

I saw a Man before me unawares: 

The oldest man he seemed that ever wore 
gray hairs, 





As a huge stone is sometimes seen to lie 

Couched on the bald top of an eminence ; 

Wonder to all who do the same espy, 

By what means it could thither come, 
and whence ; 

So that it seems a thing endued with 
sense : 

Like a sea-beast crawled forth, that on a 
shelf 

Of rock or sand reposeth, there to sun 
itself ; 


Such seemed this Man, not all alive nor 
dead, 

Nor all asleep, in his extreme old age: 

His body was bent double, feet and head 

Coming together in life’s pilgrimage ; 

Asifsome dire constraint of pain, or rage 

Of sickness felt by him in times long 
past, 

A more than human weight upon his 
frame had cast. 


Himself he propped, limbs, body, and 
pale face, 

Upon a long gray staff of shaven wood : 

And, still as I drew near with gentle 
pace, 

Upon the margin of that moorish flood 

Motionless as a cloud the old Man stood, 

That heareth not the loud winds when 
they call 

And moveth all together, if it move at 
all. 


At length, himself unsettling, he the 
pond 

Stirred with his staff, and fixedly did look 

Upon the muddy water, which he 
conned, 

As if he had been reading in a book : 

And now a stranger’s privilege I took ; 

And, drawing to his side, to him did say, 

‘“This morning gives us promise of a 
glorious day.” 


A gentle answer did the old Man make, 

In courteous speech which forth he 
slowly drew : 

And him with further words I thus be- 
spake, 

**¢ What occupation do you there pursue ? 

This isa lonesome place for one like you.” 

Ere he replied, a flash of mild surprise 

Broke from the sable orbs of his yet- 
vivid eyes, ; 


His words came feebly, from a feeble 
chest, 
But each in solemn order followed each, 


30 BRITISH]POETS 





With something of a lofty utterance 
drest— 

Choice word and measured phrase, 
above the reach 

Of ordinary men; a stately speech ; 

Such as grave Livers do in Scotland use, 

Religious men, who give to God and 
man their dues. 


He told, that to these waters he had 
come 

To gather leeches, being old and poor : 

Employ ment hazardous and wearisome ! 

And he had many hardships to endure: 

From pond to pond he roamed, from 
moor to moor ; 

Housing, with God’s good help, by choice 
or chance, 

And in this way he gained an honest 
maintenance. 


The old Man still stood talking by my 
side ; 

But now his voice to me was like a 
stream 

Searce heard; nor 
could I divide ; 

And the whole body of the Man did seem 

Like one whom I had met with in a 
dream ; 

Or like a man from some far region sent, 

To give me human strength, by apt ad- 
monishment. 


word from word 


My former thoughts returned: the fear 
that kills ; 

And hope that is unwilling to be fed ; 

Cold, pain, and labor, and all fleshly ills ; 

And mighty Poets in their misery dead. 

—Perplexed, and longing to be com- 
forted, 

My question eagerly did I renew, 

‘* How is it that you live, and what is it 
you do?” 


He with a smile did then his words 
repeat ; 

And said, that, gathering leeches, far 
and wide 

He travelled ; 
feet 

The waters of the pools where they 
abide. 

* Once I could meet with them on every 
side ; 

But they have dwindled long by slow 
decay ; 

Yet still I persevere, and find them 
where I may.” 


stirring thus about his 





While he was talking thus, the lonely 
place, 

The old Man’s shape, and speech—all 
troubled me: 

In my mind’s eye I seemed to see him 
pace 

About the weary moors continually, 

Wandering about alone and silently. 

While I these thoughts within myself 
pursued, 

He, having made a pause, the same dis- - 
course renewed, 


And soon with this he other matter 
blended, 

Cheerfully uttered, with demeanor kind, 

But stately in the main ; and when he 
ended, 

i aes have laughed myself to scorn, to 

nd 
In that decrepit Man so firm a mind. 
oe aoe : ale I, ‘*be my help and stay 


Tl fine "OE ie Leech-gatherer on the 
lonely moor!” 1802. 1807. 


I GRIEVED FOR BUONAPARTE 


The direct influence of Milton seems evident 
in many of the following sonnets, and is con- 
firmed by the entry in Dorothy Wordsworth’s 
Journal, May 21, 1802: ‘‘ William wrote two 
sonnets of Buonaparte, after I had read Milton’s 
sonnets to him.” See also Wordsworth’s note on 
‘“*Nuns fret not at their convent’s narrow room,”’ 


p. 48 


I GRIEVED for Buonaparté, with a vain 

Andanun thinking guef! The tenderest 
mood 

Of that Man’s mind—what can it be? 
what food 

Fed his first hopes? what knowledge 
could he gain? 

‘Tis not in battles that from youth we 
train 

The Governor who must be wise and 
good, 

And temper with the sternness of the 
brain 

Thoughts motherly, and meek as woman- 
hood, 

Wisdom doth live with children round 
her knees : 

Books, leisure, perfect freedom, and the 
talk 

Man holds with week-day man in the 
hourly walk 

Of the mind’s business: 
degrees 


these are the 


WORDSWORTH 31 





By which true Sway doth mount; this 
is the stalk 

True Power doth grow on; and her rights 

are these. 1802, 1807. 


COMPOSED UPON WESTMINSTER 
BRIDGE, SEPTEMBER 3, 1802 


‘““We left London on Saturday morning at 
half-past five or six, the 30th of July. We 
mounted the Dover coach at Charing Cross. It 
was a beautiful morning. The city, St. Paul’s, 
with the river, and a multitude of little boats, 
made a most beautiful sight as we crossed 
Westminster Bridge. The houses were not over- 
hung by their cloud of smoke, and they were 
spread out endlessly; yet the sun shone so 
brightly, with such a fierce light, that there was 
even something like the purity of one of nature’s 
own grand spectacles.’ (Dorothy Wordsworth s 
Journal, July, 1802.) 


EARTH has not anything to show more 
fair : 

Dull would he be of soul who could pass 
by 

A sight so touching in its majesty: 

This City now doth, like a garment, 
wear 

The beauty of the morning; silent, bare, 

Ships, towers, domes, theatres and tem- 
ples lie 

Open unto the fields, and to the sky ; 

All bright and glittering in the smoke- 
less air. 

Never did sun more beautifully steep 

In his first splendor, valley, rock, or 
hill ; 

Ne’er saw I. never felt, a calm so deep! 

The river glideth at his own sweet will : 

Dear God ! the very houses seem asleep ; 

And all that mighty heart is lying still! 

1802. 1807. 


COMPOSED BY THE SEA-SIDE, 
NEAR CALAIS, Auaust, 1802 


* We had delightful walks after the heat of the 
day was passed—seeing far off in the west the 
coast of England like a cloud crested with Dover 
Castle, which was but like the summit of the 
cloud—the evening starand the glory of thesky, 
the reflections in the water were more beautiful 
than the sky itself, purple waves brighter than 
precious stones, for ever melting away upon the 
Nothing in romance was ever half so 
beautiful. Now came in. view, as the evening 
star sunk down, and the colors of the west 
faded away, the two Jights of England.”’ (Doro- 
thy Wordsworth’s Journal, August, 1802.) 


Fair Star of evening, Splendor of the 
west, 

Star of my Country !—on the horizon’s 
brink 








Thou hangest, stooping, as might seem, 
to sink 

On England’s bosom; yet well pleased 
to rest, 

Meanwhile, and be to her a glorious crest 

Conspicuous to the Nations. Thou, I 
think, 

Should’st be my Country’s emblem ; and 
should’st wink, 

Bright Star! with laughter on her ban- 
ners, drest 


In thy fresh beauty. There! that dusky 


é spot 
Beneath thee, that is England ; there she 
lies. 
Blessings be on you both ! one hope, one 
lot, 





One life, one glory !—I, with many a fear 
For my dear Country, many heartfelt 


sighs, 
Among men who do not love her, linger 
here. 1802. 1807. 


IT IS A BEAUTEOUS EVENING, 
CALM AND FREE 


This was composed on the beach near Calais, 
in the autumn of 1802. (Wordsworth.) 

The last six lines are addressed to Words- 
worth’s sister Dorothy. See note to the preced- 
ing Sonnet. 


' Irisa beauteous evening, calm and free, 
~The holy time is quiet as a Nun 


Breathless with adoration ; the broad sun 

Is sinking down in its tranquillity ; 

The gentleness of heaven broods o’er the 
Sea: 

Listen ! the mighty Being is awake, 

And doth with his eternal motion make 

A sound like thunder—everlastingly. 

Dear Child! dear Girl! that walkest 
with me here, 

If thou appear untouched by solemn 
thought, 

Thy nature is not therefore less divine: 

Thou liest in Abraham’s bosom all the 
year ; 

And worship’st at the Temple’s inner 
shrine, 

God being with thee when we know it 
not. 1802. 1807. 


ON THE EXTINCTION OF THE 
VENETIAN REPUBLIC 


ONcE did She hold the gorgeous east in 
fee ; 

And was the safeguard of the west: the 
worth 


32 BRITISH POETS 





Of Venice did not fall below her birth, 

Venice, the eldest Child of Liberty. 

She was a maiden City, bright and free ; 

No guile seduced, no force could violate ; 

And when she took unto herself a Mate, 

She must espouse the everlasting Sea. 

And what if she had seen those glories 
fade, 

Those titles vanish, and that strength 
decay ; 

Yet shall some tribute of regret be paid 

When her long life hath reached its final 
day: 

Men are we, and must grieve when even 
the Shade 

Of that which once was great, is passed 
away. 1802. 1807. 


TO TOUSSAINT L’OUVERTURE 


TOUSSAINT, the most unhappy man of 
men ! 

Whether the whistling Rustic tend his 
plough 

Within thy hearing, or thy head be now 

Pillowed in some deep dungeon’s earless 
den ;— 

O miserable Chieftain ! where and when 

Wilt thou find patience ? Yet die not ; 


do thou 

Wear rather in thy bonds a cheerful 
brow : 

Though fallen thyself, never to rise 
again, 


Live, and take comfort. Thou hast 
left behind 

Powers that will work for thee; air, 
earth, and skies ; 


There’s not a breathing of the common 


wind 

That will forget thee; thou hast great 
allies ; 

Thy friends are exultations, agonies., 

And love, and man’s unconquerable 
mind. PSOL TR VEGT: 


NEAR DOVER, SEPTEMBER, 1802 


INLAND, within a hollow vale, I stood ; 

And saw, while sea was calm and air 
was clear, 

The coast of France—the coast of France 
how near! 

Drawn almost into frightful neighbor- 
hood. 

{ shrunk ; for verily the barrier flood 

Was like a lake, or river bright and 
fair, 





A span of waters; yet what power is 
there ! 

What mightiness for evil and for good! 

Even so doth God protect us if we be | 

Virtuous and wise. Winds blow, and 
waters roll, 

Strength to the brave, and Power, and 


Deity ; 
Yet in themselves are nothing! One 
decree 
Spake laws to them, and said that by the 
soul 
Only, the Nations shall be great and free. 
1802. 1807. 


WRITTEN IN LONDON, SEPTEMBER, 
1802 


This was written immediately after my return 
from France to London, when I could not but 
be struck, as here described, with the vanity 
and parade of our own country, especially in 
great towns and cities, as contrasted with the 
quiet, and I may say the desolation, that the 
revolution had produced in France. This must 
be borne in mind, or else the reader may think 
that in this and the succeeding Sonnets I have 
exaggerated the mischief engendered and fos- 
tered among us by undisturbed wealth. It would 
not be easy to conceive with what a depth of feel- 
ing I entered into the struggle carried on by the 
Spaniards for their deliverance from the usurped 
power of the French. Many times have I gone 
from Allan Bank in Grasmere vale, where we 
were then residing, to the top of the Raise-gap 
as it is called, so late as two o’clock in the morn- 
ing, to meet the carrier bringing the newspaper 
from Keswick. Imperfect traces of the state of 


‘mind in which I then was may be found in my 


Tract on the Convention of Cintra, as well as in 
these Sonnets. (Wordsworth.) 


O FRIEND! I know not which way I must 
look 

For comfort, being, as I am, opprest, 

To think that now our life is only drest 

For show ; mean handy-work of crafts- 
man, cook, 

Or groom !—We must run glittering like 
a brook 

In the open sunshine, or we are unblest : 

The wealthiest man among us is the 
best : 

No grandeur now in nature or in book 

Delights us. Rapine, avarice, expense, 

This is idolatry : and these we adore: 

Plain living and high thinking are no 


more : 

The homely beauty of the good old 
cause 

Is gone; our peace, our fearful inno- 
cence, 

And pure religion breathing household 
laws, 1802, 1807. 


WORDSWORTH 33 








LONDON, 1802 


Mitton! thou shouldst be living at this 
hour : 


England hath need of thee; she is a tht 


Of stagnant waters: altar, sword, and 
pen, 

Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and 
bower, 

Have forfeited their ancient English 
dower 

Of inward happiness. We are selfish 
men ; 


Oh! raise us up, return to us again ; 

And give us manners, virtue, freedom, 
power. 

Thy soul was like a Star, and dwelt 
apart: 

Thou hadst a voice whose sound was 
like the sea: 


Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, 
free, 

So didst thou travel on life’s common 
way, 


Incheerful godliness; and yet thy heart 
The lowliest duties on herself did lay. 
1802, 1807. 


GREAT MEN HAVE BEEN 
AMONG US 


GREAT men have been among us; hands 
that penned 

And tongues that uttered wisdom—bet- 
ter none: 

The later Sidney, Marvel, Harrington, 

Young Vane, and others who called 
Milton friend. 

These moralists could act and compre- 
hend 

They knew how genuine glory was put 
on; 

Taught us how rightfully a nation shone 

In splendor: what strength was, that 
would not bend 

But in magnanimous meekness. France, 
tis str ange, 

Hath brought forth no such souls as we 
had then. 

Perpetual emptiness ! unceasing change ! 

No single volume paramount, no code, 

No master spirit, no determined road ; 

But puuatly a want of books and men! 

1S02. 1807. 


IT IS NOT TO BE THOUGHT OF 


It is not to be thought of that the 
Flood 


Of British freedom, which, to the opensea 





Of the world’s praise, from dark an- 
tiquity 

Hath flowed, ‘‘ with pomp of waters, un- 
withstood,” 

Roused though it be full often toa mood 

Which spurns the check of salutary 
bands, 

That this most famous stream in bogs 
and sands 

Should perish ; and to evil and to good 

Be lost for ever. In our halls is hung 

Armory of the invincible Knights of 
old: 

We must be free or die, who speak the 
tongue 

That Shakspeare spake ; 
morals hold 

Which Milton held.—In everything we 
are sprung 

Of Earth’s first blood, have titles mani- 
fold. 1802, 1807. 


the faith and 


WHEN I HAVE BORNE IN 
MEMORY 


WHEN [ have borne in memory what has 
tamed 

Great Nations, how ennobling thoughts 
depart 

When men change swords for ledgers, 
and desert 

The student’s bower for gold, some fears 
unnamed 

I had, my Country !— 
blamed ? 

Now, when I think of thee, and what 
thou art, 

Verily, in the bottom of my heart, 

Of those unfilial fears Iam ashamed. 

For dearly must we prize thee; we who 
find 

In thee a bulwark for the cause of men : 

And I by my affection was beguiled : 

What wonder if a Poet now and then, 

Among the many movements of his 
mind, 

Felt for thee as a lover or a child! 

1802, 1807. 


am I to be 


TO HARTLEY COLERIDGE 
SIX YEARS OLD 


O THOU! whose fancies from afar are 
brought ; 

Who of thy words dost make a mock 
apparel, 

And fittest to unutterable thought 

The breeze-like motion and the self- 
born carol ; 


34 BRITISH “POETS 


Thou faery voyager! that dost float 
In such clear water, that thy boat 
May rather seem 
To brood on air than on an earthly 
stream ; 
Suspended in a stream as clear as sky, 
Where earth and heaven do make one 
imagery ; 
O blessed vision! happy child! 
Thou art so exquisitely wild, 
I think of thee with many fears 
For what may be thy lot in future years. 
I thought of times when Pain might 
be thy guest. 
Lord of thy house and hospitality ; 
And Grief, uneasy lover ! never rest 
But when she sate within the touch of 
thee. 
O too industrious folly ! 
O vain and causeless melancholy ! 
Nature will either end thee quite ; 
Or, lengthening out thy season of delight, 
Preserve for thee, by individual right, 
A young lamb’s heart among the full- 
grown flocks. 
What hast thou to do with sorrow, 
Or the injuries of to-morrow ? 
Thou art a dew-drop, which the morn 
brings forth, 
Ill fitted to sustain unkindly shocks, 
Or to be trailed along the soiling earth ; 
A gem that glitters while it lives, 
And no forewarning gives ; 
But, at the touch of wrong, without a 
strife 
Slips in a moment out of life. 
1802. 1807. 


OCT EEDA Loo. 


IN youth from rock to rock I went, 

From hill to hill in discontent 

Of pleasure high and turbulent, 
Most pleased when most uneasy ; 

But now my own delights I make,— 

My thirst at every rill can slake, 

And gladly Nature’s love partake, 
Of Thee, sweet Daisy ! 


Thee Winter in the garland wears 

That thinly decks his few gray hairs ; 

Spring parts the clouds with softest airs, 
That she may sun thee ; 

Whole Summer-fields are thine by right ; 

And Autumn, melancholy Wight! 

Doth in thy crimson head delight 

When rains are on thee. 


In shoals and bands, a morrice train, 
Thou greet’st the traveller in the lane ; 


Pleased at his greeting thee again ; 
Yet nothing daunted, 
Nor grieved if thou be set at nought : 
‘And oft alone in nooks remote 
We meet thee, like a pleasant thought, 
When such are wanted. 


Be violets in their secret mews 
The flowers the wanton Zephyrs choose ; 
Proud be the rose, with rains and dews 
Her head impearling ; 
Thou liv’st with less ambitious aim, 
Yet hast not gone without thy fame ; 
Thou art indeed by many a claim 
The Poet’s darling. 


If to‘a rock from rains he fly, 
Or, some bright day of April sky, 
Imprisoned by hot sunshine lie 
Near the green holly, 
And wearily at length should fare ; 
He needs but look about, and there 
Thou art !—a friend at hand, to scare 
His melancholy. 


A hundred times, by rock or bower, 

Ere thus I have lain couched an hour, 

Have I derived from thy sweet power 
Some apprehension ; 

Some steady love; some brief delight ; 

Some memory that had taken flight ; 

Some chime of fancy wrong or right ; 
Or stray invention. 


If stately passions in me burn, 
And onechance look to Thee should turn, 
I drink out of an humbler urn 
A lowlier pleasure ; 
The homely sympathy that heeds 
The common life our nature breeds ; 
A wisdom fitted to the needs 
Of hearts at leisure. 


Fresh-smitten by the morning ray, 
When thou art up, alert and gay, 
Then, cheerful Flower! my spirits play 
With kindred gladness : 
And when, at dusk, by dews opprest 
Thou sink’st, the image of thy rest 
Hath often eased my pensive breast 
Of careful sadness. 


And all day long I number yet, 

All seasons through, another debt, 

Which I, wherever thou art anet, 
To thee am owing; 

An instinct call it, a blind sense ; 

A happy, genial influence, 

Coming one knows not how, nor whence, 
Nor whither going. 


WORDSWORTH 35 


Child of the Year! that round dost run 
Thy pleasant course,—when day’s begun 
As ready to salute the sun 
As lark or leveret, 
Thy long-lost praise thou shalt regain ; 
Nor be less dear to future men 
Than in old time: thou not in vain 
Art Nature’s favorite.! 7802. 1807. 


TO THE SAME FLOWER 


WITH little here to do or see 
Of things that in the great world be, 
Daisy ! again I talk to thee, 
For thou art worthy, 
Thou unassuming Common-place 
Of Nature, with that homely face, 
And yet with something of a grace, 
Which Love makes for thee! 


. Oft on the dappled turf at ease 
I sit, and play with similes, 
Loose types of things through all de- 
grees, 
Thoughts of thy raising : 
And many a fond and idle name 
I give to thee, for praise or blame, 
As is the humor of the game, 
While Lam gazing. 


A nun demure of lowly port; 

Or sprightly maiden, of Love’s court, 

In thy simplicity the sport 
Of all temptations ; 

A queen in crown of rubies drest ; 

A starveling in a scanty vest ; 

Are all, as seems to suit thee best, 
Thy appellations. 


A little cyclops, with one eye 

Staring to threaten and defy. 

That thought comes next—and instantly 
The freak is over, 

The shape will vanish—and behold 

A silver shield with boss of gold, 

That spreads itself, some faery bold 
In fight to cover! 


I see thee glittering from afar— 
And then thou art a pretty star ; 
Not quite so fair as many are 

In heaven above thee! 
Yet like a star, with glittering crest, 
Self-poised in air thou seem’st to rest ;— 
May peace come never to his nest, 

Who shall reprove thee ! 


1 See, in Chaucer and the elder Poets, the 
honors formerly paid to this flower. 
( Wordswortlt.) 


Bright Flower! for by that name at last, 
When all my reveries are past, 
I call thee, and to that cleave fast, 
Sweet silent creature ! 
That breath’st with me in sun and air, 
Do thou, as thou art wont, repair 
My heart with gladness, and a share 
Of thy meek nature! 1802. 1807. 


TO THE DAISY 


BRIGHT Flower! whose home is every- 
where, "5 

Bold in maternal Nature’s care, 

And all the long year through, the heir 
Of joy or sorrow ; 

Methinks that there abides in thee 

Some concord with humanity, 

Given to no other flower I see 
The forest thorough ! 


Is it that Man is soon deprest ? 
A thoughtless Thing! who, once un- 
blest, 
Does little on his memory rest, 
Or on his reason, 
And Thou would’st teach him how to 
find 
A shelter under every wind, 
A hope for times that are unkind 
And every season ? 


Thou wander'st the wide world about, 

Unchecked by pride or scrupulous doubt, 

With friends to greet thee, or without, 
Yet pleased and willing ; 

Meek, yielding to the occasion’s call, 

And all things suffering from all, 

Thy function apostolical 
In peace fulfilling. 


THE GREEN LINNET 


I802. 21807. 


BENEATH these fruit-tree boughs that 
shed 
Their snow-white blossoms on my head, 
With brightest sunshine round me 
spread 
Of spring’s unclouded weather, 
In this sequestered nook how sweet 
To sit upon my orchard-seat ! 
And birds and flowers once more to 
greet, 
My last year’s friends together. 


One have I marked, the happiest guest 
In all this covert of the blest : 
Hail to Thee, far above the rest 

In joy of voice and pinion! 


36 BRITISH POETS 


Thou, Linnet! in thy green array, 

Presiding Spirit here to-day, 

Dost lead the revels of the May ; 
And this is thy dominion. 


While birds, and butterflies, and flow- 
ers, 
Make all one band of paramours, 
Thou, ranging up and down the bowers, 
Art sole in thy employment : 
A Life, a Presence like the Air, 
Scattering thy gladness without care, 
Too blest with any one to pair ; 
Thyself thp own enjoyment. 


Amid yon tuft of hazel trees, 
That twinkle to the gusty breeze, 
Behold him perched in ecstasies, 

Yet seeming still to hover ; 
There! where the flutter of his wings 
Upon his back and body flings 
Shadows and sunny glimmerings, 

That cover him all over. 


My dazzled sight he oft deceives, 

A Brother of the dancing leaves ; 

Then flits, and from the cottage-eaves 
Pours forth his song in gushes ; 

As if by that exulting strain 

He mocked and treated with disdain 

The voiceless Form he chose to feign, 
While fluttering in the bushes. 

1803. 1807. 


YEW-TREES 


Compare the note on A Night-Piece. 


THERE is a Yew-tree, pride of Lorton 
Vale, 

Which to this day stands single, in the 
midst 

Of its own darkness, as it stood of 
Tore 5 

Not loth to furnish weapons for the 
bands 

Of Umfraville or Percy ere they marched 

To Scotland’s heaths; or those that 
crossed the sea 

And drew their sounding bows at Azin- 
cour, 

Perhaps at earlier Crecy, or Poictiers. 

Of vast circumference and gloom pro- 
found 

This solitary Tree! a living thing 

Produced too slowly ever to decay ; 

Of form and aspect too magnificent 

To be destroyed. But worthier still of 
note 





Are those fraternal Four of Borrowdale, 

Joined in one solemn and capacious 
grove ; 

Huge trunks; and each particular trunk 
a growth 

Of intertwisted fibres serpentine 

Up-coiling, and inveterately convolved ; 


Nor uninformed with Phantasy, and 
. looks 

That threaten the profane ;—a pillared 
shade, 

Upon whose grassless floor of red-brown 
hue, 

By sheddings from the pining umbrage 
tinged 


Perennially—beneath whose sable roof 

Of boughs, as if for festal purpose, 

decked 

unrejoicing 

Shapes 

May meet at noontide ; Fear and trem- 
bling Hope, 

Silence and Foresight ; Death the Skele- 
ton 

And Time the Shadow ;—there to cele- 
brate, 

As ina natural temple scattered o’er 


With berries—ghostly 


With altars undisturbed of mossy stone, 


United worship; or in mute repose 

To he, and listen to the mountain flood 

Murmuring from Glaramara’s inmost 
caves. 1803, 1807. 


AT THE GRAVE OF BURNS 
1808 


SEVEN YEARS AFTER HIS DEATH 


For illustration, see my Sister’s Journal. 

(Wordsworth). 

I SHIVER, Spirit fierce and bold, 

At thought of what I now behold: 

As vapors breathed from dungeons 

cold, 

Strike pleasure dead, 

So sadness comes from out the mould 
Where Burns is laid. 


And have I then thy bones so near, 
And thou forbidden to appear ? 
As if it were thyself that’s here 
I shrink with pain ; 
And both my wishes and my fear 
Alike are vain. 


Off weight—nor press on weight !— 
away 

Dark thoughts !they came, but not to 
stay ; 


WORDSWORTH 37 


With chastened feelings would I pay 
The tribute due 

To him, and aught that hides his clay 
From mortal view. 


Fresh as the flower, whose modest worth 
He sang, his genius ‘‘ glinted ” forth, 
Rose like a star that touching earth, 
For so it seems, 
Doth glorify its humble birth 
With matchless beams. 


The piercing eve, the thoughtful brow, 
The struggling heart, where be they 
now ?— 
Full soon the Aspirant of the plough, 
The prompt, the brave, 
Slept, with the obscurest, in the low 
And silent grave. 


I mourned with thousands, but as one 

More deeply grieved, for He was gone 

Whose light I hailed when first it shone, 
And showed my youth 

How Verse may build a princely throne 
On humble truth. 


Alas! where’er the current tends, 
Regret pursues and with it blends,— 
Huge Criffel’s hoary top ascends 
By Skiddaw seen, 
Neighbors we were, and loving friends 
We might have been ; 





True friends though diversely inclined ; 
But heart with heart and mind with 
mind, 
Where the main fibres are entwined, 
Through Nature’s skill, 
May even by contraries be joined 
More closely still. 


The tear will start, and let it flow ; 
Thou ‘“ poor Inhabitant below,” 
At this dread moment—even so— 
Might we together 
Have sate and talked where 
blow, 
Or on wild heather. 


gowans 


What treasures would have then been 
placed 
Within my reach ; of knowledge graced 
By fancy what a rich repast ! 
But why go on ?— 
Oh! spare to sweep, thou mournful 
blast, 
His grave grass-grown, 





There, too, a Son, his joy and pride, 
(Not three weeks past the Stripling 
died, ) 

Lies gathered to his Father’s side, 
Soul-moving sight ! 

Yet one to which is not denied 
Some sad delight : 


For he is safe, a quiet bed 
Hath early found among the dead, 
Harbored where none can be misled, 
Wronged, or distrest ; 
And surely here it may be said 
That such are blest. 


And oh for Thee, by pitying grace 

Checked oft-times in a devious race, 

May He who halloweth the place 
Where Man is laid 

Receive thy Spirit in the embrace 
For which it prayed ! 


Sighing I turned away ; but ere 
Night fell I heard, or seemed to hear, 
Music that sorrow comes not near, 
A ritual hymn, 
Chanted in love that casts out fear 
By Seraphim. 
1808. 1845. 


TO A HIGHLAND GIRL 


AT INVERSNEYDE, UPON LOCH LOMOND 


This delightful creature and her demeanor are 
particularly described in my Sister’s Journal. 
(Wordsworth.) 


SWEET Highland Girl, a very shower 

Of beauty is thy earthly dower! 

Twice seven consenting years have shed 

Their utmost bounty on thy head : 

And these gray rocks ; that household 
lawn; 

Those trees, a veil just half withdrawn ; 

This fall of water that doth make 

A murmur near the silent lake ; 

This little bay ; a quiet road 

That holds in shelter thy Abode— 

In truth together do ye seem 

Like something fashioned in a dream ; 

Such Forms as from their covert peep 

When earthly cares are laid asleep ! 

But, O fair Creature! in the light 

Of common day, so heavenly bright, 

I bless Thee, Vision as thou art 

I bless thee with a human heart ; 

God shield thee to thy latest years ! 

Thee neither know I, nor thy peers ; 

And yet my eyes are filled with tears. 


38 BRITISH® POETS 





With earnest feeling I shall pray 
For thee when I am far away : 
For never saw I mien, or face, 
In which more plainly I could trace 
Benignity and home-bred sense 
Ripening in perfect innocence. 
Here scattered, like a random seed, 
Remote from men, Thou dost not need 
The embarrassed look of shy distress,, 
And maidenly shamefacedness : 
Thou wear’st upon thy forehead clear 
The freedom of a Mountaineer : 
A face with gladness overspread ! 
Soft smiles, by human kindness bred ! 
And seemliness complete, that sways 
Thy courtesies, about thee plays ; 
With no restraint, but such as springs 
From quick and eager visitings 
Of thoughts that lie beyond the reach 
Of thy few words of English speech: 
A bondage sweetly brooked, a strife 
That gives thy gestures grace and life ! 
So have I, not unmoved in mind, 
Seen birds of tempest-loving kind— 
Thus beating up against the wind. 
What hand but would a garland cuil 
For thee who art so beautiful ? 
O happy pleasure! here to dwell 
Beside thee in some heathy dell ; 
Adopt your homely ways, and dress, 
A Shepherd, thou a Shepherdess ! 
But I could frame a wish for thee 
More like a grave reality : 
Thou art to me but asa wave 
Of the wild sea; and I would have 
Some claim upon thee, if I could, 
Though but of common neighborhood. 
What joy to hear thee, and tosee! 
Thy elder Brother I would be, . 
Thy Father--anything to thee ! 
Now thanks to Heaven! that of its 
grace 
Hath led me to this lonely place. 
Joy have I had ; and going hence 
I bear away my recompense. 
In spots like these it is we prize 
Our Memory, feel that she hath eyes: 
Then, why should I be loth to stir ? 
I feel this place was made for her; 
To give new pleasure like the past, 
Continued long as life shall last. 
Noram I loth, though pleased at heart, 
Sweet Highland Girl! from thee to part : 
For I, methinks, till I grow old, 
As fair before me shall behold, 
As I do now, the cabin small, 
The lake, the bay, the waterfall ; 
And Thee, the spirit of them all ! 


ISO3, 1807. 





STEPPING WESTWARD 


While my Fellow-traveller and I were walk- 
ing by the side of Loch Ketterine, one fine even- 
ing after sunset, in our road to a Hut where, in 
the course of our Tour, we had been hospitably 
entertained some weeks before, we met, inone 
of the loneliest parts of that solitary region, two 
well-dressed Women, one of whom said to us by 
way of greeting, “ What, you arestepping west- 
ward?” (Wordsworth. ) 


“ What, you are stepping westward ?”” 
—‘* Yea.” 

—T would be a wildish destiny, 
If we, who thus together roam 
In a strange Land, and far from home, 
Were in this place the guests of Chance: 
Yet who would stop, or fear to advance 
Though home or shelter he had none, 
With such a sky to lead him on? 


The dewy ground was dark and cold ; 
Behind, all gloomy to behold ; 

And stepping westward seemed to be 
A kind of heavenly destiny : 

I liked the greeting ; ’t was a sound 
Of something without place or bound ;. 
And seemed to give me spiritual right 
To travel through that region bright. 


The voice was soft, and she who spake 

Was walking by her native lake: 

The salutation had to me 

The very sound of courtesy : 

Its power was felt ; and while my eye 

Was fixed upon the glowing Sky, | 

The echo of the voice enwrought 

A human sweetness with the thought 

Of travelling through the world that lay 

Before me in my endless way. “ 
1807. 


. S03. 
THE SOLITARY REAPER 


BEHOLD her, single in the field, 
Yon solitary Highland Lass ! 
Reaping and singing by herself ; 
Stop here, or gently pass! 

Alone she cuts and binds the grain, 
And sings a melancholy strain ; 

O listen! for the Vale profound 

Is overflowing with the sound. 


No Nightingale did ever chant 

More welcome notes to weary bands 
Of travellers in some shady haunt, 
Among Arabian sands : 

A voice so thrilling ne’er was heard 
In spring-time from the Cuckoo-bird, 
Breaking the silence of the seas 
Among the farthest Hebrides, 


WORDSWORTH 39 





Will no one tell me what she sings ?— 
Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow 
For old, unhappy, far-off things, 

And battles long ago: 

Or is it some more humble lay, 
Familiar matter of to-day ? 

Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain, 
That has been, and may be again ? 


Whate’er the theme, the maiden sang 
As if her song could have no ending ; 
I saw her singing at her work, 
And o’er the sickle bending ;— 
I listened. motionless and still ; 
And, as I mounted up the hill 
The music in my heart I bore, 
Long after it was heard no more. 
ISOS. 


YARROW UNVISITED 


1807. 


See the various Poems the scene of which is 
laid upon the banks of the Yarrow; in particu- 
lar, the exquisite Ballad of Hamilton beginning 
““Busk ye, busk ye, my bonny, bonny Bride,-- 

Busk ye, busk ye, my winsome Marrow !—”’ 
(Wordsworth). 


From Stirling castle we had seen 

The mazy Forth unravelled : 

Had trod the banks of Clyde, and Tay, 
And with the Tweed had travelled ; 
And when we came to Clovenford, 
Then said my ‘‘ winsome Marrow,” 

** Whate’er betide, we'll turn aside, 
And see the Braes of Yarrow.” 


** Let Yarrow folk, frae Selkirk town, 
Who have been buying, selling, 

Go back to Yarrow, ’tis their own ; 
Each maiden to her dwelling! 

On Yarrow’s banks let herons feed, 
Hares couch, and rabbits burrow ! 

But we will downward with the Tweed, 
Nor turn aside to Yarrow. 


“‘There’s Galla Water, Leader Haughs, 

Both lying right before us ; 

And Dryborough, where with chiming 
Tweed 

The lintwhites sing in chorus ; 

There’s pleasant Tiviot-dale, a land 

Made blithe with plough and harrow : 

Why throw away a needful day 

To go in search of Yarrow ? 


‘* What’s Yarrow but a river bare, 
That glides the dark hills under? 
There are a thousand such elsewhere 
As worthy of your wonder.” 


—Strange words they seemed of slight 
and scorn 

My True-love sighed for sorrow ; 

And looked me in the face, to think 

I thus could speak of Yarrow! 

‘‘Oh! green,” said I, ‘“‘are Yarrow’s 
holms, 

And sweet is Yarrow flowing! 

Fair hangs the apple frae the rock, 

But we will leave it growing. 

O’er hilly path, and open Strath, 

We'll wander Scotland thorough ; 

But, though so near, we will not turn 

Into the dale of Yarrow. 


‘* Let beeves and home-bred kine partake 
The sweets of Burn-mill meadow ; 

The swan on still St. Mary’s Lake 

Float double, swan and shadow ! 

We will not see them ; will not go, 
To-day, nor yet to-morrow, 

Enough if in our hearts we know 
There’s such a place as Yarrow. 


‘* Be Yarrow stream unseen, unknown! 
It must, or we shall rue it : 

We have a vision of our own ; 

Ah! why should we undo it? 

The treasured dreams of times long past, 
We'll keep them, winsome Marrow ! 
For when we're there, although ’tis fair, 
‘Twill be another Yarrow ! 


‘*Tf Care with freezing years should 
come, 

And wandering seem but folly,— 

Should we be loth to stir from home, 

And yet be melancholy ; 

Should life be dull, and spirits low, 

*T will soothe us in our sorrow, 

That earth has something yet to show, 

The bonny holms of Yarrow!” 


1803. 1807. 


ODE 


INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY FROM REC- 
OLLECTIONS OF EARLY CHILDHOOD 


‘In my Ode onthe Intimations of Immor- 
tality in Childhood, I do not profess to give a 
literal representation of the state of the affec- 
tions and of the moral being in childhood. I re- 
cord my own feelings at that time--my absolute 
spirituality, my ‘ all-soulness,’ if I may so speak. 
At that time I could not believe that I should lie 
down quietly in the grave, and that my body 
would moulder into dust.”? (Wordsworth in con- 
versation ; Knight’s Life of Wordsworth, II, 
326.) 

I 


THERE was a time when meadow, grove, 
and stream, 


40 BRITISH POETS 








The earth, and every common sight, 
To me did seem 
Apparelled in celestial light, 
The glory and the freshness of a dream. 
It is not now as it hath been of yore ;— 
Turn whereso’er I may, 
By night or day, 
The things which I have seen I now can 
see no more. 


II 


The Rainbow comes and goes, 
And lovely is the Rose, 
The Moon doth with delight 
Look round her when the heavens are 
bare ; 
Waters on a starry night 
Are beautiful and fair ; 
The sunshine is a glorious birth ; 
But yet I know, where’er I go, 
That there hath past away a glory from 
the earth. 
II 
Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous 
song, 
And while the young lambs bound 
As to the tabor’s sound, 
To me alone there came a thought of 
grief ; 
A timely utterance gave that thought 
relief, 
And I again am strong: 
The cataracts blow their trumpets from 
the steep ; 
No more shall grief of mine the season 
wrong ; 
I hear the Echoes through the moun- 
tains throng, 
The Winds come to me from the fields 
of sleep, 
And all the earth is gay ; 
Land and sea 
Give themselves up to jollity, 
And with the heart of May 
Doth every Beast keep holiday ;— 
Thou Child of Joy, 
Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, 
thou happy Shepherd-boy ! 


IV 


Ye blesséd Creatures, I have heard the 
call 
Ye to each other make: I see 
The heavens laugh with you in your 
jubilee ; 
My heart is at your festival, 
My head hath its coronal, 
The palaces of your bliss, I feel—I feel 
it all, 


Oh evil day ! if I were sullen 
While Earth herself is adorning, 
This sweet May-morning, 
And the Children are culling 
On every side, 
In a thousand valleys far and wide, 
Fresh flowers ; while the sun shines 
warm, 
And the Babe leaps up on his Mother’s 
arm :— 
I hear, I hear, with joy I hear! 
—But there’s a Tree, of many, one, 
A single Field which I have looked 
upon, 
Both of them speak of something that is 
gone: 
The Pansy at my feet 
Doth the same tale repeat : 
Whither is fled the visionary gleam ? 
Where is it now, the glory and the 
dream ? 
Vv 
Our birth is but a sleep and a forget- 
ting : 
The Soul that rises with us, our life’s 
Star, 
Hath had elsewhere its setting, 
And cometh from afar : 
Not in entire forgetfulness, 
And not in utter nakedness, 
But trailing clouds of glory do we come 
From God, who is our home: 
Heaven lies about us in our infancy ! 
Shades of the prison-house begin to 
close 
Upon the growing Boy, 
But he beholds the light, and whence it 
flows, 
He sees it in his joy ; 
The Youth, who daily farther from the 
east 
Must travel, still is Nature’s Priest, 
And by the vision splendid 
Is on his way attended ; 
At length the Man perceives it die 


away, 
And fade into the light of common day. 
VI 

Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her 
Own ; 

Yearnings she hath in her own natural 
kind, 

And, even with something of a Mother’s 
mind, 


And no unworthy aim, 
The homely Nurse doth all she can 
To make her Foster-child, her Inmate 
Man, 


WORDSWORTH AI 





Forget the glories he hath known, 
And that imperial palace whence he 


came. 
VII 
Behold the Child among his new-born 
blisses, 


A six years’ Darling of a pigmy size ! 

See, where ’mid work of his own hand 
he lies, 

Fretted by sallies of his mother’s kisses, 

With light upon him from his father’s 


eyes ! 

See, at his feet, some little plan or 
chart, 

Some fragment from his dream of hu- 
man life, 

Shaped by himself with newly-learned 


art: 
A wedding or a festival, 
A mourning or a funeral ; 
And this hath now his heart, 
And unto this he frames his song: 
Then will he fit his tongue 
To dialogues of business, love, or strife ; 
But it will not be long 
Ere this be thrown aside, 
And with new joy and pride 
The little Actor cons another part ; 
Filling from time to time his ‘* humor- 
ous stage” 
With all. the Persons, down to palsied 


Age, 
That Life brings with her in her equip- 
age ; 
As if his whole vocation 
Were endless imitation. 


MITE 


Thou, whose exterior semblance doth 
belie 
Thy Soul’s immensity ; 
Thou best Philosopher, who yet dost 


keep 
Thy heritage, thou Eye among the 
blind, 
That, deaf and silent, read’st the eternal 
_ deep, 


Haunted forever by the eternal mind,— 
Mighty Prophet! Seer blest! 

On whom those truths do rest, 

Which we are toiling all our lives to 
find, 

in darkness lost, the darkness of the 
grave ; 

Thou, over whom thy Immortality 

Broods like the Day, a Master o’er a 
Slave, 

A Presence which is not to be put by ; 


Thou little Child, yet glorious in the 
might 

Of heaven-born freedom on thy being’s 
height, 

Why with such earnest pains dost thou 
provoke 

The years to bring the inevitable yoke, 

Thus blindly with thy blessedness at 


strife ? 

Full soon thy Soul shall have her earthly 
freight, 

And custom lie upon thee with a 
weight, 


Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life! 


IX 


O joy! that in our embers 
Is something that doth live, 
That nature yet remembers 
What was so fugitive ! 
The thought of our past years in me 
doth breed 
Perpetual benediction : not indeed 
For that which is most worthy to be 
blest— 
Delight and liberty, the simple creed 
Of Childhood, whether busy or at rest. 
With new-fledged hope still fluttering 
in his breast :— 
Not for these I raise 
The song of thanks and praise ; 

But for those obstinate questionings 

Of sense and outward things, 

Fallings from us, vanishings ; 

Blank misgivings of a Creature 
Moving about in worlds not realized, 
High instincts before which our mortal 

Nature 
Did tremble hke a guilty Thing sur- 
prised : 
But for those first affections. 
Those shadowy recollections, 

Which, be they what they may, 

Are yet the fountain light of all our day. 

Aye yet a master light of all our seeing ; 

Uphold us, cherish, and have power 
to make 

Our noisy years seem moments in the 


being 
Of the eternal Silence: truths that 
wake, 


To perish never ; 
Which neither listlessness, nor mad en- 
deavor, 
Nor Man nor Boy, 
Nor all that is at enmity with joy, 
Can utterly abolish or destroy ! 
Hence in a season of calm weather 
Though inland far we be, 


Pa BRITISH POETS 





Our Souls have sight of that immortal 
sea 
Which brought us hither, 
Can in a moment travel thither, 
And see the Children sport upon the 
shore, 
And hear the mighty waters rolling 
evermore. 


x 


Then sing, ye Birds, sing, sing a joyous 
song! 
And let the young Lambs bound 
As to the tabor’s sound ! 
We in thought will join your throng, 
Ye that pipe and ye that play, 
Ye that through your hearts to-day 
Feel the gladness of the May ! 
What though the radiance.which was 
once so bright 
Be now forever taken from my sight, 
Though nothing can bring back the 
hour ; 
Of splendor in the grass, of glory in the 
flower ; 
We will grieve not, rather find 
Strength in what remains behind ; 
In the primal sympathy 
Which having been must ever be ; 
In the soothing thoughts that spring 
Out of human suffering ; 
In the faith that looks through 
death, 
In years that bring the philosophic 
mind. 


XI 


And O ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, 
and Groves, 

Forebode not any severing of our loves ! 

Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your 
might ; 

I only have relinquished one delight 

To live beneath your more habitual 
sway. 

I love the Brooks which down their 
channels fret, 

Even more than when I tripped lightly 
as they ; 

The innocent brightness of a new-born 
Day 

Is lovely yet ; 

The Clouds that gather round the set- 
ting sun 

Do take a sober coloring from an eye 

That hath kept watch o’er man’s mor- 
tality ; . 

Another race hath been, and other 
palms are won. 


Thanks to the human heart by which 


we live, 

Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and 
fears, 

To me the meanest flower that blows 
can give 

Thoughts that do often lie too deep for 
tears. 1808-6, 1807. 


TO THE CUCKOO 


O BLITHE New-comer! I have heard, 
I hear thee and rejoice. 

O Cuckoo! shall I call thee Bird, 

Or but a wandering Voice? — 


While Iam lying on the grass 
Thy twofold shout I hear, 

From hill to hill it seems to pass, 
At once far off, and near. 


Though babbling only to the Vale, 
Of sunshine and of flowers, _ 
Thou bringest unto me a tale 

Of visionary hours. 


Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring ! 
Even yet thou art to me 

No bird, but an invisible thing, 

A voice, a mystery ; 


The same whom in my school-boy days 
I listened to ; that Cry 

Which made me look a thousand ways 
In bush, and tree, and sky. 


To seek thee did I often rove 
Through woods and on the green ; 
And thou wert still a hope, a love; 
Still longed for, never seen. 


And I can listen to thee yet ; 
Can lie upon the plain 

And listen, till I do beget 
That golden time again. 


O blessed Bird! the earth we pace 

Again appears to be 

An unsubstantial, faery place ; 

That is fit home for Thee! 
ISO4. 1807. 


SHE WAS A PHANTOM OF 
DELIGHT 


Written at Town-end, Grasmere. The germ of 
this poem was four lines composed as a part of 
the verses on the Highland Girl. Though begin- 
ning in this way, it was written from my heart, 
as is sufficiently obvious. (Wordsworth.) 


SHE was a Phantom of delight 
When first she gleamed upon my sight ; 


WORDSWORTH | 43 





A lovely Apparition sent 

To be a moment’s ornament ; 

Her eyes asstars of Twilight fair ; 

Like Twilight’s, too, her dusky hair; 
But all things else about her drawn 
From May-time and the cheerful Dawn; 
A dancing Shape, an Image gay, 

To haunt, to startle, and way-lay. 


I saw her upon nearer view, 

A Spirit, yet a Woman too! 

Her household motions light and free, 

And steps of virgin-liberty : 

A countenance in which did meet 

Sweet records, promises as sweet ; 

A Creature not too bright or good 

For human nature’s daily food ; 

For transient sorrows, simple wiles, 

Praise, blame, love, kisses, tears and 
smiles. 


And now I see with eye serene 

The very pulse of the machine ; 

A Being breathing thoughtful breath, 

A Traveller between life and death ; 

The reason firm, the temperate will, 

Endurance, foresight, strength, 
skill ; 

A perfect Woman, nobly planned, 

To warn, to comfort, and command ; 

And yeta Spirit still, and bright 

With something of angelic light. 


and 


1804. 1807. 
I WANDERED LONELY AS A 
CLOUD 
Written at Town-end, Grasmere. The Daf- 


fodils grew and still grow on the margin of Ulls- 
water, and probably may be seen to this day as 
beautiful in the month of March, nodding their 
golden heads beside the dancing and foaming 
waves. (Wordsworth.) 


I WANDERED lonely as a cloud 

That floats on high o’er vales and hills, 
When all at once I saw a crowd, 

A host, of golden daffodils ; 

Beside the lake, beneath the trees, 
Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. 


Continuous as the stars that shine 

And twinkle on the milky way, 

They stretched in never-ending line 

Along the margin of a bay: 

Ten thousand saw I at a glance, 

Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. 

The waves beside them danced; but 
they 

Out-did the sparkling waves in glee: 

A poet could not but be gay, 


In such a jocund company : 

I gazed—and gazed—-but little thought 

What wealth the show to me had 
brought: 


For oft, when on my couch I lie 
In vacant or in pensive mood, 
They flash upon that inward eye 
Which is the bliss of solitude ; 
And then my heart with pleasure fills, 
And dances with the daffodils. 

1804. 1807. 


THE AFFLICTION OF MARGARET 


Written at Town-end, Grasmere. This was 
taken from the case of a poor widow who lived 
in the town of Penrith. Her sorrow was well 
known to Mrs. Wordsworth, to my Sister, and, I 
believe, to the whole town. She kept a shop, 
and when she saw a stranger passing by, she was 
in the habit of going out into the street to en- 
quire of him after her son. (Wordsworth.) 


WHERE art thou, my beloved Son, 
Where art thou, worse to me than dead ? 
Oh find me, prosperous or undone! 

Or, if the grave be now thy bed, 

Why am I ignorant of the same, 

That.I may rest, and neither blame 

Nor sorrow may attend thy name? 


Seven years, alas! to have received 

No tidings of an only child; 

To have despaired, have hoped, believed, 
And been for evermore beguilea ; 
Sometimes with thoughts of very bliss ! 
I catch at them, and then I miss ; 

Was ever darkness like to this ? 


He was among the prime in worth, 

An object beauteous to behold ; 

Well born, well bred ; I sent him forth 
Ingenuous, innocent, and bold : 

If things ensued that wanted grace, 

As hath been said, they were not base ; 
And never blush was on my face. 


Ah! little doth the young one dream, 
When full of play and childish cares, 
What power is in his wildest scream, 
Heard by his mother unawares! 

He knows it not, he cannot guess: 
Years to a mother bring distress ; 

But do.nct make her love the less. 


Neglect me! no, I suffered long 

From that ill thought; and, being blind, 
Said, *‘ Pride shall help me in my wrong ; 
Kind mother have I been, as kind 

As ever breathed :” and that is true ; 
I’ve wet my path with tears like dew, 
Weeping for him when no one knew, 


44 BRITISH POETS 





My Son, if thou be humbled, poor, 
Hopeless of honor and of gain, 

Oh! do not dread thy mother’s door ; 
Think not of me with grief and pain: 
I now can see with better eyes ; 

And worldly grandeur I despise, 

And fortune with her gifts and lies. 


Alas! the fowls of heaven have wings, 
And blasts of heaven will aid their flight ; 
They mount—how shorta voyage brings 
The wanderers back to their delight! 
Chains tie us down by land and sea ; 
And wishes, vain as mine, may be 

All that is left to comfort thee. 


Perhaps some dungeon hears thee groan, 
Maimed, mangled by inhuman men ; 

Or thou upon a desert thrown 

Inheritest the lion’s den ; 

Or hast been summoned to the deep, 
Thou, thou and all thy mates, to keep 
An incommunicable sleep. 


I look for ghosts; but none will force 
Their way to me: ’tis falsely said 

That there was ever intercourse 
Between the living and the dead ; 

For, surely, then I should have sight 

Of him I wait for day and night, 

With love and longings infinite. 


My apprehensions come in crowds ; 

I dread the rustling of the grass; 

The very shadows of the clouds 

Have power toshake meas they pass: 
I question things and do not find 

One that will answer to my mind ; 

And all the world appears unkind. 


Beyond participation lie 
My troubles, and beyond relief : 
If any chance to heave a sigh, 
They pity me, and not my grief. 
Then come to me, my Son, or send 
Some tidings that my woes may end ; 
I have no other earthly friend ! 
LSO4. 


ODE TO DUTY 


STERN Daughter of the Voice of God! 

O Duty! if that name thou love 

Who art a light to guide, a rod 

To check the erring, and reprove ; 

Thou, who art victory and law 

When empty terrors overawe : 

From vain temptations dost set free: 

And calm’st the weary strife of frail 
buinanity.| ! 


1807. 


There are who ask not if thine eye 

Be on them ; who, in love and truth, 

Where no misgiving is, rely 

Upon the genial sense of youth: 

Glad Hearts ! without reproach or blot 

Who do thy work, and know it not: 

Oh! if through confidence misplaced 

They fail, thy saving arms, dread 
Power ! around them cast. 


Serene will be our days and bright, 

And happy will our nature be, 

When love is an unerring light, 

And joy its own security. 

And they a blissful course may hold 

Even now, who, not unwisely bold, 

Live in the spirit of this creed ; 

Yet seek thy firm support, according to 
their need. 


I, loving freedom, aud untried, 

No sport of every random gust, 

Yet being to myself a guide, 

Too blindly have reposed my trust : 

And oft, when in my heart was heard 

Thy timely mandate, I deferred 

The task, in smoother walks to stray ; 

But thee I now would serve more 
strictly, if I may. 


Through no disturbance of my soul, 

Or strong compunction in me wrought, 

I supplicate for thy control ; 

But in the quietness of thought : 

Me this unchartered freedom tires ; 

I feel the weight of chance- desires : 

My hopes no more must change their 
name, 

I long for a repose that ever is the 
same, 


Stern Lawgiver! yet thou dost wear 

The Godhead’s most benignant grace ; 

Nor know we anything so fair 

As is the smile upon thy face: 

Flowers laugh before thee on their beds 

And fragrance in thy footing treads ; 

Thou dost preserve the stars from wrong ; 

And the most ancient heavens, through 
Thee, are fresh and strong. 


To humbler functions, awful Power ! 

I call thee: I myself commend 

Unto thy guidance from this hour ; 

Oh, let my weakness have an end! 

Give unto me, made lowly wise, 

The spirit of self-sacrifice ; 

The confidence of reason give : 

And in the light of truth thy Bondman 
let me live! 1805. 1807. 


WORDSWORTH 4s 


TO A SKY-LARK 


Up with me! up with me into the clouds! 
For thy song, Lark, is strong ; 
Up with me, up with me into the clouds ! 
Singing, singing, 
With clouds and sky about thee ringing 
Lift me, guide me till I find 
That spot which seems so to thy mind! 


I have walked through wildernesses 
dreary 

And to-day my heart is weary ; 

Had I now the wings of a Faery, 

Up to thee would I fly. 

There is madness about thee, and joy 
divine 

In that song of thine ; 

Lift me, guide me high and high 

To thy banqueting-place in the sky. 


Joyous as morning 
Thou art laughing and scorning ; 
Thou hast a nest for thy love and thy 
rest. 
And, though little troubled with sloth, 
Drunken Lark! thou would’st be loth 
To be such a traveller as I. 
Happy, happy Liver, 
With a soul as strong as a mountain 
river 
Pouring out praise to the Almighty 
Giver, 
Joy and jollity be with us both! 


Alas! my journey, rugged and uneven, 

Through prickly moors or dusty ways 
must wind ; 

But hearing thee, or others-of thy kind, 

As full of gladness and as free of 
heaven, 

I, with my fate contented, will plod on, 

And hope for higher raptures, when 
life’s day isdone. 1805, 1807. 


ELEGIAC STANZAS 


SUGGESTED BY A _ PICTURE OF PEELE 
CASTLE, IN A STORM, PAINTED BY SIR 
GEORGE BEAUMONT 


I was thy neighbor once, thou rugged 
Pile! 

Four summer weeks I dwelt in sight of 
thee : 

I saw thee every day; and all the while 

Thy Form was sleeping on a glassy sea. 


So pure the sky, so quiet was the air! 

So like, so very like, was day to day ! 

Whene’er I looked, thy Image still was 
there ; 

It trembled, but it never passed away. 


How perfect was the calm! it seemed 
no sleep ; 
No mood, which season takes away, or 


brings : 

I could have fancied that the mighty 
Deep 

Was even the gentlest of all gentle 
Things. 


Ah! THEN, if mine had been the Painter’s 
hand, 

To express what then I saw; and add 
the gleam, 

The light that never was, on sea or 
land, 

The consecration, and the Poet’s dream ; 


I would have planted thee, thou hoary 
Pile 

Amid a world how different from this ! 

Beside a sea that could not cease to 
smile ; 

On tranquil land, beneath a sky of bliss. 


Thou shouldst have seemed a treasure- 
house divine 

Of peaceful years; 
heaven ;— 

Of all the sunbeams that did ever shine 

The very sweetest had to thee been 
given. 


a chronicle of 


A picture had it been of lasting ease, 
Elysian quiet, without toil or strife ; 
No motion but the moving tide, a breeze, 
Or merely silent Nature’s breathing life. 


Such, in the fond illusion of my heart, 

Such Picture would I at that time have 
made: 

And seen the soul of truth in every part, 

A steadfast peace that might not be 
betrayed. 


So once it would have been,—’tis so no 
more ; 

I have submitted to a new control: 

A power is gone, which nothing can 
restore ; 

A deep distress hath humanized my 
Soul. 


46 BRITISH POETS 





Not for a moment could I now behold 

A smiling sea, and be what I have been: 

The feeling of my loss will ne’er be old ; 

This, which I know, I speak with mind 
serene. 


Then, Beaumont, Friend! who would 
have been the Friend, 

If he had lived, of Him whom I deplore, 

This work of thine I blame not, but 
commend ; 


Thissea in anger, and that dismal shore. 


O ’tis a passionate Work !—yet wise and 
well, 

Well chosen in the spirit that is here ; 

That Hulk which labors in the deadly 
swell, 

This rueful sky, this pageantry of fear ! 


And this huge Castle, standing here sub- 


lime, 

I love to see the look with which it 
braves, 

Cased in the unfeeling armor of old 
time, 


The lightning, the fierce wind, and 


trampling waves. 


Farewell, farewell the heart that lives 
alone, 

Housed in a dream, at distance from the 
Kind! 

Such happiness, wherever it be known, 

Is to be pitied ; for ’t is surely blind. 


But welcome fortitude, and patient 


cheer, 

And frequent sights of what is to be 
borne! 

Such sights, or worse, as are before me 
here.— 

Not without hope we suffer and we 
mourn, 1805. 1807. 


TO A YOUNG LADY 


WHO HAD BEEN REPROACHED FOR TAK- 
ING LONG WALKS IN THE COUNTRY 


DEAR Child of Nature, let them rail! 

—There is a nest in a green dale, 

A harbor and a hold ; 

Where thou, a Wife and Friend, shalt 
see 

Thy own heart-stirring days, and be 

A light to young and old. 


There, healthy as a shepherd boy, 
And treading among flowers of joy 


Which at no season fade, 

Thou, while thy babes around thee cling, 
Shalt show us how divine a thing 

A Woman may be made. 


Thy thoughts and feelings shall not die, 


‘Nor leave thee, when gray hairs are nigh, 


A melancholy slave ; 

But an old age serene and bright, 

And lovely as a Lapland night, 

Shall lead thee to thy grave. 
ISOS. 


FRENCH REVOLUTION 


AS IT APPEARED TO ENTHUSIASTS AT ITS 
COMMENCEMENT 


1807. 


An extract from the long poem of my own 
poetical education. It was first published by 
Coleridge in his ‘“ Friend,’’ which is the reason 
of its having had a place in every edition of my 
poemssince. (Wordsworth.) From The Prelude, - 
B . 


OH! pleasant exercise of hope and joy ! 

For mighty were the auxiliars which 
then stood 

Upon our side, we who were strong in 
love! 

Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive, 

But to be young was very heaven !— 
Oh! times, 

In which the meagre, stale, forbidding 
ways 

Of custom, law, and statute, took at once 

The attraction of a country in romance ! 

When Reason seemed the most to assert 
her rights, 

When most intent on making of herself 

A prime Enchantress—to assist the work, 

Which then was going forward in her 
name ! 

Not favored spots alone, but the whole 
earth, 

The beauty wore of promise, that which 
sets 

(As at some moment might not be unfelt 

Among the bowers of paradise itself) 

The budding rose above the rose full 
blown. 

What temper at the prospect did not 
wake 

To happiness unthought of ? The inert 

Were roused, and lively natures rapt 
away ! 

They who had fed their childhood upon 
dreams, 

The playfellows of fancy, who had made 

All powers of swiftness, subtilty, and 
strength 


«? 


WORDSWORTH 47 





Their ministers,—who in lordly wise had 
stirred 

Among the grandest objects of the sense, 

And dealt with whatsoever they found 
there 

As if they had within some lurking right 

To wield it ;—they, too, who, of gentle 
mood, 

Had watched all gentle motions, and to 

- these 

Had fitted their own thoughts, schemers 
more mild, 

And in the region of their peaceful 
selves ;— 

Now was it that both found, the meek 
and lofty 

Did both find, helpers to their heart's 
desire, 

And stuff at hand, plastic as they could 
wish ; 

Were called upon to exercise their skill, 


_ Not in Utopia, subterranean fields, 


Or some secreted island, Heaven knows 
where! 
But in the very world, which is the 
world 
Of all of us,—the place where in the end 
We find our happiness, or not at all! 
1805. 1810. 


CHARACTER OF THE HAPPY 
WARRIOR 


Suggested in part by an event which all Eng- 
land was lamenting—the death of Lord Nelson— 
and in part by the personal loss, which he still 
felt so keenly, his brother John’s removal. On 
the 4th of February, 1806, Southey wrote thus 
to Sir Walter Scott: . ‘Wordsworth was 
with me last week; he has been of late more 
employed in correcting his poems than in writ- 
ting others ; but one piece he has written, upon 
the ideal character of a soldier, than which I 
have never seen anything more full of meaning 
and sound thought. The subject was suggested 
by Nelson’s most glorious death... .’ 

(Knight, Life of Wordsworth, LU, 46-7.) 


WHo is the happy Warrior? Who is he 
That every man in arms should wish to 


be ? 

—It is the generous Spirit, who, when 
brought 

Among the task of real life, hath 
wrought 

Upon the plan that pleased his boyish 
thought : 

Whose high endeavors are an inward 
light 

That makes the path before him always 
bright : 


Who, with a natural instinct to discern 





What knowledge can perform, is dili- 
gent to learn ; 

Abides by this resolve, and stops not 
there, 

But makes his moral being his prime 
care ; 

Who, doomed to go in company with 
Pain, 

And Fear, 
train ! 

Turns his necessity to glorious gain ; 

In face of these doth exercise a power 

Which is our human nature’s highest 
dower ; 

Controls them and subdues, transmutes, 
bereaves 

Of.their bad influence, and their good 
receives : 

By objects, which might force the soul 
to abate 

Her feeling, rendered more compassion- 
ate ; 

Is placable—because occasions rise 

So often that demand such sacrifice ; 

More skilful in self-knowledge, even 
more pure, 

As tempted more; more able to endure, 

As more exposed to suffering and dis- 
tress ; 

Thence, also, more alive to tenderness. 

—’Tis he whose law is reason; who de- 
pends 

Upon that law as on the best of friends ; 

Whence, in a state where men are 
tempted still 

To evil for a guard against worse ill, 

And what in quality or act is best 

Doth seldom on a right foundation rest, 

He labors good on good to fix, and owes 

To virtue every triumph that he knows: 

—Who, if he rise tostation of command, 

Rises by open means; and there will 
stand 

On honorable terms, or else retire, 

And in himself possess his own desire ; 

Who comprehends his trust, and to the 
same 

Keeps faithful with a singleness of aim ; 

And therefore does not stoop, nor lie i in 
wait 

For wealth, or honors, or for worldly 
state ; 

Whom they must follow ; on whose head 
must fall, 

Like showers of manna, if they come at 
all: 

Whose powers shed round him in the 
common strife, 

Or mild concerns of ordinary life, 


and Bloodshed, miserable 


48 RRITISH 





A constant influence, a peculiar grace 3 

But who, if he be called upon to face. 

Some awful moment to which Heaven 
has joined 

Great issues, good or 
kind, 

Is happy as a Lover; and attired 

With sudden brightness, ike a Man in- 
spired ; 

And, through the heat of conflict, keeps 
the law 

In calmness made, and sees what he 
foresaw ; 

Or if an unexpected call succeed, 

Come when it will, is equal to the need: 

—He who, though thus endued as with 
a sense 

And faculty for storm and turbulence, 

Is yet a Soul whose master-bias leans 

To homefelt pleasures and to gentle 
scenes ; 

Sweet images ! 
be, 

Are at his heart ; and such fidelity 

It is his darling passion to approve ; 

More brave for this, that he hath much 
to love :— 

Tis, finally, the Man, who, lifted high, 

Conspicuous object in a Nation’s eye, 

Or left unthought-of in obscurity,— 

Who, with a toward or untoward lot, 

Prosperous or adverse, to his wish or 
not— 

Plays, in the many games of life, that 
one 

Where what he most doth value must 
be won: 

Whom neither shape of danger can dis- 
may, 

Nor thought of tender happiness betray ; 

Who, not content that former worth 
stand fast, 

Looks forward, persevering to the last, 

From well to better, daily self-surpast : 

Who, whether praise of him must walk 
the earth 

For ever, and to noble deeds give birth, 

Or he must fall, to sleep without his 
fame, 

And leave a dead unprofitable name— 

Finds comfort in himself and in his 
cause ; 

And, while the moral mist is gathering, 
draws 

His breath in 
applause : 

This is the happy Warrior ; this is He 

That every Man in arms should wish to 
be. + 1806.) 1807. 


bad for human 


which, wheresoe’er he 


confidence of Heaven’s 








POELS 





YES, IT WAS THE MOUNTAIN 
ECHO 


YES, it was the mountain Echo, 
Solitary, clear, profound, 
Answering to the shouting Cuckoo, 
Giving to her sound for sound! 


Unsolicited reply 

To a babbling wanderer sent ; 
Like her ordinary ery, 
Like—but oh, how different ! 


Hears not also mortal Life ? 

Hear not we, unthinking Creatures! 
Slaves of folly, love, or strife— 
Voices of two different natures ? 


Have not we too ?—yes, we have 
Answers, and we know not whence; 
Echoes from beyond the grave, 
Recognized intelligence ! 


Such rebounds our inward ear 
Catches Sometimes from afar— 
Listen, ponder, hold them dear 3 
For of God,—of God they are. 

1806. 1807. 


NUNS FRET NOT AT THEIR CON- 
VENT’S NARROW ROOM 


In the cottage, Town-end, Grasmere, one after- 
noon in 1801, my sister read to me the Sonnets of 
Milton. I had long been well acquainted with 
thei, but I was particularly struck on that oeca- 
sion with the dignified simplicity and majestic 
harmony that runs through most of them,—in 
character so totally different from the Italian, 
and still more so from Shakspeare’s fine Sonnets. 
I took fire, if I may be allowed to say so, and 
produced three Sonnets the same afternoon, the 
first I ever wrote except an irregular one at 
school. Of these three, the only one I distinctly 
remember is—‘‘I gr ieved for Buonaparté.’’? One 
was never written down: the third, which was, 
I believe, preserved, I cannot particularize. 
( Wordsworth. ) 


Nuns fret not at their convent’s narrow 
room ; 
And hermits are contented with their 
cells ; 
And students with their pensive citadels ; 
Maids at the wheel, the weaver at his 
loom, 
Sit blithe and happy ; bees that soar for 
bloom, 
Highas the highest Peak of Furness-fells, 
Will Ue by the hour in foxglove 
ells: 


WORDSWORTH 49 


In truth the prison, unto which we doom 
Ourselves, no prison is: and hence for 


me, 

In sundry moods, ’twas pastime to be 
bound 

Within. the Sonnet’s scanty plot of 
ground ; 


Pleased if some Souls (for such there 
needs must be) 
Who have felt the weight of too much 


liberty, 
Should find brief solace there, as I have 
found. 1806, 1807. 


PERSONAL TALK 


I 


I AM not One who much or oft delight 

To season my fireside with personal 
talk— 

Of friends, who live within an easy walk, 

Or neighbors, daily, weekly, in my sight : 

And, for my chance-acquaintance, ladies 
bright, 

Sons, mothers, maidens withering on the 
stalk, 

These all wear out of me, like Forms, 
with chalk 

Painted on rich men’s floors, for one 
feast-night. 

Better than such discourse doth silence 
long, 

Long, barren silence, square with my 
desire ; 

To sit without emotion, hope, or aim, 

In the loved presence of my cottage-fire, 

And listen to the flapping of the flame, 

Or kettle whispering its faint undersong. 


II 


‘Yet life,” you say, ‘‘is life; we have 
seen and see, 

And with a living pleasure we describe ; 

And fits of sprightly malice do but bribe 

The languid mind into activity. 

Sound sense, and love itself, and mirth 
and glee 

Are fostered by the comment and the 
gibe.” 

Even be it so; 
tribe, 

- Our daily world’s true Worldlings, rank 
not me! 

Children are blest, and powerful; their 
world lies 

More justly balanced; partly at their 
feet, 

And part far from them: sweetest mel- 
odies 


4 


yet still among your 





Are those that are by distance made 
more sweet ; 

Whose mind is but the mind of his own 
eyes, 

He is a Slave; the meanest we can 
meet ! 


III 


Wings have we,-—and as far as we can 
go 


We may find pleasure: wilderness and 
wood, 

Blank ocean and mere sky, support that 
mood 


Which with the lofty sanctifies the low. 

Dreams, books are each a world; and 
books, we know, 

Are a substantial world, both pure and 
good : 

Round these, with tendrils strong as 
flesh and blood, 

Our pastime and our happiness will 
grow. 

There find I personal themes, a plente- 
ous store, 

Matter wherein right voluble Iam, 

To which I listen with a ready ear ; 

Two shall be named, pre-eminently 
dear,— 

The gentle Lady married to the Moor ; 

And heavenly Una with her milk-white 
Lamb. 


LW 


Nor can I not believe but that hereby 
Great gains are mine; for thus I live re- 


mote 

From evil-speaking; rancor, never 
sought, 

Comes to me not; malignant truth, or 
lie. 

Hence have I genial seasons, hence have 
I 


Smooth passions, smooth discourse, and 
joyous thought : 

And thus from day to day my little boat 

Rocks in its harbor, lodging peaceably. 

Blessings be with them—and eternal 





praise, 

Who gave us nobler loves, and nobler 
cares 

The Poets, who on earth have made us 
heirs 

Of truth and pure delight by heavenly 
lays! 

Oh! might my name _ be numbered 


among theirs, 
Then gladly would I end my mortal 
days. ISOG, 1807. 


50 BRITISH POETS 





THE WORLD IS TOO MUCH WITH 
US 


THE world is too much with us; late and 
soon, 

Getting and spending, we lay waste our 
powers : 

Little we see in Nature that is ours ; 

We have given our hearts away, a sor- 


did boon ! 

The Sea that bares her bosom to the 
moon ; 

The winds that will be howling at all 
hours, 

And are up-gathered now like sleeping 
flowers ; 

For this, for everything, we are out of 
tune ; 

It moves us not.—Great God! I’d rather 
be 


A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn ; 

So might I, standing on this pleasant 
lea, 

Have glimpses that would make me less 
forlorn ; 

Have sight of Proteus rising from the 


sea 3 
Or hear old Triton blow his wreathéd 
horn. 1806. 1807. 


TO SLEEP 


A FLOCK of sheep that leisurely pass 
ve 

One after one; 

: bees 

Murmuring; the fall of rivers, 
and seas, 

Smooth fields, white sheets of water, 
and pure sky ; 

I have thought of all by turns, and yet 


the sound of rain, and 


winds 


do lie 

Sleepless! and soon the small birds’ 
melodies 

Must hear, first uttered from my orchard 
trees ; 


And the first cuckoo’s melancholy cry. 

Even thus last night, and two nights 
more, I lay, 

And could not win thee, Sleep ! by any 
stealth : 

So do not let me wear to-night away : 

Without Thee what is all the morning’s 
wealth ? 

Come, blessed barrier between day and 
day, 

Dear Houher of fresh thoughts and joy- 
ous health ! 1806, 1807. 


NOVEMBER, 1806 

ANOTHER year !—another deadly blow ! 

Another mighty Empire overthrown ! 

And Weare left, or shall be left, alone; 

The last that dare to struggle with the 
Foe. 

‘Tis well! from this day forward we 
shall know 

That in ourselves our safety must be 
sought ; 

That by our own right hands it must be 
wrought ; 

That we must stand unpropped, or be 


laid low. 

O dastard whom such foretaste doth not 
cheer ! 

We shall exult, if they who rule the 
land 

Be men who hold its many blessings 
dear, 

Wise, upright, valiant; nota servile 
band, 

Who are to judge of danger which they 
fear, 

And honor which they do not under- 
stand. 1806, 1807. 


THOUGHT OF ‘A’ BRITON Oia 
SUBJUGATION OF SWITZERLAND 


Two Voices are there; one is of the 
sea, 

One of the mountains ; each a mighty 
Voice: 

In both from age to age thou didst re- 
joice, 

They were thy chosen music, Liberty ! 

There came a Tyrant, and with holy 
glee 

Thou fought’st against him; but hast 
vainly striven: 

Thou from thy Alpine holds at length 
art driven, 

Where not a torrent murmurs heard by 
thee. 

Of one deep bliss thine ear hath been 
bereft : 

Then cleave, O cleave to that which still 
is left ; 

For, high-souled Maid, whee Sorrow - 
would it be \ 

That mountain floods should thunder as 
before, 

And Ocean bellow from 
shore, © 

And neither awful Voice be heard by 
thee ? ' 1807. 1807, 


fia) . rocky 


WORDSWORTH et 





HERE PAUSE: THE POET CLAIMS 
AT LEAST THIS PRAISE 


HERE pause : the poet claims at least this 
praise, 

That virtuous Liberty hath been the 
scope 

Of his pure song, which did not shrink 
from hope 

In the worst moment of these evil days ; 

From hope, the paramount duty that 
Heaven lays, 

For its own honor, on man’s suffering 

heart. 
Never may from our souls’ one truth 
depart— 

That an accursed thing it is to gaze 

On prosperous tyrants with a dazzled 
eye ; 

Nor—touched with due abhorrence of 
their guilt 

For whose dire ends tears flow, 
blood is spilt, 

And justice labors in extremity— 

Forget thy weakness, upon which is built 

O wretched man, the throne of tyranny ! 

1811, 1815. 


and 


- LAODAMIA 


Written at Rydal Mount. The incident of the 
trees growing and withering put the subject into 
my thoughts, and I wrote with the hope of giving 
it a loftier tone than, so far as I know, has been 
given to it by any of the Ancients who have 
treated of it. It cost me more trouble than al- 
most anything of equal length I have ever writ- 
ten. (Wordsworth.) 

‘“*Taodamia is a very original poem; I mean 
original with reference to your own manner, 
You have nothing like it. I should have seen 
it in a strange place, and greatly admired it, 
but not suspected its derivation...” (Lamb 
to Wordsworth. Talfourd, Final Memories of 
Charles Lamb, p. 151.) 


*“ WiTH sacrifice before the rising morn 

Vows have I made by fruitless hope in- 
spired ; 

And from the infernal Gods, ’mid shades 
forlorn 

Of night, my slaughtered Lord have I 
required : 

Celestial pity I again implore :— 

Restore him to my sight—great Jove, 
restore !” 


So speaking, and by fervent love en- 
dowed 

With faith, the Suppliant heavenward 
lifts her hands ; 

While, like the sun emerging from a 
cloud, 


Her countenance brightens—and her 
eye expands ; 

Her bosom heaves and spreads, her stat- 
ure grows ; 

And she expects the issue in repose. 


O terror! what hath she perceived ?—O 
joy ! 

What doth she look on ?—whom doth she 
behold ? 

Her Hero slain upon the beach of Troy ? 

His vital presence ? his corporeal mould ! 

It is—if sense deceive her not—’tis He? 

And a God leads him, wingéd Mercury ! 


Mild Hermes. spake—and touched her 
with his wand 

That calms all fear; ‘‘Such grace hath 
crowned thy prayer, 

Laodamia ! that at Jove’s command 

Thy Husbana walks the paths of upper 
air: 

He comes to tarry with thee three hours’ 
space ; 

Accept the gift, behold him face to face ! 


Forth sprang the impassioned Queen ; 
her Lord to clasp ; 

Again that consummation she essayed ; 

But unsubstantial Form eludes her grasp 

As often as that eager grasp was made, 

The Phantom parts—but parts to re-unite, 

And re-assume his place before her sight. 


‘« Protesilaus, lo! thy guide is gone ! 

Confirm, I pray, the vision with thy 
voice : 

This is our palace,—yonder is thy throne ; 

Speak, and the floor thou tread’st on 
will rejoice. 

Not to appal me have the gods bestowed 

This precious boon; and blest a sad 
abode.” 


‘Great Jove, Laodamia! doth not leave 

His gifts imperfect :—Spectre though I 
be, 

Tam not sent to scare thee or deceive ; 

But in reward of thy fidelity. 

And something also did my worth obtain ; 

For fearless virtue bringeth boundless 
gain. 


‘*Thou knowest, the Delphic oracle fore- 
told 

That the first Greek who touched the 
Trojan strand 

Should die; but me the threat could not 
withhold; 


52 BRUPISEH “Por S 








A generous cause a victim did demand ; 
And forth I leapt upon the sandy plain ; 
A self-devoted chief—by Hector slain.” 


‘‘Supreme of Heroes—bravest, noblest, 
best ! 

Thy matchiess courage I bewail no more, 

Which then, when tens of thousands 
were deprest 

By doubt, propelled thee to the fatal 
shore ; 

Thou found’st--and I forgive thee—here 
thou art— 

A nobler counsellor than my poor heart. 


‘* But thou, though capable of sternest 


deed, 

Wert kind as resolute, and good as 
brave ; 

And he, whose power restores thee, hath 
decreed 

Thou should’st elude the malice of the 
grave : 


Redundant are thy locks, thy lipsas fair 
As when their breath enriched Thessa- 
lian air. 


‘*No Spectre greets me,—no vain Shadow 


this ; 

Come, blooming Hero, place thee by my 
side ! 

Give, on this well-known couch, one 


nuptial kiss 

To me, this day, a second time thy 
bride [774" 

Jove frowned in heaven: the conscious 
Parce threw 

Upon those roseate lips a Stygian hue. 


‘This visage tells thee that my doom is 
past : 

Norshould the change be mourned, even 
if the joys 

Of sense were able to return as fast 

And surely as they vanish. Earth de- 
stroys 

Those raptures duly—Erebus disdains ; 

Calm pleasures there abide—majestic 
pains. 





‘* Be taught, O faithful Consort, to con- 
trol 

Rebellious passion : for the Gods approve 

The depth, and not the tumault, of the 
soul ; 

A fervent, not ungovernable, love. 

Thy transports moderate; and meekly 
mourn 

When I depart, for brief is my sojourn—” 


‘* Ah, wherefore ?—Did not Hercules by 
force 

Wrest from the guardian Monster of the 
tomb 

Alcestis, a reanimated corse, 

Given back to dwell on earth in vernal 
bloom ? 

Medea’s spells dispersed the weight of 
years, 

And Atson stood a youth ’mid youthful 
peers. 


‘* The Gods to us are merciful—and they 

Yet further may relent: for mightier 
far 

Than strength of nerve and sinew, or the 
sway 

Of magic potent over sun and star, 

Is love, though oft to agony distrest, 

And though his favorite seat be feeble 
woman's breast. 


‘* But if thou goest, I follow—” ‘*‘ Peace!” 
he said ;— 

She looked upon him and was calmed 
and cheered ; 

The ghastly color from his lips had fled ; 

In his deportment, shape, and mien, ap- 
peared 

Elysian beauty. melancholy grace, 

Brought from a pensive though a happy 
place. 


He spake of love, such love as Spirits 
feel 

In worlds whose course is equable and 
pure ; 

No fears to beat .away—no strife to 
heal— 

The past unsighed for, and the future 
sure ; 

Spake of heroic arts in graver mood 

Revived, with finer harmony pursued ; 


Of all that is most beauteous—imaged 
there 

In happier 
streams, 

An ampler ether, a diviner air, 

And fields invested with purpureal 
gleams ; 

Climes which the sun, who sheds the 
brightest day 

Earth knows, is all unworthy to survey. 


beauty; more pellucid 


Yet there the Soul shall enter which 
hath earned 

That privilege by virtue. ‘‘ Ill,” said he, 

‘*The end of man’s existence I discerned, 

Who from ignoble games and revelry 


WORDSWORTH 53 


Could draw, when we had parted, vain 
delight, 

While tears were thy best pastime, day 
and night ; 


‘And while my youthful peers before 
my eyes 

(Each hero following his peculiar bent) 

Prepared themselves for glorious enter- 
prise 

By martial sports,—or, seated in the 


tent, 

Chieftains and kings in council were de- 
tained ; 

What time the fleet at Aulis lay en- 
chained. 


‘““The wished-for wind was given :—I 
then revolved 

The oracle, upon the silent sea ; 

And, if no worthier led the way, re- 


solved 

That, of a thousand vessels, mine should 
be 

The foremost prow in pressing to the 
strand,— 


Mine the first blood that tinged the Tro- 
jan sand. 


‘“ Yet bitter, oft-times bitter was the 
pang 
When of thy loss I thought, beloved 


Wife! 

On thee too fondly did my memory 
hang, 

And on the joys we shared in mortal 
life,— 


The paths which we had trod—these 
fountains, flowers, 

My new-planned cities, and unfinished 
towers. 


‘* But should suspense permit the Foe to 


cry, 

‘Behold they tremble !—haughty their 
array, 

Yet of their number no one dares to 
die ?’ 

In soul I swept the indignity away : 

Old frailties then recurred :—but lofty 
thought, 

In act embodied, my 
wrought. 


deliverance 


*“* And Thou, though strong in love, art 
all too weak 

In reason, in self-government too slow ; 

I counsel thee by fortitude to seek 

Our blest re-union in the shades below. 








The invisible world with thee hath sym- 
pathized ; 
Be thy affections raised and solemnized. 


‘*Learn, by a mortal yearning, to as- 
’ ’ 


cend— 

Seeking a higher object. Love was 
given, ; 

Encouraged, sanctioned, chiefly for that 
end ; 

For this the passion to excess was 
driven— : 

That self might be annulled: her bond- 
age prove 

The fetters of a dream, opposed to 
love.” —— 


Aloud she shrieked ! for Hermes reap- 
pears ! 

Round the dear Shade she would have 
clung—’t is vain : 

The hours are past—too brief had they 
been years ; 

And him no mortal effort can detain : 

Swift, toward the realms that know not 
earthly day, 

He through the portal takes his silent 
way, 

And on the palace-floor a lifeless corse 
she lay. 


Thus, all in vain exhorted and reproved, 

She perished ; and, as fora wilful crime, 

By the just Gods whom no weak pity 
moved, 

Was doomed to wear out her appointed 
time, 

Apart from happy Ghosts, that gather 
flowers 

Of blissful quiet *mid unfading bowers. 


—Yet tears to human suffering are due ; 

And mortal hopes defeated and o’er- 
thrown 

Are mourned by man, and not by man 
alone, 

As fondly he believes.—Upon the side 

Of Hellespont (such faith was enter- 
tained) 

A knot of spiry trees for ages grew 

From out the tomb of him for whom she 
died ; 

And ever, when such stature they had 
gained 

That Ilium’s walls were subject to their 
view, 

The trees’ tall summits withered at the 
sight : 

A constant interchange of growth and 
blight ! 1814. 1815. 


54 BRITISH POETS 





YARROW VISITED 


SEPTEMBER, 1814 


As mentioned in my verses on the death of the 
Ettrick Shepherd, my first visit to Yarrow was 
in his company. We had lodged the night be- 
fore at Traquhair, where Hogg had joined us 
. .. Lseldom read or think of this poem without 
regretting that my dear Sister was not of the 
party, as she would have had so much delight in 
recalling the time when, travelling together in 
Seotland, we declined going in search of this 
celebrated stream, not altogether, I will frankly 
confess, for the reasons assigned in the poem on 
the occasion. ( Wordsworth.) 


AND is this—Yarrow ?—This the Stream 
Of which my fancy cherished, 

So faithfully, a waking dream ? 

An image that hath perished ! 

O thatsome Minstrel’s harp were near, 
To utter notes of gladness, 

And chase this silence from the air, 
That fills my heart with sadness ! 


Yet why ?—a silvery current flows 

With uncontrolled meanderings ; 

Nor have these eyes by greener hills 

Been soothed, in all my wanderings. 

And, through her depths, Saint Mary's 
Lake 

Is visibly delighted ; 

For not a feature of those hills 

Is in the mirror slighted. 


A blue sky bends o’er Yarrow vale, 
Save where that pearly whiteness 

Is round the rising sun diffused, 

A tender hazy brightness ; 

Mild dawn of promise! that excludes 
All profitless dejection ; 

Though not unwilling here to admit 
A pensive recollection. 


Where was it that the famous Flower 

Of Yarrow Vale lay bleeding ? 

His bed perchance was yon smooth 
mound 

On which the herd is feeding : 

And haply from this crystal pool, 

Now peaceful as the morning, 

The Water-wraith ascended thrice— 

And gave his doleful warning. 


Delicious is the Lay that sings 

The haunts of happy Lovers, 

The path that leads them to the grove, 
The leafy grove that covers: 

And Pity sanctifies the Verse 

That paints, by strength of sorrow, 


The unconquerable strength of love ; 
Bear witness, rueful Yarrow ! 


But thou, that didst appear so fair 
To fond imagination, 

Dost rival in the light of day 

Her delicate creation : 

Meek loveliness is round thee spread, 
A softness still and holy ; 

The grace of forest charms decayed, 
And pastoral melancholy. 


That region left, the vale unfolds 

Rich groves of lofty stature, 

With Yarrow winding through the 
pomp . 

Of cultivated nature ; 

And, rising from those lofty groves, 

Behold a Ruin hoary ! 

The shattered front of Newark’s Towers, 

Renowned in Border story. 


Fair scenes for childhood’s opening 
bloom, 

For sportive youth to stray in ; 

For manhood to enjoy his strength ; 

And age to wearawayin!  - 

Yon cottage seems a bower of bliss, 

A covert for protection 

Of tender thoughts, that nestle there— 

The brood of chaste affection. 


How sweet, on this autumnal day, 
The wild-wood fruits to gather, 

And on my True-love’s forehead plant 
A crest of blooming heather ! 

And what if I enwreathed my own! 
’T were no offence to reason ; 

The sober Hills thus deck their brows 
To meet the wintry season. 


I see—but not by sight alone, 

Loved Yarrow, have I won thee; 

A ray of fancy still survives— 

Her sunshine plays upon thee! 

Thy ever-youthful waters keep 

A course of lively pleasure ; 

And gladsome notes my lips can breathe, 
Accordant to the measure. 


The vapors linger round the Heights, 
They melt, and soon must vanish ; 
One hour is theirs, nor more is mine— 
Sad thought, which I would banish, 
But that I know, where’er I go, 

Thy genuine image, Yarrow ! 

Will dwell with me—to heighten joy, 
And cheer my mind in sorrow, 


1814. 1820. 


WORDSWORTH 55 





TO B. R. HAYDON 


B. R. Haydon, the painter, was for many years 
a friend of Wordsworth. On November 27, 1815, 
Haydon wrote: *I have benefited and have been 
supported in the troubles of life by your poetry. 
. . 1 will bear want, pain, misery, and blindness ; 
but I will never yield one step I have gained on 
the road I am determined to travel over.’ 
Wordsworth’s answer to this letter was the 
following sonnet. ‘ 


HIGH is our calling, Friend !—Creative 


Art 

(Whether the instrument of words she 
use, 

Or pencil pregnant with ethereal hues. ) 

Demands the service of a mind and heart, 

Though sensitive, yet, in their weakest 
part 

Heroically fashioned—to infuse 

Faith in the whispers of the lonely Muse, 

While the whole world seems adverse to 
desert. 

And, oh! when Nature sinks, as oft she 


may, 

Through long-lived pressure of obscure 
distress, 

Still to be strenuous for the bright re- 
ward, 

And in the soul admit of no decay, 

Brook no continuance of weak-minded- 
ness— 

Great is the glory, for the strife is hard ! 

1815. 1816. 


NOVEMBER 1 


How clear, how keen, how marvellously 
bright 

The effluence from yon distant mount- 
ain’s head, 

Which, strewn with snow smooth as the 
sky can shed, 

Shines like another sun—on mortal sight 

Uprisen, as if to check approaching 
Night, 

And all her twinkling stars. 
would tread, 

If so he might, yon mountain’s glittering 
head— 

Terrestrial, but a surface, by the flight 

Of sad mortality’s earth-sullying wing, 

Unswept, unstained? Nor shall the 

. aérial Powers 

Dissolve that beauty, destined to endure, 
White, radiant, spotless, exquisitely 


Who now 


pure, 
Through all vicissitudes, till genial 
Spring 
Has filled the laughing vales with wel- 
come fiowers. 1815, 1816. 





SURPRISED BY JOY — IMPATIENT 
AS THE WIND 


This was in fact suggested by my daughter 
Catherine long after her death. (Wordsworth.) 


SURPRISED by joy—impatient as the 
Wind 

I turned to share the transport—Oh! 
with whom 

But Thee, deep buried in the silent tomb, 

That spot which no vicissitude can find ? 

Love, faithful love, recalled thee to my 
mind— 

But how could I forget thee? Through 
what power, 

Even for the least division of an hour, 

Have I been so beguiled as to be blind 

To my most grievous loss ?— That 
thought’s return 

Was the worst pang that sorrow ever 
bore, 

Save one, one only, when I stood forlorn, 

Knowing my heart’s best treasure was 

no more ; 

That neither present time, nor years un- 
born 

Could to my sight that heavenly face 
restore. 1815. 1815. 


HAST THOU SEEN, WITH FLASH 
INCESSANT 


HAstT thou seen, with flash incessant, 
Bubbles gliding under ice, 

Bodied forth and evanescent, 

No one knows by what device ? 


are thoughts !—A 
meadow 
Mimicking a troubled sea, 
Such is life; and death a shadow 
From the rock eternity! 878. 1820. 


Such wind-swept 


COMPOSED UPON AN EVENING OF 
EXTRAORDINARY SPLENDOR 
AND BEAUTY 


I 


HAD this effulgence disappeared 

With flying haste, I might have sent, 
Among the speechless clouds, a look 

Of blank astonishment ; 

But ’tis endued with power to stay, 
And sanctify one closing day, 

That frail Mortality may see— 

What is ?—ah no, but what can be ! 
Time was when field and watery cove 


56 BREEISHAPOETS 





With modulated echoes rang, 

While choirs of fervent Angels sang 

Their vespers in the grove ; 

Or, crowning, star-like, 
sovereign height, 

Warbled, for heaven above and earth 
below, 

Strains suitable to both.—Such holy rite, 

Methinks, if audibly repeated now 

From hill or valley, could not move 

Sublimer transport, purer love, 

Than doth this silent spectacle — the 
gleam— 

The shadow—and the peace supreme! 


II 


No sound is uttered,—but a deep 

And solemn harmony pervades 

The hollow vale from steep to steep, 

And penetrates the glades. 

Far-distant images draw nigh, 

Called forth by wondrous potency 

Of beamy radiance, that imbues, 

Whate’er it strikes, with gem-like hues! 

In vision exquisitely clear, 

Herds range along the mountain side; 

And glistening antlers are descried ; 

And gilded flocks appear. 

Thine is the tranquil hour, purpureal 

Kve! 

long as god-like wish, or hope 

divine, 

Informs my spirit, ne’er can I believe 

That this magnificence is wholly thine! 

—From worlds not quickened by the sun 

A portion of the gift is won; 

An intermingling of Heaven’s pomp is 
spread 

On ground which British 
tread ! 


each some 


But 


shepherds 


III 


And, if there be whom broken ties 

Afflict, or injuries assail, 

Yon hazy ridges to their eyes 

Present a glorious scale, 

Climbing suffused with sunny air, 

To stop—no record hath told where ! 

And tempting Fancy to ascend, 

And with immortal Spirits blend ! 

—Wings at my shoulders seem to play ; 

But, rooted here, I stand and gaze 

On those bright steps that heavenward 
raise 

Their practicable way. 

Come forth, ye drooping old men, look 
abroad, 

And see to what fair countries ye are 
bound ! 


And if some traveller, weary of his road, 

Hath slept since noontide on the grassy 
ground, 

Ye Genii! to his covert speed ; 

And wake him with such gentle heed 

As may attune his soul to meet the 
dower 

Bestowed on this transcendent hour ! 


LV 


Such hues from their celestial Urn 

Were wont to stream before mine eye, 

Where’er it wandered in the morn 

Of blissful infancy. 

This glimpse of glory, why renewed ? 

Nay, rather speak with gratitude ; 

For, if a vestige of those gleams 

Survived, ‘twas only in my dreams. 

Dread Power! whom peace and calm- 
ness serve 

No less than Nature’s threatening voice, 

If aught unworthy be my choice, 

From THEE if I would swerve ; 

Oh, let thy grace remind me of the 
light 

Full early lost, and fruitlessly deplored ; 

Which, at this moment, on my waking 
sight 

Appears to shine, by miracle restored ; 

My soul, though yet confined to earth, 

Rejoices in a second birth ! 


—Tis past, the visionary splendour 
fades ; 
And night approaches with her shades. 
1818. 1820. 


SEPTEMBER, 1819 


DEPARTING summer hath assumed 
An aspect tenderly illumed, 

The gentlest look of spring ; 

That calls from yonder leafy shade 
Unfaded, yet prepared to fade, 

A timely carolling. 


No faint and hesitating trill, * 
Such tribute as to winter chill 
The lonely redbreast pays! 

Clear, loud, and lively is the din, 
From social warblers gathering in 
Their harvest of sweet lays. 


Nor doth the example fail to cheer 

Me, conscious that my leaf is sere, 

And yellow on the bough :— 

Fall, rosy garlands, from my head! 

Ye myrtle wreaths, your fragrance shed 
Around a younger brow ! 


- =F 


WORDSWORTH 8 


Yet will I temperately rejoice ; 

Wide is the range, and free the choice 
Of undiscordant themes ; 

Which, haply, kindred souls may prize 
Not less than vernal ecstasies, 

And passion’s feverish dreams. 


For deathless powers to verse belong, 
And they like Demi-gods are strong 
On whom the Muses smile ; 


But some their function have dis- 
claimed, 

Best pleased with what is aptliest 
framed 


To enervate and defile. 


Not such the initiatory strains 

Committed to the silent plains 

In Britain’s earliest dawn : 

Las the groves, the stars grew 
ale, 

While all-too-daringly the veil 

Of nature was withdrawn ! 


Nor such the spirit-stirring note 
When the live chords Alczeus smote, 
Inflamed by sense of wrong ; 

Woe! woe to Tyrants! from the lyre 
‘Broke threateningly. in sparkles dire 
Of fierce vindictive song. 


And not unhallowed was the page 

By wingéd Love inscribed, to assuage 
The pangs of vain pursuit ; 

Love listening while the Lesbian Maid 
With finest touch of passion swayed 
Her own A#olian lute. 


O ye, who patiently explore 

The wreck of Herculanean lore, 
What rapture! could ye seize 
Some Theban fragment, or unroll 
One precious, tender-hearted, scroll 
Of pure Simonides. 


That were, indeed, a genuine birth 
Of poesy ; a bursting forth 

Of genius from the dust : 

What Horace gloried to behold, 
What Maro loved, shall we enfold ? 
Can haughty Time be just ! 


1819. 1820. 


AFTER-THOUGHT 


I THOUGHT of Thee, my partner and my 
guide, 

As being past away.—Vain sympathies ! 

For, backward, Duddon, as I cast my 
eyes, 


I see what was, and is, and will abide; 

Still glides the Stream, and shall for 
ever glide ; 

The Form remains, the Function never 
dies ; 

While we, the brave, the mighty, and 
the wise, 

We Men, who in our morn of youth de- 
fied 

The elements, must vanish ;—be it so ! 

Enough, if something from our hands 
have power 

To live, and act, and serve the future 


hour; 
And if, as toward the silent tomb we 
20, 


Through love, through hope, and faith’s 
transcendent dower, 

We feel that we are greater than we 
know. 1820. 1820. 


MUTABILITY 


From low to high doth dissolution 
climb, 

And sink from high to low, along a 
seale 

Of awful notes, whose concord shall not 
fail ; 

A musical but melancholy chime, 

Which they can hear who meddle not 
with crime, 

Nor avarice, nor Over-anxious care. 

Truth fails not; but her outward forms 
that bear 

The longest date do melt like frosty 
rime, 

That in the morning whitened hill and 
plain 

And is no more; drop like the tower 
sublime 

Of yesterday, which royally did wear 

His crown of weeds, but could not even 
sustain 

Some casual shout that broke the silent 
Biky 

Or the unimaginable touch of Time. 

1821. 1822. 


INSIDE OF KING’S COLLEGE 
CHAPEL, CAMBRIDGE - 


Tax not the royal Saint with vain ex- 
pense, 

With ill-matched aims the 
who planned— 

Albeit laboring for a scanty band 

Of white-robed Scholars only—this im- 
mense 


Architect 





58 BRITISH POETS 








And glorious Work of fine intelligence ! 

Give all thou canst; high Heaven re- 
jects the lore 

Of nicely-calculated less or more ; 

So deemed the man who fashioned for 
the sense 

These lofty pillars, spread that branch- 
ing roof 

Self-poised, and scooped into ten thou- 
sand cells, E 

Where light and shade repose, where 
music dwells 

Lingering—and wandering on as loth to 
die ; 

Like thoughts whose very sweetness 
yieldeth proof 

That they were born for immortality. 

1821. 1822. 


MEMORY 


A PEN—to register ; a key— 

That winds through secret wards ; 
Are well assigned to Memory 

By allegoric Bards. 


As aptly, also, might be given 

A Pencil to her hand ; . 
That, softening objects, sometimes even 
Outstrips the heart’s demand ; 

That smooths foregone distress, the 
lines 

Of lingering care subdues, 
Long-vanished happiness refines, 

And clothes in brighter hues ; 


Yet, like a tool of Fancy, works 
Those Spectres to dilate 

That startle Conscience, as she lurks 
Within her lonely seat. 


Oh! that our lives, which flee so fast, 
In purity were such, 

That not an image of the past 

Should fear that pencil’s touch! 


Retirement then might hourly look 
Upon a soothing scene, 

Age steal to his allotted nook 
Contented and serene ; 


With heart as calm as lakes that sleep, 

In frosty moonlight glistening ; 

Or mountain rivers, where they creep 

Along a channel smooth and deep, 

To their own far-off murmurs listening. 
1823. 1827. 


TO A SKY-LARK 


ETHEREAL minstrel! pilgrim of the sky! 

Dost thou despise the earth where cares 
abound ? 

Or, while the wings aspire, are heart 
and eye 

Both with thy nest upon the dewy 

ground ? 

Thy nest which thou canst drop into at 
will, 

Those quivering wings composed, that 
music still ! 


Leave to the nightingale her shally 
wood; 

A privacy of glorious light is thine ; 

Whence thou dost pour upon the world 


a flood 

Of harmony, with instinct more di- 
vine ; . 

Type of the wise who soar, but never 
roam ; 


True to the kindred points of Heaven 
and Home ! 1825, 1827. 


SCORN NOT THE SONNET 


Composed, almost extempore, in a short walk 
on the western side of Rydal Lake. (Wordsworth.) 


Scorn not the Sonnet; Critic, you have 


frowned, 

Mindless of its just honors; with this 
key 

Shakspeare unlocked his heart; the 
melody 


Of this small lute gave ease to Petrarch’s 
wound ; 

A thousand times this pipe did Tasso 
sound ; 

With it Camdédens soothed an exile’s 
grief ; 

The Sonnet glittered a gay myrtle leaf 

Amid the cypress with which Dante 
crowned 

His visionary brow: a glow-worm lamp, 

It cheered mild Spenser, called from 
Faeryland 

To struggle through dark ways; and, 
when a damp 

Fell round the path of Milton, in his 
hand 

The Thing became a trumpet; whence 
he blew 

Soul-animating strains—alas, too few ! 

1827, 1827, 


WORDSWORTH 59 
ee OS 


THE PRIMROSE OF THE ROCK 


Written at Rydal Mount. The Rock stands on 
the right hand a little way Jeading up the middle 
road from Rydal to Grasmere. We have been 
in the habit of calling it the glow-worm rock 
from the number of glow-worms we have often 
seen hanging on it as described. The tuft of 
primrose has, I fear, been washed away by the 
heavy rains. (Wordsworth) 

" Dorothy Wordsworth’s Journal, April 24th, 


A Rock there is whose homely front 
The passing traveller slights ; 
Yet there the glow-worms hang their 
lamps, 
Like stars, at various heights : 
And one coy Primrose to that Rock 
The vernal breeze invites. 


What hideous warfare hath been waged, 
What kingdoms overthrown, 

Since first I spied that Primrose-tuft 
And marked it for my own; 

A lasting link in Nature’s chain 
From highest heaven let down ! 


The flowers, still faithful to the stems. 
Their fellowship renew ; 

The stems are faithful to the root, 
That worketh out of view ; 

And to the rock the root adheres 
In every fibre true. 


Close clings to earth the living rock, 
Though threatening still to fall ; 
The earth is constant to her sphere ; 
And God upholds them all: 
So blooms this lonely Plant, nor dreads 
Her annual funeral. 
* K * * 
Here closed the meditative strain ; 
But air breathed soft that day, 
The hoary mountain-heights 
cheered, 
_The sunny vale looked gay ; 
And to the Primrose of the Rock 
I gave this after-lay. 


were 


I sang—Let myriads of bright flowers, 
Like Thee, in field and grove 

Revive unenvied ;—mightier far, 
Than tremblings that reprove 

Our vernal tendencies to hope, 
Is God’s redeeming love ; 


That love which changed—for wan dis- 
ease, 
For sorrow that had bent 
O’er hopeless dust, for withered age— 
Their moral element, 
And turned the thistles of a curse 
To types beneficent. 


Sin-blighted though we are, we too, 
The reasoning Sons of Men, 

From one oblivious winter called 
Shall rise, and breathe again ; 

And in eternal summer lose 
Our threescore years and ten. 


To humbleness of heart descends 
This prescience from on high, 

The faith that elevates the just, 
Before and when they die; 

And makes each soul a separate heaven. 
A court for Deity. 1831. 1835. 


YARROW REVISITED 


The following Stanzas are a memorial of a day 
passed with Sir Walter Scott and other Friends 
visiting the Banks of the Yarrow under his guid- 
ance, immediately before his departure from 
Abbotsford, for Naples. 

Thetitle Yarrow Revisited will stand in no need 
of explanation for Readers acquainted with the 
Author’s previous poems suggested by that cele- 
brated Stream. (Wordsworth. ) 


THE gallant Youth, who 
gained, 

Or seeks, a ‘‘ winsome Marrow,” 

Was but an Infant in the lap 
When first I looked on Yarrow ; 

Once more, by Newark’s Castle-gate 
Long left without a warder, 

I stood, looked, listened. and with Thee, 
Great Minstrel of the Border ! 


ruled wide on that 


may have 


Grave thoughts 
sweet day, 
Their dignity installing 
In gentle bosoms, while sere leaves 
Were on the bough, or falling ; 
But breezes played, and _ sunshine 
gleamed— 
The forest to embolden ; 
Reddened the fiery hues, and shot 
Transparence through the golden. 


For busy thoughts the Stream flowed on 
In foamy agitation ; 
And slept in many a crystal pool 
For quiet contemplation : 
No public and no private care 
The freeborn mind enthralling, 
We made a day of happy hours, 
Our happy days recalling. 
Brisk Youth appeared, the Morn of 
youth, 
With freaks of graceful folly ,— 
Life’s temperate Noon, her sober Eve, 
Her Night not melancholy ; 
Past, present, future, all appeared 
In harmony united, 


60 BRITISH “RBOETS 





Like guests that meet, and some from 
tar 
By cordial love invited. 


And if, as Yarrow, through the woods 
And down the meadow ranging, 

Did meet us with unaltered face, 
Though we were changed and chang- 

ing ; 

If, then, some natural shadows spread 
Our inward prospect over, 

The soul’s deep valley was not slow 
Its brightness to recover. 


Eternal blessings on the Muse, 
And her divine employment ! 
The blameless Muse, who trains her Sons 
For hope and calm enjoyment ; 
Albeit sickness, lingering yet, 
Has o’er their pillow brooded ; 
And Care waylays their steps-—a Sprite 
Not easily eluded. 


For thee, O Scott! compelled to change 
Green Eildon-hill and Cheviot 

For warm Vesuvio’s vine-clad slopes ; 
And leave thy Tweed and Tiviot 

For mild Sorrento’s breezy waves ; 
May classic Fancy, linking 

With native Fancy her fresh aid, 
Preserve thy heart from sinking! 


Oh! while they minister to thee, 
Kach vying with the other, 
May Health return to mellow Age 
With Strength, her venturous brother ; 
And Tiber, and each brook and rill 
Renowned in song and story, 
With unimagined beauty shine, 
Nor lose one ray of glory ! 


For Thou, upon a hundred streams, 
By tales of love and sorrow, 
Of faithful love, undaunted truth, 
Hast shed the power of Yarrow ; 
And streams unknown, hills yet unseen, 
Wherever they invite Thee, 
At parent Nature’s grateful call, 
With gladness must requite Thee. 


A gracious welcome shall be thine, 
Such looks of love and honor 

As thy own Yarrow gave to me 
When first I gazed upon her ; 

Beheld what I had feared to see, 
Unwilling to surrender 

Dreams treasured up from early days, 
The holy and the tender. 


And what, for this frail world, were all 
That mortals do or suffer, 





Did no responsive harp, no pen, 
Memorial tribute offer ? 

Yea, what were mighty Nature’s self ? 
Her features, could they win us, 


Unhelped by the poetic voice 


That hourly speaks within us? 


Nor deem that localized Romance 
Plays false with our affections ; 
Unsanctifies our tears—made sport 
For fanciful dejections : 

Ah, no! the visions of the past 
Sustain the heart in feeling 

Life asshe is—our changeful Life, 
With friends and kindred dealing, 


Bear ne Ye, whose thoughts that 
ay 
In Yarrow’s groves were centred ; 
Who through the silent portal arch 
Of mouldering Newark entered ; 
And clomb the winding stair that once 
Too timidly was mounted 
By the ‘‘last Minstrel,” (not the last !) 
Ere he his Tale recounted. 


Flow on for ever, Yarrow Stream ! 
Fulfil thy pensive duty, 
Well pleased that future Bards should 
chant 
For simple hearts thy beauty ; 
To dream-light dear while yet unseen, 
Dear to the common sunshine, 
And dearer still. as now I feel, 
To memory’s shadowy moonshine ! 
1831 1835. 


THE TROSACHS 


As recorded in my sister’s Journal, I had first 
seen the Trosachs in her and Coleridge’s com- 
pany. The sentiment that runs through this 
Sonnet was natural to the season in which I 
again saw this beautiful spot ; but thisand some 
other sonnets that follow were colored by the 
remembrance of my recent visit to Sir Walter 
Scott, and the melancholy errand on which he 
was going. (Wordsworth.) 


THERE'S not a nook within this solemn 
Pass, 

But were an apt confessional for One 

Taught by his summer spent, his autumn 
gone, 

That Life is but a tale of morning grass 

Withered at eve. From scenes of art 
which chase 

That thought away, turn, and with 
watchful eyes 

Feed it ’mid Nature’s old felicities, 

Rocks, rivers, and smooth lakes - more 
clear than glass 


WORDSWORTH 61 


Untouched, unbreathed upon. Thrice 
happy quest, 

If from a golden perch of aspen spray 

(October’s workmanship to rival May) 

The pensive warbler of the ruddy breast 

That moral sweeten by a heaven-taught 


lay, 
Lulling the year, with all its cares, to 
rest ! 18381. 1835. 


IF THOU INDEED DERIVE THY 
LIGHT FROM HEAVEN 


If thou indeed derive thy light from 
Heaven, 

Then, to the measure of that heaven- 
born light, 

Shine, Poet ! in thy place, and be content: 

The stars pre-eminent in magnitude, 

And they that from the zenith dart their 
beams, 

(Visible though they be to half the earth, 

Though half a sphere be conscious of 

their brightness) 

Are yet of no diviner origin, 

No purer essence, than the one that 
burns, 

Like an untended watch-fire on the ridge 

Of some dark mountain ; or than those 
which seem 

Humbly to hang, like twinkling winter 
lamps, 


Among the branches of the leafless trees. ° 


Allare the undying offspring of one Sire : 

Then, to the measure of the light vouch- 
safed, 

Shine, Poet! in thy place, and be con- 
tent. 1832, 18386. 


IF THIS GREAT WORLD OF JOY 
AND PAIN 


IF this great world of joy and pain 
Revolve in one sure track ; 

If freedom, set, will rise again, 
And virtue, flown, come back ; 
Woe to the purblind crew who fill 
The heart with each day’s care ; 
Nor gain, from past or future, skill 

To bear, and to forbear ! 
1838, 1835. 


“THERE!” SAID A STRIPLING, 
POINTING WITH MEET PRIDE 


‘* THERE!” said a Stripling, 
with meet pride 

Towards a low roof with green trees 
half concealed, 


pointing 


‘*Is Mosgiel Farm ; and that’s the very 
field 

Where Burns ploughed up the Daisy.” 
Far and wide 

A plain below stretched seaward, while, 
descried 

Above sea-clouds, the Peaks of Arran 
rose ; 

And, by that simple notice, the repose 

Of earth, sky, sea and air, was vivitied. 

Beneath ‘‘the random bield of clod or 


stone ” 

Myriads of daisies have shone forth in 
flower 

Near the lark’s nest, and in their natural 
hour 

Have passed away ; less happy than the 
One 

That, by the unwilling ploughshare, died 
to prove 

The tender charm of poetry and love. 


y OD2 
OV. 


1835. 


MOST SWEET IT IS WITH UN- 
UPLIFTED EYES 


Most sweet it is with unuplifted eyes 

To pace the ground, if path be there or 
none, 

While a fair region round the traveller 
lies 

Which he forbears again to look upon ; 

Pleased rather with some soft ideal scene, 

The work of Fancy, or some happy tone 

Of meditation, slipping in between 

The beauty coming and the beauty gone. 

If Thought and Love desert us, from that 
day 

Let us break off all commerce with the 
Muse : 

With Thought and Love companions of 
our way, 

Whate’er the senses take or may refuse, 

The Mind’s internal heaven shall shed her 
dews 

Of inspiration on the humblest lay. 

ISSS. = ASAD, 


EXTEMPORE EFFUSION UPON THE 
DEATH OF JAMES HOGG! 
WHEN first, descending from the moor- 


lands, 
I saw the Stream of Yarrow glide 


1 Walter Scott . . died Sept. 21, 1832 


S. T. Coleridge . * July 25, 1834 
Charles Lamb . * Dee. 27, 1834 
Geo. Crabbe . “heb. 38,1832 
Felicia Hemans “ May 16, 18384 


62 


Along a bare and open valley, 
The Ettrick Shepherd was my guide. 


When last along its banks I wandered 
Through groves that had begun to shed 
Their golden leaves upon the pathways, 
My steps the Border-minstrel led. 


The mighty Minstrel breathes no longer, _ 


’>Mid mouldering ruins low he lies; 
And death upon the braes of Yarrow, 
Has closed the Shepherd-poet’s eyes: 


_Nor has the rolling year twice measured, 
From sign to sign, its steadfast course, 
Since every mortal power of Coleridge 
Was frozen at its marvellous source ; 


The rapt One, of the godlike forehead, 

The heaven-eyed creature sleeps in 
earth : 

And Lamb, the frolic and the gentle, 

Has vanished from his lonely hearth. 


Like clouds that rake the mountain- 
summits, 

Or waves that own no curbing hand, 

How fast has brother followed brother 

From sunshine to the sunless land ! 


Yet I, whose lids from infant slumber 
Were earlier raised, remain to hear 

A timid voice, that asks in whispers, 
‘¢Who next will drop and disappear ? ” 


Our haughty life is crowned with dark- 
ness, 

Like London with its own black wreath, 

On which with thee, O Crabbe! forth- 
looking, 

I gazed from Hampstead’s breezy heath. 


As if but yesterday departed, 

Thou too art gone before ; but why, 
O’er ripe fruit, seasonably gathered, 
Should frail survivors heave a sigh? 


Mourn rather for that holy Spirit, 
Sweet as the spring, as ocean deep ; 
For Her who, ere her summer faded, 
Has sunk into a breathless sleep. 


No more of old romantic sorrows, 

For slaughtered Youth or _ love-lorn 
Maid! 

With sharper grief is Yarrow smitten, 

And Ettrick mourns with her their Poet 
dead. November, 1835. 1836, 


BRITISH POETS } 


A POET !—HE HATH PUT HIS 
HEART TO SCHOOL 


A Poet!—He hath put his heart to 
school, 

Nor dares to move unpropped upon the 
staff 

Which Art hath lodged within his hand 
—must laugh 

By precept only, and shed tears by rule. 

Thy Art be Nature; the live current 
quaff, 

And let the groveller sip his stagnant 
pool, 

In fear that else, when Critics grave and 
cool 

Have killed him, Scorn should write his 
epitaph. 

How does the Meadow-flower its bloom 
unfold ? 

Because the lovely little flower is free 

Down to its root, and, in that freedom, 
bold ; 

And so the grandeur of the Forest-tree 

Comes not by casting in a formal mould, 

But from its own divine vitality. 


1842... 1842, 


SO FAIR, SO SWEET, WITHAL SO 
SENSITIVE 


So fair, so sweet, withal so sensitive, 

Would that the little Flowers were born 
to live, 

Conscious of half the pleasure which 
they give; 


That to this mountain-daisy’s self were 


known 

The beauty of its star-shaped shadow, 
thrown 

On the smooth surface of this naked 
stone! 


And what if hence a bold desire should 


mount 

High as the Sun, that he could take 
account 

Of all that issues from his glorious 
fount! 


So might he ken how by his sovereign 
aid 
delicate companionships 
made ; 
And how he rules the pomp of light 
and shade ; 


eos. 
) These are 


WORDSWORTH 63 


And were the Sister-power that shines 
by night 

So privileged, what a countenance of 
delight 

Would through the clouds break forth 
on human sight! 

Fond fancies! wheresoe’er shall turn 
thine eye 

On earth, air, ocean, or the starry sky, 

Converse with Nature in pure sympa- 


thy ; 
All vain desires, all lawless wishes 
quelled, 
Be Thou to love and praise alike im- 
pelled 
Whatever boon is granted or withheld. 
1845. 1845. 


THE UNREMITTING VOICE OF 


NIGHTLY STREAMS 

THE unremitting voice of nightly 
streams 

That wastes so oft, we think, its tune- 
ful powers, 

If neither soothing to the worm that 
gleams 

Through dewy grass, nor small birds 
hushed in bowers, 

Nor unto silent leaves 
flowers,— 

That voice of unpretending harmony 

(For who what isshall measure by what 
seems 

To be, or not to be, 

Or tax high Heaven with prodigality ?) 

Wants not a healing influence that can 
creep 


and drowsy 


Into the human breast, and mix with 
slee 

To regulate the motion of our dreams 

For kindly issues—as through every 
clime 

Was felt near murmuring brooks in 
earliest time ; 

As at this day, the rudest swains who 
dwell 

Where torrents roar, or hear the tink- 
jing knell 

Of water-breaks, 

could tell 


with grateful heart 
1846. 1850. 


SONNET 
TO AN OCTOGENARIAN 

AFFECTIONS lose their object; Time 

brings forth 
No successors ; and, lodged in memory, 
If love exist no longer, it must die,— 
Wanting accustomed food, must pass 

from earth, 
Or never hope to reach a second birth. 
This sad belief, the happiest that is left 
To thousands, share not Thou ; howe’er 


bereft, 

Scorned, or neglected, fear not such a 
dearth. 

Though poor and destitute of friends 
thou art, 


Perhaps the sole survivor of thy race, 

One to whom Heaven assigns that 
mournful part 

The utmost solitude of age to face, 

Still shall be left some corner of the 


heart 
Where Love for living Thing can find a 
place. 1846. 1850. 


(iO ERD Gare 
LIST OF REFERENCES 


EDITIONS 

Tere is no “standard ” edition of Coleridge’s Poetical Works, though 
that edited by James Dykes Campbell nearly fills the place of one. The 
best editions are: the Pickering Edition, London, 1877, 4 volumes; re- 
issued by The Macmillan Co., with additions, in 1880; the Aldine Edition, 
2 volumes, 1885; the Riverside Edition (Houghton, Mifflin & Co.) ; and 
the * Globe Edition, edited by James Dykes Campbell, 1 volume, 1893, 
(The Macmillan Co.). 


BrioGRAPHY 


GintMAN (James), The Lifeof Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Vol I, 1838 
(not completed). Branptu (Alois), Samuel Taylor Coleridge und die eng- 
lische Romantik, Berlin, 1886. (English edition, by Lady Eastlake, as- 
sisted by the author, 1887). Trarut (H. D.), Coleridge, (English Men of 
Letters Series), 1884. Caine (T. Hall), Coleridge (Great Writers Series), 
1887. * Camprety (James Dykes), Samuel Taylor Coleridge,a Narrative 
of the Events of his Life, 1894. (See also Knight’s Life of Wordsworth.) - 


PERSONAL REMINISCENCES AND HARLY CRITICISM 


CoLermpGE (S. T.), Biographia Literaria. Table Talk. Letters, edited 
by Ernest Hartiey Coleridge. Anima Poete, Selections from the unpub- 
lished Note-Books of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, edited by Ernest Hartley 
Coleridge. Letters, Conversations, and Recollections of 8S. T. Coleridge, 
edited by Thomas Allsop. Memoir and Letters of Sara Coleridge, edited 
by her daughter. Corrie (Joseph), Early Recollections of 8. T. 
Coleridge. Tatrourp (T.N.), Final Memorials of Lamb.  lRosrn- 
son (H. C.), Diary. Hazirrr (William), My First Acquaintance with Poets. 
Hazuirr (William), Spirit of the Age. Hazrirr (William), Lectures on 
the English Poets; Lecture 8. Dr Quincry (Masson’s Edition), Vol. 5, 

Joleridge and Opium-Eating. Mirrorp (M. R.), Recollections of a Literary 
Life. Wutson (John), Essays. Jrrrrey (Lord Francis), Critical Essays: 
Coleridge’s Literary Life. * Cartyiz, The Life of John Sterling, Chap. 5. 
Lamp (Charles), Works: * Christ’s Hospital Five and Thirty Years Ago ; 
Recollections of Christ’s Hospital ;On the Death of Coleridge. * Worps- 
wortH (Dorothy), Recollections of a Tour in Scotland. Journal. 

64 


COLERIDGE 65 


LATER CRITICISM 


Mitt (J. 5.), Dissertations and Discussions. SrepHen (Leslie), Hours 
ina Library, Vol. III. * Pater (Walter), Appreciations. * LowEL. 
(J.R.), Prose Works. *Swinpurne (A. C.), Essays and Studies. * Gar- 
NEeTr (R.), Essays of an Ex-librarian: The Poetry of Coleridge. Rosrrr- 
son (John M.), New Essays Towards a Critical Method. Winter (W.), 
Shakespeare’s England: At the Grave of Coleridge. Rossrerr1 (W. M.), 
Lives of Famous Poets. Dowprn (Edward), New Studies in Literature: 
Coleridge as a Poet. Dowpren (Edward), French Revolution and Eng- 
lish Literature: Essay IV. Brers, English Romanticism in the Nine- 
teenth Century. Woopsrerry (G. E.), Makers of Literature. Snairp 
(J. C.), Studies in Poetry and Philosophy. Catverr (G. H.), Biographic 
Aesthetic Studies: Coleridge, Shelley, Goethe. Mircneni (D. G.), Eng- 
lish Lands, Letters and Kings. Sainrsspury (G.), Essays in English 
Literature: Coleridge and Southey. Brirre.y (Augustine), Obiter Dicta. 
Watson (William), Excursions in Criticism. 

Bayne (Peter), Essays, II. Brxux (C. D.), Some of our English Poets. 
Brooke (Stopford A.), Theology in the English Poets. Brooks (8. W.), 
English Poetry and Poets. CuHaNcELLor (EK. B.), Literary Types. Cuor- 
LEY (Henry F.), Authors of England. Dawson (G.), Biographical Lec- 
tures. Dawson (W. J.), Makers of Modern English. Drsuier (C. D.) 
Afternoons with the Poets. Drvry (J.), Comparative Estimate of Mod- 
ern English Poets. Dixon (W. M.), English Poetry: Blake to Brown- 
ing. FRroraincuam (O. B.), Transcendentalism in New England. Haun 
(5. C.), Book of Memories. Hancock (A. E.), The French Revolution 
and the English Poets. Jounson (C. F.), Three Americans and Three 
Englishmen. MacDonatp (G.), England’s Antiphon. O’Hacan (T.), Oc- 
casional Papers. Ossoxi (M. F.), Art, Literature and the Drama. Rerrp 
(H.), Lectures on British Poets: II. Suairp (J. C.), Studies in Poetry. 
SuHarp (Rh. F.), Architects of English Literature. Suepp (W. G. F.), Lit- 
erary Essays. Swanwick (A.), Poets the Interpreters of Their Age. 
Tuomson (K. B.), Recollections of Literary Characters. TuckERMAN 
(i. T.), Thoughts on the Poets. Worron (Mabel E.), Word Portraits. 


MrmoriaL VERSES, ETC. 


SHELLEY, To Coleridge. * Rossert1 (D. G.), Five English Poets: 
Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Dr Vere (Aubrey), Coleridge. Browning 
(EK. B.), A Vision of Poets. Warrs-Dunrton (T.), Coleridge (in Stedman’s 
Victorian Anthology.) Watson (William), Lines in a Fly-Leaf of Chris- 
tabel. Hetiman (G. 8.), Coleridge (in Stedman’s American Anthology). 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


SHEPHERD (R. H.), Bibliography of Coleridge ; revised by W. F. Pri- 
deaux. Haney (J. L.), A Bibliography of Samuel Taylor Coleridge. 
5 


CODE RIDGE 


LIFE 


AS late I journey’d o’er the extensive 
plain 

Where native Otter sports his scanty 
stream, 

Musing in torpid woe a sister’s pain, 

The glorious prospect woke me from 
the dream. 


At every step it widen’d to my sight, 

Wood, Meadow, verdant Hill, and dreary 
Steep, - 

Following in quick succession of delight, 

Till all—at once—did my eye ravish’d 
sweep ! 


May this (I cried) my course through 
Life portray ! 

New scenes of wisdom may each step 
display, 

And knowledge open as my days ad- 
vance ! 

Till what time Death shall pour the un- 
darken’d ray, 

My eye shall dart thro’ 
panse, 

And thought suspended lie in rapture’s 
blissful trance. 

September, 1789, 


infinite ex- 


1834.! 


LINES 
ON AN AUTUMNAL EVENING 


O THOU wild Fancy, check thy wing! 

5 No more 

Those thin white flakes, those purple 
clouds explore ! 

Nor there with happy spirits speed thy 
flight 


1 The dates for Coleridge’s poems are made up 
from the Shepherd-Prideaux and the Haney 
bibliographies, and from the excellent notes to 
Campbell’s edition of the Poetical Works. 


66 


Bathed in rich amber-glowing floods of 
light ; 

Nor in yon gleam, where slow descends 
the day, 

With western peasant hail the morning 
ray ! 

Ah! rather bid the perished pleasures 
move, 

A shadowy train, across the soul of 
Love! 

O’er disappointment’s wintry desert fling 

Each flower that wreathed the dewy 
locks of Spring, 

When blushing, like a bride, from Hope’s 
trim bower 

She leapt, awakened by the pattering 
shower. 

Now sheds the sinking Sun a deeper 
gleam, 

Aid, lovely Sorceress! aid thy Poet’s 
dream ! 

With faery wand O bid the Maid arise, 

Chaste Joyance dancing in her bright- 
blue eyes ; 

As erst when from the Muses’ calm 
abode 

I came, with Learning’s meed not un- 
bestowed ; 

When as she twined a4 laurel round my 
brow, 

And met my kiss, and half returned my 
vow, 

O’er all my frame shot rapid my thrilled _ 
heart, 

And every nerve confessed the electric 
dart. 


O dear Deceit ! I see the Maiden rise, 

Chaste Joyance dancing in her bright- 
blue eyes! 

When first the lark high-soaring swells 
his throat, 

Mocks the tired eye, and scatters the 
loud note, 

I trace her footsteps on the accustomed 
lawn, 


COLERIDGE 67 


I mark her glancing mid the gleams of 
dawn. 

When the bent flower beneath the night- 
dew weeps 

And on the lake the silver lustre sleeps, 

Amid the paly radiance soft and sad, 

She meets my lonely path in moonbeams 
clad. 

With her along the streamlet’s brink I 
rove ; 

With her I list the warblings of the 
grove; 

And seems in each low wind her voice 
to float 

Lone whispering Pity in each soothing 
note ! 


Spirits of Love! ye heard her name! 


Obey 

The powerful spell, and to my haunt 
repair. 

Whether on clustering pinions ye are 
there, 


Where rich snows’ blossom on the 
Myrtle-trees, 


Or with fond languishment around my 


fair 

Sigh in the loose luxuriance of her 
hair; ; 

O heed the spell, and hither wing your 
way, 


Like far-off music, voyaging the breeze ! 


Spirits! to you the infant Maid was 
given 

Formed by the wondrous Alchemy of 
Heaven ! 

No fairer Maid does Love's wide empire 
know, 

No fairer Maid e’er heaved the bosom’s 
snow. 

A thousand Loves around her forehead 


A thousand Loves sit melting in her eye ; 

Love lights her smile—in Joy’s red 
nectar dips 

His myrtle flower, and plants it on her 
lips. 

She speaks! and hark that passion- 
warbled song— 

Still, Fancy ! still that voice, those notes, 
prolong, 

As sweet as when that voice with rap- 

turous falls 

wake the softened echoes of 

Heaven’s Halls! 


Shall 


O (have I sigh’d) were mine the wiz- 
ard’s rod, 





Or mine the power of Proteus, changeful 
God !1 

A flower-entangled Arbor I would seem 

To shield my Love from Noontide’s 
sultry beam : 

Or bloom a Myrtle, from whose odorous 
boughs 

My Love might weave gay garlands for 
her brows. 

When Twilight stole across the fading 


vale, 

To fan my Love I'd be the Evening 
Gale ; 

Mourn in the soft folds of her swelling 
vest, 

And flutter my faint pinions on her 
breast ! 

On Seraph wing I’d float a Dream by 
night, 

To soothe my Love with shadows of 
delight :— 


Or soar aloft to be the Spangled Skies, 
And gaze upon her with a thousand 
eyes ! 


As when the Savage, who his drowsy 
frame 

Had basked beneath the Sun’s unclouded 
flame, 

Awakes amid the troubles of the air, 

The skiey deluge, and white lightning’s 


glare— 

Aghast he scours before the tempest’s 
sweep, 

And sad recalls the sunny hour of 
sleep :— 


So tossed by storms along Life’s wilder- 
ing way, 
Mine eye reverted views that cloudless 


day, 

When by my native brook I wont to 
rove, 

While Hope with kisses nursed the In- 
fant Love. 


native brook! like Peace, so 
placidly 

Smoothing through fertile fields thy 

current meek ! 


Dear native brook! where first young 


Dear 


Poesy 

Stared wildly-eager in her noontide 
dream ! 

Where biameless pleasures dimple Quiet’s 
cheek, 


17 entreat the Publie’s pardon for having care- 
lessly suffered to be printed such intolerable stuff 
as this and the thirteen following lines. They 
have not the merit even of originality : as every 
thought is to be found in the Greek Epigrams. 
(From Coleridge’s note in the Poems, 1796.) 


68 BRITISH POETS 


As water-lilies ripple thy slow stream ! 

Dear native haunts! where Virtue still 
is gay, 

Where Friendship’s fixed star sheds a 
mellowed ray, 

Where Love a crown of thornless Roses 


wears, 

Where soften’d Sorrow smiles within her 
tears ; 

And Memory, with a Vestal’s chaste 
employ, 

Unceasing feeds the lambent flame of 
joy! 

No more your sky-larks melting from the 
sight 

Shall thrill the attuned heart-string with 
delight— 


No more shall deck your pensive Pleas- 
ures sweet 

With wreaths of sober hue my evening 
seat. 

Yet dear to Fancy’s eye your varied 
scene 

Of wood, hill, dale, and sparkling brook 
between ! 

Yet sweet to Fancy’s ear the warbled 
song, 

That soars on Morning’s wing your vales 
among. 


Scenes of my Hope! the achinge ye ye 
leave 

Like yon bright hues that paint the 
clouds of eve! 

Tearful and saddening with the saddened 


blaze 

Mine eye the gleam pursues with wistful 
gaze: 

Sees shades on shades with deeper tint 
impend, 

Till chill and damp the moonless night 
descend. 1793. 1796. 


LEWTI 
OR THE CIRCASSIAN LOVE-CHANT 


AT midnight by the stream I roved, 
To forget the form I loved. 

Image of Lewti! from my mind 
Depart ; for Lewti is not kind. 


The Moon was high, the moonlight 
gleam 
And the shadow of a star 
Heaved upon Tamaha’s stream : 
But the rock shone brighter far, 
The rock half sheltered from my view 
By pendent boughs of tressy yew.— 


So shines my Lewti’s forehead fair, 
Gleaming through her sable hair, 
Image of Lewti! from my mind 
Depart ; for Lewti is not kind. 


I saw a cloud of palest hue, 

Onward to the moon it passed ; 

Still brighter and more bright it grew, 
With floating colors not a few, 

Till it reach’d the moon at last: 
Then the cloud was wholly bright, 
With a rich and amber light ! 

And so with many a hope I seek 

And with such joy I find my Lewti; 
And even so my pale wan cheek 

Drinks in as deep a flush of beauty ! 
Nay, treacherous image! leave my 

mind, . 
If Lewti never will be kind. 


The little cloud—it floats away, 
Away it goes; away so soon ? 

Alas! it has no power to stay: 

Its hues are dim, its hues are gray 
Away it passes from the moon! 

How mournfully it seems to fly, 
Ever fading more and more, 

To joyless regions of the sky— 

And now ’tis whiter than before! 

As white as my poor cheek will be, 
When, Lewti! on my couch I lie, 

A dying man for love of thee. 

Nay, treacherous image! leave my 

mind— 
And yet, thou didst not look unkind. 


I saw a vapor in the sky. 
Thin, and white, and very high ; 
I ne’er beheld so thin a cloud: 
Perhaps the breezes that can fly 
Now below and now above, 
Have snatched aloft the lawny shroud 
Of Lady fair—that died for love. 
For maids, as well as youths, have 
perished 
From fruitless love too fondly cherished. 
Nay, treacherous image! leave my 
mind— 
For Lewti never will be kind. 


Hush! my heedless feet from under 

Slip the crumbling banks for ever: 
Like echoes to a distant thunder, 

They plunge into the gentle river. 
The river-swans have heard my tread, 
And startle from their reedy bed. 

O beauteous birds! methinks ye measure 

Your movements to some heavenly 

tune! 





COLERIDGE 69 


O beauteous birds! tis such a pleasure 
To see you move beneath the moon, 

I would it were your true delight 

To sleep by day and wake all night. 


I know the place where Lewti lies 

When silent night has closed her eyes: 
It is a breezy jasmine-bower, 

The nightingale sings o’er her head : 
Voice of the Night! had I the power 

That leafy labyrinth to thread, 

And creep, like thee, with soundless 

tread, 

I then might view her bosom white 

Heaving lovely to my sight, 

As these two swans together heave 

On the gently-swelling wave. 


Oh! that she saw me ina dream, 

And dreamt that I had died for care ; 
All pale and wasted I would seem 

Yet fair withal, as spirits are! 
Td die indeed, if I might see 
Her bosom heave, and heave for me! 
Soothe, gentle image! soothe my mind! 
To-morrow Lewti may be kind. 

1794. April 13, 1798. 


LA FAYETTE 


As when far off the warbled strains are 
heard 
That soar on Morning’s wing the vales 
among ; 
Within his cage the imprisoned matin 
bird 
Swells the full chorus with a generous 
song : 


He bathes no pinion in the dewy light, 
No Father’s joy, no Lover’s bliss he 
shares, 
Yet still the rising radiance cheers 
his sight— 
His fellows’ freedom soothes the cap- 
tive’s cares ! 


Thou, FAYETTE! who didst wake with 
startling voice 
Life’s better sun from that long win- 
try night, 
Thus in thy Country’s triumphs shalt 
rejoice 
And mock with raptures high the dun- 
geon’s might: 


For lo! the morning struggles into day, 

And Slavery’s spectres shriek and van- 
ish from the ray! 

1794, December 15, 1794. 


REFLECTIONS ON HAVING LEFT 
A PLACE OF RETIREMENT 


Sermoni propriora.—Hor. 


Low was our pretty Cot: our tallest rose 

Peeped at the chamber-window. We 
could hear 

At silent noon, and eve, and early morn, 

The sea’s faint murmur. In the open 
air 

Our myrtles blossom’d ; and across the 
porch 

Thick jasminestwined: the little land- 
scape round 

Was green and woody, and refreshed 
the eye. 

It was . spot which you might aptly 
ca 

The Valley of Seclusion! Once I saw 

(Hallowing his Sabbath-day by quietness) 

A wealthy son of commerce saunter by, 

Bristowa’s citizen : methought, it calmed 

His thirst of idle gold, and made him 


muse 

With wiser feelings: for he paused, and 
looked 

With a pleased sadness, and gazed all 
around, 

Then eyed our Cottage, and gazed round 
again, 

And sighed, and said, it was a Blessed 
Place. 

And we were blessed. Oft with patient 
ear 

Long-listening to the viewless sky-lark’s 
note 


(Viewless, or haply for a moment seen 

Gleaming on sunny wings) in whispered 
tones 

I've said to my beloved, ‘‘ Such, sweet 
girl! 

The inobtrusive song of Happiness, 

Unearthly minstrelsy! then only heard 

When the soul seeks to hear; when all 
is hushed, 

And the heart listens !” 

But the time, when first 

From that low dell, steep up the stony 
mount 

I climbed with perilous toil and reached 
the top, 

Oh! what a goodly scene! 
bleak mount, 

The bare bleak mountain speckled thin 
with sheep ; 

Gray clouds, that shadowing spot the 
sunny fields ; 

And river, now with bushy rocks o’er- 
browed, 


Here the 


70 BRITISH MPOLTS 








Now winding bright and full, with naked 
banks ; 

And seats, and lawns, the abbey and the 
wood, 

And cots, and hamlets, and faint city- 
spire ; 

The Channel there, the Islandsand white 
sails, 

Dim coasts, and cloud-like hills and 
shoreless Ocean— 

It seem’d like Omnipresence ! God, me- 
thought, 

Had built him there a Temple: 
whole World 

Seemed imaged in its vast circumfer- 
ence : 

No wish profaned my overwhelmed heart. 

Blest hour! It was a luxury,—to be! 


the 


Ah! quiet dell! dear cot, and mount 

sublime ! 

I was constrained to quit you. 
right, 

While my unnumbered brethren toiled 
and bled, 

That I should dream away the entrusted 
hours 

On rose-leaf beds, pampering the coward 
heart 

With feelings all too delicate for use? 

Sweet is the tear that from some How- 
ard’s eye 

Drops on the cheek of one he lifts from 
earth: 

And he that works me good with un- 
moved face, 

Does it but half: he chills me while he 
aids, 

My benefactor, not my brother man ! 

Yet even this, this cold beneficence 

Praise, praise it,O my Soul! oft as thou 
scann’st 

The sluggard Pity’s vision-weaving tribe! 

Who sigh for wretchedness, yet shun 
the wretched. 

Nursing in some delicious solitude 

Their slothful loves and dainty sym- 
pathies ! 

I therefore go, and join head, heart, and 


VAST IG 


hand, 

Active and firm, to fight the bloodless 
fight 

Of science, freedom, and the truth in 
Christ. 


Yet oft when after honorable toil 

Rests the tired mind, and waking loves 
to dream, 

My spirit shall revisit thee, dear Cot ! 





Thy jasmine and thy window-peeping 
rose, 

And myrtles fearless of the mild sea-air. 

And I shall sigh fond wishes—sweet 
abode! 

Ah !—had none greater ! 
had such! 

It might be so—but the time is not yet. 

Speed it, O Father! Let thy Kingdom 
come ! 1795. October, 1796. 


And that all 


TIME REAL AND IMAGINARY 
AN ALLEGORY 


On the wide level of a mountain’s head, 
(1 knew not where, but “’twas some 
faery place) 
Their pinions, ostrich-like, for sails out- 
spread, : 
Two lovely children run an endless race, 
A sister and a brother ! 
This far outstript the other ; 
Yet ever runs she with reverted face, 
And looks and listens for the boy be- 
hind: 
For he, alas! is blind! 
O’er rough and smooth with even step he 
passed, 
And knows not whether he be first or 
last. 91, Jn alee 


THIS LIME-TREE BOWER MY 
PRISON 


ADDRESSED TO CHARLES LAMB, OF THE 
INDIA HOUSE, LONDON 


In the June of 1797 some long-expected friends 
paid a visit to the author’s cottage; and on the 
morning of their arrival, he met with an acci- 
dent, which disabled him from walking during 
the whole time of their stay. One evening, 
when they had left him for a few hours, he 
composed the following lines in the garden- 
bower. (Coleridge.) 


WELL, they are gone, and here must 1 
remain, 

This lime-tree bower my prison! I have. 
lost 

Beauties and feelings, such as would 
have been 

Most sweet to my remembrance even 
when age 


1TIneluded by Coleridge among his ‘‘ Juvenile 
Poems.” There is no other evidence to indicate 
at what date it was written. See, however, a man- 
uscript note of 1811 on the same subject, given 
in Anima Poetae at the beginning of Chapter 


Had dimmed mine eyes to Rane ea 
They, meanwhile, 
Friends, whom I never more may meet 


again, 

On springy heath, along the hill-top 
edge, 

Wander in gladness, and wind down, 
perchance, 


To that still roaring dell, of which I told: 
The roaring dell, o’erwooded, narrow, 
deep, 

And only speckled by the mid-day sun ; 

Where its slim trunk the ash from rock 
to rock 

Flings arching like a_ bridge ;—that 
branchless ash, 

Unsunned and damp, whose few poor 
yellow leaves 

Ne’er tremble in the gale, yet tremble 
still, 

Fanned by the water-fall! and there my 
friends 

Behold the dark green file of long lank 
weeds, 

That all at once (a most fantastic sight!) 

Still nod and drip beneath the dripping 


edge 
Of the blue clay-stone. 


Now, my friends emerge 
Beneath the wide wide Heaven—and 
view again 
The many-steepled tract magnificent 
Of hilly fields and meadows, and the 
sea, 

With some fair bark, 
. sails light up 
The slip of smooth clear blue betwixt 

two Isles 
Of purple shadow! 


perhaps, whose 


Yes! they wander 
on 

In gladness all; but thou, 
most glad, 

My gentle-hearted Charles ! for thou hast 
pined 

And hungered after Nature, many a 
year, 

i the great City pent, winning thy way 

With sad yet patient soul, through evil 
and pain 

And strange calamity ! Ah! slowly sink 

Behind the western ridge, thou glorious 


methinks, 


Sun! 

Shine in the slant beams of the sinking 
orb, 

Ye purple heath-flowers! richlier burn, 
ye clouds! 


Live in the yellow light, ye distant 
groves ! 


COLERIDGE 71 


And kindle, thou blue Ocean! 
friend 

Struck with deep joy may stand, as I 
have stood, 

Silent with swimming sense ; yea, gazing 
round 

On the wide landscape, gaze tiii all doth 
seem 

Less gross than bodily ; 
hues 

As veil the Almighty Spirit, when yet 
he makes 

Spirits perceive his presence. 


So my 


and of such 


A delight 
Comes sudden on my heart, and I am 


lad 

As I myself were there! Nor in this 
bower, 

This little lime-tree bower, have I not 
marked 


Much that has soothed me. Pale beneath 
the blaze 

Hung the transparent foliage; and I 
watched 

Some broad and sunny leaf, and loved to 
see 

The shadow of the leaf and stem above, 

Dappling its sunshine! And that wal- 
nut-tree 

Was richly tinged, and a deep radiance 
la 

Full on the ancient ivy, which usurps 

Those fronting elms, and now, with 
blackest mass 

Makes their dark branches gleama lighter 
hue 

Through the late twilight: 
now the bat 

Wheels silent by, and not a swallow 
twitters, 

Yet still the solitary humble-bee 

Sings in the bean-flower! Henceforth I 
shall know 

That Nature ne’er deserts the wise and 
pure ; 

No plot so narrow, be but Nature there, 


and though 


No waste so vacant, but may well 
employ 

Each faculty of sense, and keep the 
heart 

Awake to Love and Beauty ! and some- 
times 


; ‘Tis well to be bereft of promised good, 


That we may lift the soul, and contem- 
late 
With lively joy the joys we cannot 
share. 
My gentle-hearted Charles! when the 
last rook 


"2 BRITISH POETS 


Beat its straight path along the dusky 
air 

Homewards, I blest it! deeming, its 
black wing 

(Now a dim speck, now vanishing in 
light) 

Had cross’d the mighty orb’s dilated 
lory, 

While thou stood’st gazing ; or whenall 
was still, 

Flew creeking o’er thy head, and had a 
charm 

For thee, my gentle-hearted Charles, to 
whom 

No sound is dissonant which tells of 
Life. 1797, 1800. 


KUBLA KHAN 


In the summer of the year 1797, the Author, 
then in ill health, had retired toa lonely farm- 
house between Porlock and Linton, on the Ex- 
moor confines of Somerset and Devonshire. In 
consequence of aslight indisposition, an anodyne 
had been prescribed, from the effects of which 
he fell asleep in his chair at the moment that he 
was reading the following sentence, or words of 
the samesubstance, in Purchas’s ‘‘ Pilgrimage”: 
‘“ Here the Khan Kubla commanded a palace to 
be built, and a stately garden thereunto. And 
thus ten miles of fertile ground were inclosed 
with a wall.”?” The Author continued for about 
three hours in a profound sleep, atleast of the 
external senses, during which time he has the 
most vivid confidence, that he could not have 
composed less than from two to three hundred 
lines; if that indeed can be called composition 
in which all the images rose up before him as 
things, with a parallel production of the corre- 
spondent expressions, without any sensation or 
consciousness of effort. On awaking he ap- 
peared to himself to have a distinct recollection 
of the whole, and taking his pen, ink, and paper, 
instantly and eagerly wrote down the lines that 
are here preserved. At this moment he was un- 
fortunately called out by a person on business 
from Porlock, and detained by him above an 
hour, and‘on his return to his room, found, to his 
no small surprise and mortification, that though 
he still retained some vague and dim recollec- 
tion of the general purport of the vision, yet, 
with the exception of some eight or ten scattered 
lines and images, all the rest had passed away, 
like the images on the surface of a stream into 
which a stone has been cast, but, alas ! without 
the after restoration of the latter. 

Then all the charm 
Is broken—all that phantom-world so fair 
Vanishes, and a thousand ecirclets spread, 
And each mis-shapes the other. Stay awhile, 
Poor youth! who scarcely dar’st lift up thine 
eyes— 
The stream will soon renew its smoothness, soon 
The visions will return! And lo, he stays, 
And soon the fragments dim of lovely forms 
Come trembling back, unite, and now once 
more 
The pool becomes a mirror. 
ere ea The Picture ; or, the Lover’s Resolu- 
ion 
Yet from the still surviving recollections in his 


mind, the Author has frequently purposed to 
finish for himself what had been originally, as it 
were, given to him. Avpuov advov acw, but the 
to-morrow isyet to come. (Coleridge’s note, 1816.) 


In Xanadu did Kubla Khan 

A stately pleasure-dome decree : 

Where Alph, the sacred river, ran 

Through caverns measureless to man 

Down to a sunless sea. : 

So twice five miles of fertile ground 

With walls and towers were girdled 
round : 

And here were gardens bright with 
sinuous rills, ' 

Where blossomed many an incense-bear- 

_ing tree ; 

And here were forests ancient as the 
hills, 

Enfolding sunny spots of greenery. 

But oh! that deep romantic chasm 
which slanted 

Down the green hill athwart a cedarn 
cover ! 

A savage place! as holy and enchanted 

As e’er beneath a waning moon was 
haunted 

By woman wailing for her demon-lover ! 

And from this chasm, with ceaseless 
turmoil seething, 

As if this earth in fast thick pants were 
breathing, 

A mighty fountain 
forced : 

Amid whoseswift half-intermitted burst 

Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding 
hail, 

Or chaffy grain beneath the thresher’s 
flail : 

And ’mid these dancing rocks at once 
and ever 

It flung up momently the sacred river. 

Five miles meandering with a mazy 
motion 

Through wood and dale the sacred river 
ran, 

Then reached the caverns measureless to 
man, 

And sank in tumult to a lifeless ocean : 

And ’mid this tumult Kubla heard from 
fare: 

Ancestral voices prophesying war ! 


momently was 


The shadow of the dome of pleasure 
Floated midway on the waves; 
Where was heard the mingled 
measure 
From the fountain and the caves. 
It was a miracle of rare device, 
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice } 


COLERIDGE 73 





A damsel with a dulcimer 
In a vision once I saw : 
It was an Abyssinian maid, 
And on her dulcimer she played, 
Singing of Mount Abora. 
Could I revive within me 
Her symphony and song, 
To such a deep delight ’twould win 
me, 
That with music loud and long, 
LI would build that dome in air, 
That sunny dome! those caves of ice ! 
And all who heard should see them 
’ there, F 
And all should cry, Beware! Beware! 
His flashing eyes, his floating hair ! 
Weave a circle round him thrice, 
And close your eyes with holy dread, 
For he on honey-dew hath fed, 
And drunk the milk of Paradise. 
1797. 1816. 


SONG FROM OSORIO 


HEAR, sweet spirit, hear the spell, 
Lest a blacker charm compel ! 

So shall the midnight breezes swell 
With thy deep long-lingering knell. 


And at evening evermore, 

In a Chapel on the shore, 

Shall the Chaunters sad and saintly, 

Yellow tapers burning faintly, 

Doleful Masses chaunt for thee, 
Miserere Domine ! 


Hark! the cadence dies away 
On the quiet moonlight sea: 

The boatmen rest their oars and say, 
Miserere Domine! dva7.. 18a: 


THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT 
MARINER}? 


IN SEVEN PARTS 


Facile credo, plures esse Naturas invisibiles 
quam visibilesin rerum universitate. Sed horum 
omnium familiam quis nobis enarrabit? et gra- 
dus et cognationes et discrimina et singulorum 
munera? Quid agunt? que loca habitant? 
Harum rerum notitiam semper ambivit ingenium 
humanum, nunquam attigit. Juvat, interea, 
non diffiteor, quandoque in animo, tanquam in 
tabula, majoris et melioris mundi imaginem 
contemplari: ne mens assuefacta hodiernee vite 
minutiis se contrahat nimis, et tota subsidat in 


1 The poem is here given in the text of 182! 
which is Coleridge’s final version, the result of 
several revisions, most of which are improve- 
ments over the first text of 1798, Instead of the 


pusillas cogitationes. Sed veritati interea invi- 
gilandum est, modusque servandus, ut certa ab 
incertis, diem a nocte, distinguamus. T. BuRNET 
Archeol. Phil. p. 68. 


ARGUMENT 2 


How a Ship having passed the Line was driven 
by storms to the cold Country towards the South 
Pole ; and how from thence she made her course 
to the tropical Latitude of the Great Pacific 
Ocean ; and of the strange things that befell ; 
and in what manner the Ancyent Marinere came 
back to his own Country. 


PART I 


2 IT is an ancient Mariner, 

And he stoppeth one of three. 

‘* By thy long gray beard and glittering 
eye, 

Now wherefore stopp’st thou me ? 


The Bridegroom’s doors 
wide, 

And Iam next of kin; 

The guests are met, the feast is set: 

May’st hear the merry din.” 


are opened 


He holds him with his skinny hand, 

‘* There was a ship,” quoth he. 

‘“*Hold off! unhand me, gray-beard 
loon!” 

Eftsoons his hand dropt he. 


83 He holds him with his glittering eye— 
The Wedding-Guest stood still, 

And listens like a three years’ child : 
The Mariner hath his will. 





third stanza, for instance, the original text has 
the two following : 


But still he holds the wedding-guest— 
“There was a Ship,’”’? quoth he— 

‘* Nay, if thou’st got a laughsome tale, 
Marinere ! come with me.” 


He holds him with his skinny hand, 
Quoth he, ‘t‘ There was a Ship—”’ 

‘“* Now get thee hence, thou gray-beard Loon ! 
Or my Staff shall make thee skip.” 


For a full study of the different texts, see 
Prof. F. H. Sykes’ Select Poems of Coleridge 
and Wordsworth, edited from Authors’ Editions, 


‘Toronto, 1899. On the origin of the poem, see 


Biographia Literaria, Chap XIV, and Words: 
worth’s account of it, quoted and discussed in 
H. D. Traill’s Life of Coleridge, pp. 47-50. 

1 In the editions of 1798 and 1800 only. 


2 An ancient Mariner meeteth three Gallants 
bidden to a wedding-feast, and detaineth one. 
[This and the following notes, except those in 
brackets, are Coleridge’s running Summary of 
the story, first printed in Sybilline Leaves, 1817. ] 

3 The Wedding-Guest is spell-bound by the 
eye of the old seafaring man, and constrained 
to hear his tale, 


74 BRITISH POETS 





The Wedding-Guest sat on a stone: 
He cannot choose but hear ; 

And thus spake on that ancient man, 
The bright-eyed Mariner. 


‘The ship was cheered, the harbor 
cleared, 

Merrily did we drop 

Below the kirk, below the hill, 

Below the lighthouse top. 


1 The sun came up upon the left, 

Out of the sea came he! 

And he shone bright, and on the right 
Went down into the sea. 


Higher and higher every day, 

Till over the mast at noon—” 

The Wedding-Guest here beat his breast, 
For he heard the loud bassoon. 


2 The bride hath paced into the hall, 
Red as a rose is she; 

Nodding their heads before her goes 
The merry minstrelsy. 


The Wedding-Guest he beat his breast, 
Yet he cannot choose but hear ; 

And thus spake on that ancient man, 
The bright-eyed Mariner. 


3 * And now the Storm-blast came, and 
he 

Was tyrannous and strong: 

He struck with his o’ertaking wings, 

And chased us south along. 


With sloping masts and dipping prow, 

As who pursued with yell and blow 

Still treads the shadow of his foe, 

And forward bends his head, 

The ship drove fast, loud roared the 
blast, 

And southward aye we fled. 


And now there came both mist and 
snow, 

And it grew wondrous cold : 

And ice, mast-high, came floating by, 

As green as emerald. 


1 The Mariner tells how the ship sailed south- 
ward with a good wind and fair weather, till it 
reached the line. 


2 The Wedding Guest heareth the bridal 
music ; but the Mariner continueth his tale. 

The ship drawn by a storm toward the south 
pole. 


# The land of ice, and of fearful sounds, where 
no living thing was to be seen. 


And through the drifts the snowy clifts 
Did send a dismal sheen : 

Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken— 
The ice was all between. 


The ice was here, the ice was there, 

The ice was all around : 

It cracked and growled, and roared and 
howled, 

Like voices in a swound ! 


1 At length did cross an Albatross, 
Thorough the fog it came ; 

As if it had been a Christian soul, 
We hailed it in God’s name. 


It ate the food it ne’er had eat, 

And round and round it flew. 

The ice did split with a thunder-fit ; 
The helmsman steered us through ! 


2 And a good south wind sprung up be- 
hind ; 

The Albatross did follow, 

And every day, for food or play, 

Came to the mariner’s hollo ! 


In mist or cloud, on mast or shroud, 

It perched for vespers nine ; 

While all the night, through fog-smoke 
white, 

Glimmered the white moon-shine.” 


8 «<God save thee, ancient Mariner ! 

From the fiends, that plague thee 
thus !— 

Why look’st thou so?” 
cross-bow 

I shot the Albatross. 


—‘‘* With my 


PART II 


‘*The Sun now rose upon the right: 
Out of the sea came he, 

Still hid in mist, and on the left 
Went down into the sea. 


And the good south wind still blew be- 
hind, 

But no sweet bird did follow, 

Nor any day for food or play 

Came to the mariners’ hollo ! 


17Till a great sea bird, called the Albatross, 
came through the snow-fog, and was received 
with great joy and hospitality. 


2 And lo! the Albatross proveth a bird of good 
omen, and followeth the ship as it returned 
northward through fog and floating ice. 


8 The ancient Mariner inhospitably killeth the 
pious bird of good omen. 


COLERIDGE 75 


1 And I had done an hellish thing, 

And it would work ’em woe: 

For all averred, I had killed the bird, 
That made the breeze to blow. 

Ah wretch! said they, the bird to slay, 
That made the breeze to blow ! 


2 Nor dim nor red, like God’s own head, 
The glorious Sun uprist : 

Then all averred, I had killed the bird 
That brought the fog and mist. 

*T was ea said they, such birds to 
slay, 

That bring the fog and mist. 


3’ The fair breeze blew, the white foam 
flew, 

The furrow followed free ; 

We were the first that ever burst 

Into that silent sea. 


4 Down dropt the breeze, the sails dropt 
down, 

*Twas sad as sad could be ; 

And we did speak only to break 

The silence of the sea ! 


Allin a hot and copper sky, 

The bloody Sun, at noon, 

Right up above the mast did stand, 
No bigger than the Moon. 


Day after day, day after day, 
We stuck, nor breath nor motion ; 
As idle as a painted ship 

Upon a painted ocean. 


5 Water, water, everywhere, 
And all the boards did shrink ; 
Water, water, everywhere 
Nor any drop to drink. 


The very deep did rot: O Christ ! 
That ever this should be! 

Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs 
Upon the slimy sea. 


About, about, in reel and rout 
The death-fires danced at night ; 
The water, like a witch’s oils, 
Burnt green, and blue and white. 


1 His shipmates ery out against the ancient 
Mariner, for killing the bird of good luck. 

2 But when the fog cleared off, they justify the 
same, and thus make themselves accomplices in 
the crime. 

$’The fair breeze continues; the ship enters 
the Pacific Ocean, and sails northward, even 
till it reaches the Line. 

4 The ship hath been suddenly becalmed. 

5 And the Albatross begins to be avenged. 


1 And some in dreams assured were 
Of the Spirit that plagued us so ; 
Nine fathom deep he had followed us 
From the land of mist and snow. 


And every through utter 
drought, 

Was withered at the root ; 

We could not speak, no more than if 


We had been choked with soot. 


tongue, 


2 Ah! well a-day! what evil looks 
Had I from old and young ! 
Instead of the cross, the Albatross 
About my neck was hung. 

PART III 
‘‘There passed a weary time. Each 

throat 

Was parched, and glazed each eye. 
A. weary time! a weary time ! 
How glazed each weary eye! 
3 When looking westward, I beheld 
A something in the sky. 





At first it seemed a little speck, 

And then it seemed a mist ; 

It moved and moved, and took at last 
A certain shape, I wist. i 


A speck, a mist, a shape, I wist ! 
And still it neared and neared : 
As if it dodged a water-sprite, 

It plunged and tacked and veered. 


4 With throats unslaked, with black lips 
baked, 

We could nor laugh nor wail ; 

Through utter drought all dumb we 
stood ! 

I bit my arm, I sucked the blood, 

And cried, A sail! a sail! 


With throats unslaked, with black lips 
baked, 
Agape they heard me call : 


1A Spirit had followed them ; one of the in- 
visible inhabitants of this planet, neither de- 
parted souls nor angels; concerning whom the 
learned Jew, Josephus, and the Platonic Con- 
stantinopolitan, Michael Psellus, may be con- 
sulted. They are very numerous, and there is 
no climate or element without one or more, 

2 The shipmates, in their sore distress, would 
fain throw the whole guilt on the ancient Mari- 
ner: in sign whereof they hang the dead sea- 
bird round his neck. 

3 The ancient Mariner beholdeth a signin the 
element afar off. 

* At its nearer approach, it seemeth him to be 
a ship; and at a dear ransom he freeth his 
speech from the bonds of thirst. 


76 ENGLISH POETS 





1 Gramercy ! they for joy did grin, 
And all at once their breath drew in, 
As they were drinking all. 


2*See! see!’ (I cried) ‘she tacks no 


more ! 
Hither to work us weal, 
Without a breeze, without a tide, 
She steadies with upright keel !’ 


The western wave was all aflame. 

The day was well-nigh done ! 

Almost upon the western wave 

Rested the broad bright Sun ; 

When that strange shape drove suddenly 
Betwixt us and the Sun. 


3 And straight the Sun was flecked with 
bars, 

(Heaven’s Mother send us grace !) 

As if through a dungeon-grate he peered 

With broad and burning face. 


Alas! (thought I, and my heart beat 
loud) 

How fast she nears and nears ! 

Are those her sails that glance in the 
Sun, 

Like restless gossameres ? 


4 Are those her ribs though which the Sun 
Did peer, as through a grate ? 

And is that Woman all her crew ? 

Is that a Death? and are there two? 
5Is Death that woman’s mate ? 


6 Her lips were red, her looks were free, 
Her locks were yellow as gold : 

Her skin was as white as leprosy, 

The Night-mare Life-in-Death was she, 
Who thicks man’s blood with cold. 


7 The naked hulk alongside came, 

And the twain were casting dice ; 

‘The game is done! ve won! I’ve won !’ 
Quoth she, and whistles thrice. 


1A flash of joy. 

? And horror follows. For can it be a ship that 
comes onward without wind or tide ? 

3 It seemeth him but the skeleton of a ship. 

* Andits ribs are seen as bars on the face of 
the setting Sun. 

®’The Spectre-Woman and her Death-mate, 
and no other on board the skeleton-ship. 

6 Like vessel, like crew ! 

if Death and Life-in-Death have diced for the 
ship’s crew, and she (the latter) winneth the 
ancient Mariner, 


The 


1The Sun’s rim dips ; the stars rush out. 
At one stride comes the dark ; 

With far-heard whisper, o’er the sea, 
Off shot the spectre-bark. 


2 We listened and looked sideways up! 
Fear at my heart, as at a cup, 

My life-blood seemed to sip! 

The stars were dim, and thick the night, 
steersman’s face by his lamp 
gleamed white ; 

From the sails the dew did drip— 

Till clomb above the eastern bar 

The horned Moon, with one bright star 
Within the nether tip. 


3 One after one, by the star-dogged Moon, 

Too quick for groan or sigh, 

Each turned his face with a ghastly 
pang, 

And cursed me with his eye. 


4¥Four times fifty living men, 

(And I heard nor sigh nor groan) 
With heavy thump, a lifeless lump, 
They dropped down one by one. 


5 The souls did from their bodies fly,— 
They fled to bliss or woe ! 

And every soul, it passed me by, 

Like the whizz of my cross-bow ! ”— 


PART IV 


6 *<T fear thee, ancient Mariner! 

I fear thy skinny hand 

And thou art long, and lank, and brown, 
As is the ribbed sea-sand.7 


I fear thee and thy glittering eye. 

And thy skinny hand, so brown.” — 

8** Fear not, fear not, thou Wedding- 
Guest ! 

This body dropt not down. 


1 No twilight within the courts of the Sun. 

2 At the rising of the Moon, 

° One after another 

4 His shipmates drop down dead. 

5 But Life-in-Death begins her work on the 
ancient Mariner. ‘. 

°The Wedding-Guest feareth that a Spirit is 
talking to him. 

7([For the last two lines of this stanza, I am in- 
debted to Mr. Wordsworth. It was on a delight- 
ful walk from Nether Stowey to Dulverton, with 
him and his sister, in the autumn of 1797, that 
this poem was planned, and in part composed. 
(Note of Coleridge, first printed in Sibylline 
Leaves, 1817) ] 

§ But the ancient Mariner assureth him of his 
bodily life, and proceedeth to relate’ his horrible 
penance, 


COLERIDGE | a4 


Alone, alone, all, all alone, 
Alone on a wide wide sea ! 
And never a saint took pity on 
My soul in agony. 


1The many men, so beautiful ! 

And they all dead did lie : 

And a thousand thousand slimy things 
Lived on; and so did [. 


2T looked upon the rotting sea, 
And drew my eyes away ; 

I looked upon the rotting deck, 
And there the dead men lay. 


I looked to heaven, and tried to pray ; 
But or ever a prayer had gusht, 

A wicked whisper came, and made 
My heart as dry as dust. 


I closed my lids, and kept them close, 

And the balls like pulses beat ; 

For the sky and the sea, and the sea and 
the sky 

Lay like a load on my weary eye, 

And the dead were at my feet. 


3 The cold sweat melted from their 
limbs, 

Nor rot nor reek did they : 

The look with which they looked on me 

Had never passed away. 


An orphan’s curse would drag to hell 

A spirit from on high ; 

But oh! more horrible than that 

Is a curse in a dead man’s eye! 

Seven days, seven nights, I saw that 
curse, 

And yet I could not die. 


4 The moving Moon went up the sky, 
And nowhere did abide: 

Softly she was going up, 

And a star or two beside— 


! He despiseth the creatures of the calm. 


2 And envieth that they should live, and so 
many lie dead. 


5 But the curse liveth for him in the eye of the 
dead men. 


4 In his loneliness and fixedness he yearneth to- 
wards the journeying Moon, and the stars that 
still sojourn, yet still move onward; and every- 
where the blue sky belongs to them, and is their 
appointed rest, and their native country and 
their own natural homes, which they enter un- 
announced, as lords that are certainly expected, 
and yet there is a silent joy at their arrival. 


Her beams bemocked the sultry main, 
Like April hoar-frost spread ; 

But where the ship’s huge shadow lay, 
The charmed water burnt alway 

A still and awful red. 


1 Beyond the shadow of the ship, 

I watched the water-snakes : 

They moved in tracks of shining white, 
And when they reared, the elfish ight 
Fell off in hoary flakes. 


Within the shadow of the ship 

I watched their rich attire: 

Blue, glossy green, and velvet black, 
They coiled and swam; and every track 
Was a flash of golden fire. 


20 happy livings things! no tongue 
Their beauty might declare : 

A spring of love gushed from my heart, 
3 And I blessed them unaware : 

Sure my kind saint took pity on me, 
And I blessed them unaware. 


4 The selfsame moment I could pray ; 
And from my neck so free 

The Albatross fell off, and sank 
Like lead into the sea. 


PART V 


‘“ Oh sleep! it is a gentle thing, 
Beloved from pole to pole ! 

To Mary Queen the praise be given! 
She sent the gentle sleep from Heaven, 
That slid into my soul. 


5 The silly buckets on the deck, 

That had so long remained, 

I dreamt that they were filled with dew ; 
And when I awoke, it rained. 


My lips were wet, my throat was cold, 
My garments all were dank ; 

Sure I had drunken in my dreams, 

And still my body drank. 


I moved, and could not feel my limbs: 
I was so light—almost 

I thought that I had died in sleep, 

And was a blessed ghost. 


1 By the light of the Moon he beholdeth God’s 
creatures of the great calm. 


2 Their beauty and their happiness. 
3 He blesseth them in his heart. 
# The spell begins to break. 


5 By grace of the holy Mother, the ancient 
Mariner is refreshed with rain. 


78 BRITISH POETLS 





1 And soon I heard a roaring wind : 

It did not come anear : 

But with its sound it shook the sails, 
That were so thin and sere. 


The upper air burst into life ! 

And a hundred fire-flags sheen, 

To and fro they were hurried about ! 
And to and fro, and in and out, 

The wan stars danced between. 


And the coming wind did roar more 
loud, 

And the sails did sigh like sedge ; 

And the rain poured down from one 
black cloud ; 

The Moon was at its edge. 


The thick black cloud was cleft, and still 
The Moon was at its side: 

Like waters shot from some high crag, 
The lightning fell with never a jag, 

A river steep and wide. 


2The loud wind 
ship, 

Yet now the ship moved on ! 

Beneath the lightning and the Moon 

The dead men gave a groan, 


never reached the 


They groaned, they stirred, they all up- 
rose, 

Nor spake, nor moved their eyes ; 

It had been strange, even in a dream, 

To have seen those dead men rise. 


The helmsman steered, the ship moved 
on; 

Yet never a breeze up blew: 

The mariners all ’gan work the ropes, 

Where they were wont to do ; 

They raised their limbs lke lifeless 
tools— 

We were a ghastly crew. 


The body of my brother’s son 
Stood by me, knee to knee : 

The body and I pulled at one rope 
But he said nought to me.”— 


8 “<T fear thee, ancient Mariner !”’— 
‘* Be calm, thou Wedding-Guest ! 


1 He heareth sounds and seeth strange sights 
and commotions in the sky and the element. 


* The bodies of the ship’s crew are inspired, 
and the ship moves on ; 


3 But not by the souls of the men, nor by 
demons of earth or middle air, but by a blessed 
troop of angelic spirits, sent down by the invo- 
cation of the guardian saint, 





’Twas not those souls that fled in pain, 
Which to their corses came again, 
But a troop of spirits blest : 


For when it dawned—they dropped their 
arms, 

And clustered round the mast ; 

Sweet sounds rose slowly through their 
mouths, 

And from their bodies passed. 


Around, around, flew each sweet sound, 
Then darted to the Sun ; 

Slowly the sounds came back again, 
Now mixed, now one by one. 


Sometimes a-dropping from the sky 

I heard the sky-lark sing ; 

Sometimes all little birds that are, 

How they seemed to fill the sea and air 
With their sweet jargoning ! 


And now ’twas like all instruments, 
Now like a lonely flute ; 

And now it is an angel’s song, 

That makes the heavens be mute. 


It ceased ; yet still the sails made on 
A pleasant noise till noon, 

A noise like of a hidden brook 

In the leafy month of June, 

That to the sleeping woods all night 
Singetha quiet tune. 


Till noon we quietly sailed on, 

Yet never a breeze did breathe : 
Slowly and smoothly went the ship, 
Moved onward from beneath. 


1 Under the keel nine fathom deep, 
From the land of mist and snow, 
The spirit slid: and it was he 

That made the ship to go. 

The sails at noon left off their tune, 
And the ship stood still also. 


The Sun, right up above the mast, 

Had fixed her to the ocean: 

But in a minute she ’gan stir, 

With a short uneasy motion— 
Backwards and forwards half her length 
With a short uneasy motion. 


Then like a pawing horse let go, 
She made a sudden bound : 

It flung the blood into my head, 
And I fell down in a swound. 


1The lonesome Spirit from the south-pole 
carries on the ship as far as the Line, in obedi- 
ence to the angelic troop, but still requireth 
vengeance, 


COLERIDGE 79 


1 How long in that same fit I lay, 
I have not to declare ; 

But ere my living life returned, 
I heard and in my soul discerned 
Two voices in the air. 


‘Is it he?’ quoth one, ‘Is this the man? 
By him who died on cross, 

With his cruel bow he laid full low 

The harmless Albatross. 


The spirit who bideth by himself 

In the land of mist and snow, 

He loved the bird that loved the man 
Who shot him with his bow.’ 


The other was a softer voice, 

As soft as honey-dew : 

Quoth he, *The man hath penance 
done, 

And penance more will do.’ 


PART VI 
FIRST VOICE 


‘*** But tell me, tell me! speak again, 
Thy soft response renewing— 

What makes that ship drive on so fast ? 
What is the ocean doing ? 


SECOND VOICE 


‘Still as a slave before his lord, 
The ocean hath no blast ; 

His great bright eye most silently 
Up to the Moon is cast— 


If he may know which way to go; 
For she guides him smooth or grim. 
See, brother, see! how graciously 
She looketh down on him.’ 


FIRST VOICE 


2* But why drives on that ship so fast, 
Without or wave or wind?’ 


SECOND VOICE 


‘The air is cut away before, 
And closes from behind. 


1The Polar Spirit’s fellow-demons, the invis- 
ible inhabitants of the element, take part in his 
wrong; and two of them relate one to the other, 
that penance long and heavy for the ancient 
Mariner hath been accorded to the Polar Spirit, 
who returneth southward. 

2The Mariner hath been cast into a trance; 
for the angelic power causeth the vessel to 
drive northward faster than human life could 
endure. 


Fly, brother, fly! more high, more high ! 
Or we shall be belated : 

For slow and slow that ship will go, 
When the Mariner’s trance is abated.’ 


1T woke, and we were sailing on 

As in a gentle weather : 

‘Twas night, calm night, the Moon was 
high, 

The dead men stood together. 


All stood together on the deck, 
For a charnel-dungeon fitter : 
All fixed on me their stony eyes, 
That in the Moon did glitter. 


The pang, the curse, with which they 
died, 

Had never passed away : 

I could not draw my eyes from theirs, 

Nor turn them up to pray. 


2 And now this spell was snapt: once 
more 

I viewed the ocean green, 

And looked far forth, yet little saw 

Of what had else been seen— 


Like one, that on a lonesome road 

Doth walk in fear and dread, 

And having once turned round walks 
on, 

And turns no more his head ; 

Because he knows, a frightful fiend 

Doth close behind him tread. 


But soon there breathed a wind on me, 
Nor sound nor motion made: 

Its path was not upon the sea, 

In ripple or in shade. 


It raised my hair, it fanned my cheek 
Like a meadow-gale of spring—_ 

It mingled strangely with my fears, 
Yet it felt like a welcoming. 


Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship, 

Yet she sailed softly too : 

Sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze— 
On me alone it blew. 


8Oh! dream of joy! is this indeed 
The light-house top I see ? 

Is this the hill? is this the kirk ? 
Is this mine own countree ? 


1The supernatural motion is retarded; the 
Mariner awakes, and his penance begins anew. 

2 The curse is finally expiated. 

3 And theancient Mariner beholdeth his native 
country. 


80 BRITISH*POETS 





We drifted o’er the harbor-bar, 
And I with sobs did pray— 

‘O let me be awake, my God! 
Or let me sleep alway.’ 


The harbor-bay was clear as glass, 
So smoothly it was strewn ! 

And on the bay the moonlight lay, 
And the shadow of the Moon. 


The rock shone bright, the kirk no less, 
That stands above the rock : 

The moonlight steeped in silentness 
The steady weathercock. 


And the bay was white with silent light 
Till rising from the same, 

1Full many shapes, that shadows were, 
In crimson colors came. 


2A little distance from the prow 
Those crimson shadows were: 

I turned my eyes upon the deck— 
Oh, Christ! what saw I there ! 


Each corse lay flat, lifeless and flat, 
And, by the holy rood ! 

A man all light, a seraph-man, 

On every corse there stood. 


This seraph-band, each waved his hand: 
It was a heavenly sight! 

They stood as signals to the land, 

Each one a lovely light; 


This seraph-band, each waved his hand, 
No voice did they impart— 

No voice; but oh! the silence sank 
Like music on my heart. 


But soon I heard the dash of oars, 

I heard the Pilot’s cheer ; 

My head was turned perforce away, 
And I saw a boat appear. 


The Pilot and the Pilot’s boy, 

IT heard them coming fast: 

Dear Lord in Heaven! it was a joy 
The dead men could not blast. 


I saw a third—I heard his voice : 

It is the Hermit good ! 

He singeth loud his godly hymns 
That he makes in the wood. 

He’ll shrieve my soul, he’ll wash away 
The Albatross’s blood. 


1 The angelic spirits leave the dead bodies, 
2 And appear in their own forms of light. 


_ PART VII 


1“ This Hermit good lives in that wood 
Which slopes down to the sea, 

How loudly his sweet voice he rears ! 
He loves to talk with marineres 

That come from a far countree. 


He kneels at morn, and noon, and eve— 

He hath a cushion plump: 

It is the moss that wholly hides 

The rotted old oak-stump. — 

The skiff-boat neared: I heard them 
talk, 

‘Why, this is strange, I trow! 

Where are those lights so many and 
fair, 

That signal made but now ?’ 


2‘Strange, by my faith!’ the Hermit 
said— 

‘And they answered not our cheer ! 

The planks looked warped ! and see those 
sails, 

How thin they are and sere ! 

TI never saw aught like to them, 

Unless perchance it were 


Brown skeletons of leaves that lag 

My forest-brook along ; 

When the ivy-tod is heavy with snow, 
And the owlet whoops to the wolf below, 
That eats the she-wolf’s young.’ 


‘Dear Lord ! it hath a fiendish look ’— 
(The Pilot made reply) 

‘I am a-feared.’—‘ Push on, push on !’ 
Said the Hermit cheerily. 


The boat came closer to the ship, 

But I nor spake nor stirred ; 

The boat came close beneath the ship, 
And straight a sound was heard. 


8 Under the water it rumbled on, 
Still louder and more dread : 

It reached the ship, it split the bay ; 
The ship went down like lead. 


4Stunned by that loud and dreadful 
sound, 
Which sky and ocean smote, 


1The Hermit of the Wood, 

* Approacheth the ship with wonder. 

3 The ship suddenly sinketh. 

*The ancient Mariner is saved in the Pilot’s 
boat. 


COLERIDGE 81 





Like one that hath been seven days 
drowned 

My body lay afloat ; 

But swift as dreams, myself I found 

Within the Pilot’s boat. 


Upon the whirl, where sank the ship, 
The boat spun round and round ; 

And all was still, save that the hill 
Was telling of the sound. 


I moved my lips—the Pilot shrieked 
And fell down in a fit ; 

The Holy Hermit raised his eyes, 
And prayed where he did sit. 


I took the oars : The Pilot's boy 

Who now doth cr azy go 

Laughed loud and long, and all the while 
His eyes went to and fro. 

‘Ha! ha!’ quoth he, ‘full plain I see, 
The Devil knows how to row.’ 


And now, all in my own countree, 

I stood on the firm land ! 

The Hermit stepped forth from the boat, 
And scarcely he could stand. 


1“ Oshrieve me, shrieve me, holy man !’ 
The Hermit crossed his brow. _ 

‘Say quick,’ quoth he, ‘I bid thee say— 
What manner of man art thou?’ 


Forthwith this 
wrenched 

With a woful agony, 

Which forced me to begin my tale ; 

And then it left me free. 


frame of mine was 


2 Since then, at an uncertain hour, 
That agony returns : 

And till my ghastly tale is told, 
This heart within me burns. 


I pass, like night, from land to land ; 
I have strange power of speech ; 
That moment that his face I see, 

I know the man that must hear me : 
To him my tale I teach. 


What loud uproar bursts from that door! 
The wedding-guests are there : 

But in the garden-bower the bride 

And bride-maids singing are : 

And hark the little vesper bell, 

Which biddeth me to prayer ! 


1 The ancient Mariner earnestly entreateth the 
Hermit to shrieve him ; and the penance of life 
falls on him. 


2 And ever and anon throughout his future life 


an agony constraineth him to travel from land 
to land, 


O Wedding-Guest ! this soul hath been 
Alone on a wide wide sea : 

So lonely, ’twas, that God himself 
Scarce seemed there to be. 


O sweeter than the marriage-feast, 
*Tis sweeter far to me, 

To walk together to the kirk, 
With a goodly company !— 


To walk together to the kirk, 

And all together pray. 

While each to his great Father bends, 
Old men, and babes, and loving friends 
And youths and maidens gay ! 


} Farewell, farewell ! but this I tell 
To thee, thou Wedding-Guest ! 

He prayeth well, who loveth well 
Both man and bird and beast. 


He prayeth best, who loveth best 
All things both great and small ; 
For the dear God who loveth us, 
He made and loveth all.” 


The Mariner, whose eye is bright, 
Whose beard with age is hoar, 


Is gone ; and now the Wedding-Guest 
Turned from the bridegroom’s door, 
He went like one that hath been 
stunned, 
And is of sense forlorn : 
A sadder and a wiser man, 
He rose the morrow morn. 
1797-1798. 1798. 


CHRISTABEL 


The first part of the following poem was writ- 
ten in the year one thousand seven hundred and 
ninety-seven, at Stowey, in the county of Somer- 
set. The second part, after my return from 
Germany, in the year one thousand eight hun- 
dred, at Keswick, Cumberland. Since the latter 
date, my poetic powers have been, till very 
lately, ina state of suspended animation. But 
as, in my very first conception of the tale, 
I had the whole present tomy mind, with the 
wholeness, no less than with the liveliness of a vis- 
ion; I trust that I shall be able to embody in 
verse the three parts si to come, in the course 
of the present year... 

I have only to add, ‘that the metre of the 
Christabel is not, properly speaking, irregular, 
though it may seem so from its being founded 
ona new principle: namely, that of counting 
in each line the accents, not the syllables. 
Though the latter may vary from seven to 
twelve, yet in each line the accents will be found 


1 And to teach, by his own example, love and 
reverence to all things that God made and 
loveth. 


82 BRITISH POETS 





to be only four. Nevertheless this occasional 
variation in number of syllables is not intro- 
duced wantonly, or for the mere ends of con- 
venience, but in correspondence with some tran- 
sition in the nature of the imagery or passion. 
(From Coleridge’s Preface to the first edition. ) 


PART THE FIRST 


’Tis the middle of night by the castle 
clock, 

And the owls have awakened the crow- 
ing cock, 

Tu—whit !——Tu—whoo ! 

And hark, again! the crowing cock, 

How drowsily it crew. 


Sir Leoline, the Baron rich, 

Hath a toothless mastiff, which 

From her kennel beneath the rock 

Maketh answer to the clock, 

Four for the quarters, and twelve for 
the hour ; 

Ever and aye, by shine and shower, 

Sixteen short howls, not over loud ;: 

Some say, she sees my lady’s shroud. 


Is the night chilly and dark ? 

The night is chilly, but not dark. 

The thin gray cloud is spread on high, 

It covers but not hides the sky. 

The moon is behind, and at the full; 

And yet she looks both small and dull. 

The night is chill, the cloud is gray ; 

*Tis a month before the month of May. 

And the Spring comes slowly up this 
way. 


The lovely lady, Christabel, 

Whom her father loves so well, 

What makes her in the woods so late, 

A furlong from the castle gate? 

She had dreams all yesternight 

Of her own betrothed knight ; 

And she in the midnight wood will pray 
For the weal of her lover that’s far away. 


She stole along, she nothing spoke, 

The sighs she heaved were soft and low, 
And naught was green upon the oak 
But moss and rarest misletoe : 

She kneels beneath the huge oak tree, 
And in silence prayeth she. 


The lady sprang up suddenly, 

The lovely lady, Christabel ! 

It moaned as near, as near can be, 

But what it is she cannot tell.—- 

On the other side it seems to be, 

Of the huge, broad-breasted, old oak 
tree. 





The night is chill; the forest bare ; 

Is it the wind that moaneth bleak ? 

There is not wind enough in the air 

To move away the 1inglet curl 

From the lovely lady’s cheek— 

There is not wind enough to twirl 

The one red leaf. the last of its clan, 

That dances as often as dance it can, 

Hanging so light, and hanging so high, 

On the topmost twig that looks up at 
the sky. 


Hush, beating heart of Christabel ! 

Jesu, Maria, shield her well! 

She folded her arms beneath her cloak, 

And stole to the other side of the oak. 
What sees she there ? 


There she sees a damsel bright, 

Drest in a silken robe of white, 

That shadowy in the moonlight shone: 

The neck that made the white robe 
wan, 

Her stately neck, and arms were bare ; 

Her blue-veined feet unsandal’d were, 

And wildly glittered here and there 

The gems entangled in her hair. 

I guess, ’twas frightful there to see 

A lady so richly clad as she— 

Beautiful exceedingly ! 


Mary mother, save me now ! 
(Said Christabel,) And who art thou? 


The lady strange made answer meet, 

And her voice was faint and sweet :— 

Have pity on my sore distress, 

I scarce can speak for weariness : 

Stretch forth thy hand, and have no 
fear ! 

Said Christabel, How camest thou here ? 

And the lady, whose voice was faint and 
sweet, 

Did thus pursue her answer meet: 


My sire is of a noble line, 

And my nameis Geraldine : 

Five warriors seized me yestermorn, 

Me, even me, a maid forlorn: 

They choked my cries with force and 
fright, 

And tied me on a palfrey white. 

The palfrey was as fleet as wind, - 

And they rode furiously behind. 

They spurred amain, their steeds were 
white: 

And once we crossed the shade of night. 

As sure as Heaven shall rescue me, 

I have no thought what men they be; 

Nor do I know how long it is 


COLERIDGE 83 


(For I have lain entranced I wis) 

Since one, the tallest of the five, 

Took me from the palfrey’s back, 

A weary woman, scarce alive. 

Some muttered words his comrades 
spoke : 

He placed me underneath this oak ; 

He swore they would return with haste ; 

Whither they went I cannot tell— 

I thought I heard, some minutes past, 

Sounds as of a castle bell. 

Stretch forth thy hand (thus ended she), 

And help a wretched maid to flee. 


Then Christabel 
hand, 

And comforted fair Geraldine : 

O well, bright dame! may you command 

The service of Sir Leoline ; 

And gladly our stout chivalr y 

Will he send forth and friends withal 

To guide and guard you safe and free 

Home to your noble father’s hall. 


stretched forth her 


She rose: and forth with steps they 
passed 

That strove to be, and were not, fast. 

Her gracious stars the lady blest, 

And thus spake on sweet Christabel : 

All our household are at rest 

The hall as silent as the cell ; 

Sir Leoline is weak in health, 

And may not well awakened be, 

But we will move as if in stealth, 

And I beseech your courtesy, 

This night, to share your couch with me. 


They crossed the moat, and Christabel 

Took the key that fitted well; 

A little door she opened straight, 

Allin the middle of the gate ; 

The gate that was ironed within and 
without, 

Where an army in battle array had 
marched out. 

The lady sank, belike through pain, 

And Christabel with might and main 

Lifted her up, a weary weight, 

Over the threshold of the gate : 

Then the lady rose again, 

And moved, as she were not in pain. 


So free from danger, free from fear, 

They crossed the court; right glad they 
were. 

And Christabel devoutly cried 

To the lady by her side, 

Praise we the Virgin all divine 

Who hath rescued thee from thy dis- 
tress ! 


Alas, alas! said Geraldine, 

I cannot speak for weariness. 

So free from danger, free from fear, 

They crossed the court: right glad they 
were. 


Outside her kennel, the mastiff old 
Lay fast asleep, in moonshine cold. 
The mastiff old did not awake, 

Yet she an angry moan did make ! 
And what can ail the mastiff bitch ? 
Never till now she uttered yell 
Beneath the eye of Christabel. 
Perhaps it is the owlet’s scritch: 
For what can ail the mastiff bitch ? 


They passed the hall, that echoes still, 

Pass as lightly as you will ! 

The brands were flat, the brands were 
dying, 

Amid their own white ashes lying; 

But when the lady passed, there came 

A tongue of light, a fit of flame ; 

And Christabel saw the lady’s eye, 

And nothing else saw she thereby, 

Save the boss of the shield of Sir Leoline 
tall, 

Which hung ina murky old niche in the 
wall. 

O softly tread, said Christabel, 

My father seldom sleepeth well. 


Sweet Christabel her feet doth bare, 

And jealous of the listening air 

They steal their way from stair to stair 

Now in glimmer, and now in gloom, 

And now they pass the Baron’s room, 

As still as death, with stifled breath ! 

And now have reached her chamber 
door ;: 

And now doth Geraldine press down 

The rushes of the chamber floor. 


The moon shines dim in the open air, 
And not a moonbeam enters here. - 
But they without its light can see 

The chamber carved so curiously, 
Carved with figures strange and sweet, 
All made out of the carver’s brain, 

For a lady’s chamber meet ; 

The lamp with twofold silver chain 

Is fastened to an angel’s feet. 


The silver lamp burns dead and dim; 

But Christabel the lamp will trim. 

She trimmed the lamp, and made it 
bright, 

And left it swinging to and fro, 

While Geraldine, in wretched plight, 

Sank down upon the floor below. 


84 


O weary lady, Geraldine, 

I pray you, dr ink this cordial wine! 
It is a wine of virtuous powers ; 

My mother made it of wild flowers. 


And will your mother pity me, 

Who am a maiden most forlorn ? 
Christabel answered—Woe is me! 
She died the hour that I was born. 

l have heard the gray-haired friar tell 
How on her death-bed she did say, 
That she should hear the castle-bell 
Strike twelve upon my wedding-day. 
O mother dear! that thou wert here ! 


I would, said Geraldine, she were ! 


But soon with altered voice, said she— 

‘“Off, wandering mother! Peak and 
pine! 

I have power to bid thee flee.” 

Alas ! what ails poor Geraldine ? 

Why stares she with unsettled eye ? 

Can she the bodiless dead espy ? 

And why with hollow voice cries she, 

“Off, woman, off! this hour is mine— 

Though thou her guardian spirit be, 

Off, woman, off ! tis given to me.” 


Then Christabel knelt by the lady’s side, 
And raised to heaven her eyes so blue— 
‘* Alas!” said she, ‘* this ghastly ride— 
Dear lady! it hath wildered you!” 

The lady wiped her moist cold brow, 
And faintly said, ** ’tis over now !” 
Again the wild-flower wine she drank: 
Her fair large eyes ’gan glitter bright, 
And from the floor whereon she sank, 
The lofty lady stood upright : 

She was most beautiful to see, 

Like a lady of a far countreée. 


And thus the lofty lady spake— 

** All they who live in the upper sky, 
Do love you, holy Christabel ! 

And you love them, and for their sake 
And for the good w hich me befel, 
Even lin my degree will try, 

Fair maiden, to requite you well. 

But now unrobe yourself; for I 

Must pray, ere yet in bed I lie.” 


Quoth Christabel, So let it be! 
And as the lady bade, did she. 
Her gentle limbs did she undress, 
And lay down in her loveliness. 


But through her brain of weal and woe 
So many thoughts moved to and fro, 


i 
(nS SSS SSS 


BRITISH POETS 


That vain it were her lids to close ; 
So half-way from the bed she rose, 
And on her elbow did recline 
To look at the lady Geraldine. 


Beneath the lamp the lady bowed, 
And slowly rolled her eyes around ; 
Then drawing in her breath aloud, 
Like one that shuddered, she unbound 
The cincture from beneath her breast : 
Her silken robe, and inner vest, 
Dropt to her feet, and full in view, 
Behold! her bosom and _ half 
side 
A sight to dream of, not to tell! 
O shield her! shield sweet Christabel ! 


her 





Yet Geraldine nor speaks nor stirs ; 
Ah! what a stricken look was hers! 
Deep from within she seems half-way 
To lift some weight with sick assay, 
And eyes the maid and seeks delay ; 
Then suddenly, as one defied, 
Collects herself in scorn and pride, 
And lay down by the Maiden’s side !— 
And in her arms the maid she took, 
Ah wel-a-day ! 
And with low voice and doleful look 
These words did say: 
‘In the touch of this bosom there 
worketh a spell, 
Which is lord of thy utterance, Christa- 
bel! 
Thou knowest to-night, and wilt know 
to-morrow, 
This mark of my shame, this seal of my 
SOrTOW ; 
But vainly thou warrest, 
For this is alone in 
Thy power to declare, 
That in the dim forest 
Thou heard’st a low moaning, 
And found’st a bright lady, surpassingly 
fair ; 
And didst bring her home with thee in 
love and in charity, 
To shield her and shelter her from the 
damp air.” 


THE CONCLUSION TO PART THE FIRST 


It was a lovely sight to see 

The lady Christabel, when she 

Was praying at the old oak tree. 
Amid the jagged shadows 
Of mossy leafless boughs, 
Kneeling in the moonlight, 
To make her gentle vows ; 


COLERIDGE 85 


Her slender palms together prest, 

Heaving sometimes on her breast ; 

Her face resigned to bliss or bale— 

Her face, oh call it fair not pale. 

And both blue eyes more bright than 
clear, 

Each about to have a tear. 


With open eyes (ah woe is me !) 

Asleep, and dreaming fearfully, 

Fearfully dreaming, yet, I wis, 

Dreaming that alone, which is— 

O sorrow and shame! Can this be she, 

The lady, who knelt at the old oak 
tree ? 

And lo! the worker of these harms, 

That holds the maiden in her arms, 

Seems to slumber still and mild, 

As a mother with her child. 


A star hath set, a star hath risen, 

O Geraldine! since arms of thine 

Have been the lovely lady’s prison. 

O Geraldine! one hour was thine— 
Thow’st had thy will! By tairn and 

rill, 

The night-birds all that hour were still, 
But now they are jubilant anew, 


From cliff and tower, tu--whoo! tu— 
whoo ! 

Tu—whoo! tu—whoo! from wood and 
fell! 


And see! the lady Christabel 

Gathers herself from out her trance ; 

Her limbs relax, her countenance 

Grows sad and soft; the smooth thin 
lids 

Close o’er her eyes! and tears she sheds— 

Large tears that leave the lashes bright ! 

And oft the while she seems to smile 

As infants at a sudden light! 


Yea, she doth smile, and she doth 
weep, 
Like a youthful hermitess, 
Beauteous in a wilderness. 
Who, praying always, prays in sleep. 
And, if she move unquietly, 
Perchance, ’tis but the blood so free 
Comes back and tingles in her feet. 
No doubt, she hath a vision sweet. 
What if her guardian spirit ’twere, 
What if she knew her mother near? 
But this she knows, 1n joys and woes, 
That saints will aid if men will call: 
For the blue sky bends over all! 


sie FP one 


PART THE SECOND 


Each matin bell, the Baron saith, 
Knells us back to a world of death. 
These words Sir Leoline first said, 
When he rose and found his lady dead: 
These words Sir Leoline will say 

Many a morn to his dying day ! 


And hence the custom and law began 
That still at dawn the sacristan, 

Who duly pulls the heavy bell, 

Five and forty beads must tell 
Between each stroke—a warning nell, 
Which not a soul can choose but hear 
From Bratha Head to Wyndermere. 


Saith Bracy the bard, So let it knell! 
And let the drowsy sacristan 

Still count as slowly as he can ! 

There is no lack of such, I ween, 

As well fill up the space between. 

In Langdale Pike and Witch’s Lair, 
And Dungeon-ghyll so foully rent, 
With ropes of rock and bells of air 
Three sinful sextons’ ghosts are pent, 
Who all give back, one after t’other, 
The death-note to their living brother ; 
And oft too, by the knell offended, 
Just as theirone! two! three! is ended 
The devil mocks the doleful tale 

With a merry peal from Borrowdale. 


The air is still ! through mist and cloud 
That merry peal comes ringing loud ; 
And Geraldine shakes off her dread, 
And rises lightly from the bed ; 

Puts on her silken vestments white, 
And tricks her hair in lovely plight, 
And nothing doubting of her spell 
Awakens the lady Christabel. 

‘‘ Sleep you, sweet lady Christabel ? 

I trust that you have rested well.” 


And Christabel awoke and spied 

The same who lay down by her side— 
O rather say, the same whom she 
Raised up beneath the old oak tree! 
Nay, fairer yet! and yet more fair! 
For she belike hath drunken deep 

Of all the blessedness of sleep ! 

And while she spake, her looks, her air, 
Such gentle thankfulness declare, 

That (so it seemed) her girded vests 
Grew tight beneath her heaving breasts. 
“Sure I have sinn’d!” said Christabel. 
‘¢ Now heaven be praised if all be well! ” 
And in long faltering tones, yet sweet, 
Did she the lofty lady greet 


86 BRITISH’ POETS 





_ With such perplexity of mind | 
As dreams too lively leave behind. 


So quickly she rose, and quickly arrayed 
Her maiden limbs, and having prayed 
That He, who on the cross did groan, 
Might wash away her sins unknown, 
She forthwith led fair Geraldine 

To meet her sire, Sir Leoline. 


The lovely maid and the lady tall 

Are pacing both into the hall, 

And pacing on through page and groom, 
Enter the Baron’s presence-room, 


The Baron rose, and while he prest 
His gentle daughter to his breast, 
With cheerful wonder in his eyes 
The lady Geraldine espies, 

And gave such welcome to the same, 
As might beseem so bright a dame! 


But when he heard the lady’s tale, 
And when she told her father’s name, 
Why waxed Sir Leoline so pale, 
Murmuring o’er the name again, 
Lord Roland de Vaux of Tryermaine ? 


Alas! they had been friends in youth ; 

But whispering tongues can _ poison 
truth ; 

And constancy lives in realms above ; 

And life is thorny ; and youth is vain ; 

And to be wroth with one we love 

Doth work like madness in the brain. 

And thus it chanced, as I divine, 

With Roland and Sir Leoline. 

Each spake words of high disdain 

And insult to his heart’s best brother: 

They parted—ne’er to meet again! 

But never either found another 

To free the hollow heart from pain- 
ing— 

They stood aloof, the scars remaining, 

Like cliffs which had been rent asunder; 

A dreary sea now flows between. 

But neither heat, nor frost, nor thunder, 

Shall wholly do away, I ween, 

The marks of that which once hath been. 


Sir Leoline, a moment’s space, 

Stood gazing on the damsel’s face ; 
And the youthful Lord of Tryermaine 
Came back upon his heart again. 


O then the Baron forgot his age, 

His noble heart swelled high with rage ; 
He swore by the wounds in Jesu’s side 
He would proclaim it far and wide, 


With trump and solemn heraldry, 

That they, who thus had wronged the 
dame 

Were base as spotted infamy ! 

‘* And if they dare deny the same, 

My herald shall appoint a week, 

And let the recreant traitors seek 

My tourney court—that there and then 

I may dislodge their reptile souls 

From the bodies and forms of men!” 

He spake: his eye in lightning rolls! 

For the lady was ruthlessly seized ; and 
he kenned 

In the beautiful lady the child of his 
friend ! 


And now the tears were on his face, 

And fondly in his arms he took 

Fair Geraldine, who met the embrace, 

Prolonging it with joyous look. 

Which when she viewed, a vision fell 

Upon the soul of Christabel, 

The vision of fear, the touch and pain! 

She shrunk and shuddered, and saw 
again— 

(Ah, woe isme! Was it for thee, 

Thou gentle maid! such sights to see ?) 

Again she saw that bosom old, 

Again she felt that bosom cold, 

And drew in her breath with a hissing 


sound : 

Whereat the Knight turned wildly 
round, 

And nothing saw, but his own sweet 
maid 


With eyes upraised, as one that prayed. 


The touch, the sight, had passed away, 
And in its stead that vision blest, 
Which comforted her after-rest, 
While in the lady’s arms she lay, 
Had put a rapture in her breast, 
And on her lips and o’er her eyes 
Spread smiles ike hight! 

With new surprise, 
‘What ails then my beloved child ?” 
The Baron said.—His daughter mild 
Made answer, ‘* All will yet be well!” 
I ween, she had no power to tell 
Aught else: so mighty was the spell. 


Yet he, who saw this Geraldine, 

Had deemed her sure a thing divine. 

Such sorrow with such grace 
blended, 

As if she feared she had offended 

Sweet Christabel, that gentle maid! 

And with such lowly tones she prayed 

She might be sent without delay 


she 


COLERIDGE 87 


Home to her father’s mansion. 
“Nay! 
Nay, by my soul!” said Leoline. 
‘*Ho! Bracy the bard, the charge be 
thine! 
Go thou, with music sweet and loud, 
And take two steeds with trappings 
proud, 
And take the youth whom thou lov’st best 
To bear thy harp, and learn thy song, 
And clothe you both in solemn vest, 
And over the mountains haste along, 
Lest wandering folk, that are abroad, 
Detain you on the valley road. 


** And when he has crossed the Irthing 
flood, 

My merry bard! he hastes, he hastes 

Up Knorren Moor, through Halegarth 
Wood, 

And reaches soon that castle good 

Which stands and threatens Scotland’s 
wastes. 

Bard Bracy! bard Bracy! your horses 
are fleet, 

Ye must ride up the hall, your music so 
sweet, 

More loud than your horses’ echoing feet ! 

And loud and loud to Lord Roland call, 

Thy daughter is safe in Langdale hall! 

Thy beautiful daughter is safe and free— 

Sir Leoline greets thee thus through me. 

He bids thee come without delay 

With all thy numerous array ; 

And take thy lovely daughter home: 

And he will meet thee on the way 

With all his numerous array 

White with their panting palfreys’ foam : 

And, by mine honor! I will say, 

That I repent me of the day 

When I spake words of fierce disdain 

To Roland de Vaux of Tryermaine !— 

—For since that evil hour hath flown, 

Many a summer’s sun hath shone ; 

Yet ne’er found I a friend again 

Like Roland de Vaux of Tryermaine.” 


The lady fell, and clasped his knees, 
Her face upraised, her eyes o’erflowing ; 
And Bracy replied, with faltering voice, 
His gracious hail on all bestowing ; 
‘Thy words, thou sire of Christabel, 
Are sweeter than my harp can tell; 

Yet might I gain a boon of thee, 

This day my journey should not be, 

So strange a dream hath come to me: 
That I had vowed with music loud 

To clear yon wood from thing unblest, 
Warn’'d by a vision in my rest! 


For in my sleep I saw that dove, 

That gentle bird, whom thou dost love, 

And call’st by thy own daughter’s 
name— 

Sir Leoline! I saw the same, 

Fluttering, and uttering fearful moan, 

Among the green herbs in the forest 
alone. 

Which when I saw and when I heard, 

I wonder’d what might ail the bird ; 

For nothing near it could I see, 

Save the grass and green herbs under- 
neath the old tree. 


‘* And in my dream, methought, I went 
To search out what might there be found ; 
And what the sweet bird’s trouble meant, 
That thus lay fluttering on the ground. 
I went and peered, and could descry 

No cause for her distressful cry ; 

But yet for her dear lady’s sake 

I stooped, methought, the dove to take, 
When lo! I saw a bright green snake 
Coiled around its wings and neck. 
Green as the herbs on which it couched, 
Close by the dove’s its head it crouched: 
And with the dove it heaves and stirs, 
Swelling its neck as she swelled hers! 

I woke ; it was the midnight hour, 

The clock was echoing in the tower ; 
But though my slumber was gone by, 
This dream it would not pass away— 

It seems to live upon my eye! 

And thence I vowed this self-same day 
With music strong and saintly song 

To wander through the forest bare, 

Lest aught unholy loiter there.” 


Thus Bracy said: the Baron, the while, 

Half-listening heard him with a smile ; 

Then turned to Lady Geraldine, 

His eyes made up of wonder and love ; 

And said in courtly accents fine, 

‘*Sweet maid, Lord Roland’s beauteous 
dove, 

With arms more strong than harp of 
song, 

Thy sire and I will crush the snake !” 

He kissed her forehead as he spake, 

And Geraldine in maiden wise 

Casting down her iarge bright eyes, 

With blushing cheek and courtesy fine 

She turned her from Sir Leoline ; 

Softly gathering up her train, 

That o’er her right arm fell again ; 

And folded her arms across her chest, 

And couched her head upon her breast, 

And looked askance at Christabel—— 

Jesu, Maria, shield her well! 


88 BRITISH POETS 


A snake’s small eye blinks dull and shy, 
And the lady’s eyes they shrunk in her 
head, 
Each shrunk up to a serpent’s eye, 
And with somewhat of malice, and more 
of dread, 
At Christabel she look’d askance !— 
One moment—and the sight was fled ! 
But Christabel in dizzy trance 
Stumbling on the unsteady ground 
Shuddered aloud, witha hissing sound ; 
And Geraldine again turned round, 
And like a thing, that sought relief, 
Full of wonder and full of grief, 
She rolled her large bright eyes divine 
Wildly on Sir Leoline. 


The maid, alas! her thoughts are gone, 
She nothing sees—no sight but one! 
The maid, devoid of guile and sin, 

I know not how, in fearful wise, 

So deeply had she drunken in 

That look, those shrunken serpent eyes, 
That all her features were resigned 

To this sole image in her mind: 

And passively did imitate 

That look of dull and treacherous hate ! 
And thus she stood, in dizzy trance, 
Still picturing that look askance 

With forced unconscious sympathy 
Full before her father’s view—— 

As far as such a look could be 

In eyes so innocent and blue ! 


And when the trance was o’er, the maid 
Paused awhile, and inly prayed : 

Then falling at the Baron’s feet, 

‘* By my mother’s soul do I entreat 
That thou this woman send away !” 
She said: and more she could not say : 
For what she knew she could not tell, 
O’er mastered by the mighty spell. 


Why is thy cheek so wan and wild, 
Sir Leoline? Thy only child 
Lies at thy feet, thy joy, thy pride, 
So fair, so innocent, so mild ; 
The same, for whom thy lady died! 
O, by the pangs of her dear mother, 
Think thou no evil of thy child ! 
For her, and thee, and for no other, 
She prayed the moment ere she died : 
Prayed that the babe for whom she died 
Might prove her dear lord’s joy and 
pride ! 
That prayer her deadly pangs beguiled, 
Sir Leoline! 
And wouldst thou wrong thy only 
child, 
Her child and thine? 


Within the Baron’s heart and brain 

If thoughts, like these, had any share, 

They only swelled his rage and pain, 

And did but work confusion there. 

His heart was cleft with pain and rage, 

His cheeks they quivered, his eyes were 
wild 

Dishonor’d thus in his old age ; 

Dishonor’d by his only child, 

And all his hospitality 

To the insulted daughter of his friend 

By more than woman’s jealousy 

Brought thus to a disgraceful end— 

He rolled his eye with stern regard 

Upon the gentle minstrel bard, 

And said in tones abrupt, austere— 

‘Why, Bracy ! dost tnou loiter here? 

I bade thee hence!” The bard obeyed ; 

And turning from his own sweet maid, 

The aged knight, Sir Leoline, 

Led forth the lady Geraldine ! 


1800. 1816. 


THE CONCLUSION TO PART THE SECOND 


A little child, a limber elf, 
Singing, dancing to itself, 
A fairy thing with red round cheeks, 
That always finds, and never seeks, 
Makes such a vision to the sight 
As fills a father’s eyes with light ; 
And pleasures flow in so thick and fast 
Upon his heart, that he at last 
Must needs express his love’s excess 
With words of unmeant bitterness. 
Perhaps ’tis pretty to force together 
Thoughts so all unlike each other ; 
To mutter and mock a broken charm, 
To dally with wrong that does no harm. 
Perhaps ’tis tender too and pretty 
At each wild word to feel within 
A sweet recoil of love and pity. 
And what, if in a world of sin 
(O sorrow and shame should this be 
true !) 

Such giddiness of heart and brain 
Comes seldom save from rage and pain, 
So talks as it’s most used to do. 

?1801. 1816. 


FRANCE: AN ODE 
I 


YE Clouds! that far above me float and 
pause, 
Whose pathless march no mortal may 
control ! 
Ye Ocean Waves! that, wheresoe’er 
ye roll, 


COLERIDGE 89 


Yield homage only to eternal laws! 
Ye Woods! that listen to the night- 
bird’s singing, 
Midway the smooth and perilous slope 
reclined, 
Save when your own imperious branches 
swinging, 
Have made a solemn music of the 
wind ! 
Where, like a man beloved of God, 
Through glooms, which never woodman 
trod, 
How oft, pursuing fancies holy, 
My moonlight way o’er flowering weeds 
I wound, 
Inspired beyond the guess of folly, 
By each rude shape and wild unconquer- 
able sound ! 
O ye loud Waves! and O ye Forests 
high! 
And O ye Clouds that far above me 
soared ! 
Thou rising sun! thou blue rejoicing 
Sky! 
Yea, every thing that is and will be 
free ! 
Bear witness for me, wheresoe’er ye 


be, 
With what deep worship I have still 
adored 
The spirit of divinest Liberty. 


II 


When France in wrath her giant-limbs 
upreared, 
And with that oath which smote air, 
earth and sea, 
Stamped her strong foot and said she 
would be free, 
Bear witness for me, how I hoped and 
feared ! 

With what a joy my lofty gratulation 
Unawed I sang, amid a slavish band: 
And when to whelm the disenchanted 

nation, 
Like fiends embattled by a wizard’s 
wand, 
The Monarchs marched in evil day, 
And Britain join’d the dire array ; 
Though dear her shores and circling 
ocean, 
Though many friendships, many youth- 
ful loves 
Had swoln the patriot emotion 
And flung a magic light o’er all her hills 
and groves ; 
Yet still my voice, unaltered, 
defeat 


sang 


To all that braved the tyrant-quelling 
lance, 
And shame too long delay’d and vain 
retreat ! 
For ne’er, O Liberty! with partial aim 
I dimmed thy light or damped thy holy 


flame ; 
But blessed the peans of delivered 
France, 
And hung my head and wept at Britain’s 
name. 


III 


‘“¢And what,” I said, ‘“‘ though 
phemy’s loud scream 
With that sweet music of deliverance 
strove ! 
Though all the fierce and drunken 
passions wove 
A dance more wild than 
maniac’s dream ! 
Ye storms, that round the dawning 
east assembled, 
The Sun was rising, though ye hid his 
light ! 
And when to soothe my soul, that 
hoped and trembled, 
The dissonance ceased, and all seemed 
calm and bright ; 
When France her front deep-scarr’d 
and gory 
Concealed with clustering wreaths of 
glory ; 
When insupportably advancing 
Her arm made mockery of the war- 
rior’s ramp ; 
While timid looks of fury glancing, 
Domestic treason, crushed beneath her 
fatal stamp, 
Writhed like a wounded dragon in his 
gore ; 
Then I reproached my fears that 
would not flee ; 
ATM aGots > (Li sald, 
teach her lore 
In the low huts of them that toil and 
groan ; 
conquering by her 
alone, 
Shall France compel the nations to be 


Blas- 


e’er was 


‘* shall Wisdom 


And, happiness 


free, 
Till Love and Joy look round, and call 
the earth their own.” 


IV 


Forgive me, Freedom ! O forgive those 
dreams ! 

I hear thy voice, I hear thy loud 
lament, 


go BRITISH PORTS 





From bleak Helvetia’s icy caverns 
sent— 
I hear thy groans upon her blood-stained 
streams ! 
Heroes, that for your peaceful country 
perished, 
And ye, that fleeing, spot your moun- 
tain snows 
With bleeding wounds; forgive me, 
that I cherished 
One thought that ever blessed your cruel 
foes ! 
To scatter rage and traitorous guilt 
Where Peace her jealous home had 
built ; 
A patriot-race to disinherit 
Of all that made their stormy wilds so 
dear ; 
And with inexpiable spirit 
To taint the bloodless freedom of the 
mountaineer— 
O France, that mockest Heaven, adul- 
terous, blind, 
And patriot only in pernicious toils ! 
Are these thy boasts, Champion of human 
kind? 
To mix with Kings in the low lust of 
sway, 
Yell in the hunt, and share the murder- 
ous prey; 
Toinsult the shrine of Liberty with spoils 
From freemen torn; to tempt and to 
betray? 


Vv 


The Sensual and the Dark rebel in 
vain, 
Slaves by theirown compulsion! In 
mad game 
They burst their manacles and wear 
the name 
Of Freedom, graven on a heavier 
chain ! 
O Liberty ! with profitless endeavor 
Have I pursued thee, many a weary 


hour ; 
But thou nor swell’st the victor’s strain 
nor ever 
Didst breathe thy soul in forms of human 
power. 
Alike from all, howe’er they praise 
thee, 
(Nor prayer, nor boastful name delays 
thee) 
Alike from  Priestcraft’s harpy 
minions, 
And factious Blasphemy’s obscener 
slaves, 





Thou speedest on thy subtle pinions, 
The guide of homeless winds, and play- 
mate of the waves! 
And then I felt thee !—on that sea-cliff’s 
verge, 
Whose pines, scarce travelled by the 
breeze above, 
Had made one murmur with the distant 
surge ! 
Yes, while I stood and gazed, my temples 
bare, 
And shot my being through earth, sea 
and air, 
Possessing all things with intensest 
love, 
O Liberty ! my spirit felt thee there. 
February, 1798. April 16, 1798. 


FROST AT MIDNIGHT 


THE Frost performs its secret ministry, 

Unhelped by any wind. The owlet’s 
cry 

Came loud—and hark, again! loud as 
before. 

The inmates of my cottage, all at rest, 

Have left me to that solitude, which 
suits 

Abstruser musings: save that at my 
side 

My cradled infant slumbers peacefully. 

Tis calm indeed! so calm, that it dis- 
turbs 

And vexes meditation with its strange 

And extreme silentness. Sea, hill, and 
wood, 

This populous village ! Sea, and hill, and 
wood, 

With allthe numberless goings-on of 
life, ' 

Inaudible as dreams! the 
flame 

Lies on my low-burnt fire, and quivers 


thin blue 


not ; 

Only that film, which fluttered on the 
grate, 

Still flutters there, the sole unquiet 
thing. 

Methinks, its motion in this hush of 
nature 

Gives it dim sympathies with me who 
live, 

Making it a companionable form, 

Whose puny flaps and freaks the idling 
Spirit 

By its own moods interprets, every where 

Kcho or mirror seeking of itself, 


| And makes a toy of Thought, 


COLERIDGE gI 


But O! how oft, 

How oft, at school, with most believing 
mind, 

Presageful, have I gazed upon the bars, 

To watch that fluttering stranger! and 
as oft 

With unclosed had I 
dreamt 

Of my sweet birth-place, and the old 
church-tower, 

Whose bells the poor man’s only music 
rang 

From morn to evening, all the hot Fair- 
day, 

So sweetly, that they 
haunted me 

With a wild pleasure, falling on mine 


lids, already 


stirred and 


ear 

Most like articulate sounds of things to 
come ! 

So gazed I, till the soothing things, I 
dreamt, 


Lulled me to sleep, and sleep prolonged 
my dreams! 

And so I boded allthe following morn, 

Awed by the stern preceptor’s face, 
mine eye 

Fixed with mock study on my swim- 
ming book : 

Save if the door half opened, and I 
snatched 

A hasty glance, and still my heart leaped 


up. 

For still I hoped to see the stranger's 
face, 

Townsman, or aunt, or sister more be- 
loved, 

My play-mate when 
clothed alike! 

Dear Babe, that sleepest cradled by 

my side, 

Whose gentle breathings, heard in this 
deep calm, 

Fill up the interspersed vacancies 

And momentary pauses of the thought! 

My babe so beautiful! it thrills my 
heart 

With tender gladness, thus to look at 
thee, 

And think that thou shalt learn far 
other lore, 


we both were 


And in far other scenes! For I was 
reared 

In the great city, pent ’mid cloisters 
dim, 

And saw nought lovely but the sky and 
stars. 

But thou, my babe ! shalt wander like a 
breeze 


By lakes and sandy shores, beneath the 
crags 

Of ancient mountain, and beneath the 
clouds, 

Which image in their bulk both lakes 
and shores 

And mountain crags : 
and hear 

The lovely shapes and sounds intelligi- 
ble 

Of that eternal language, which thy 
God 

Utters, who from eternity doth teach 

Himself in all, and all things in himself. 

Great universal Teacher ! he shall mould 

Thy spirit, and by giving make it ask. 

Therefore all seasons shall be sweet to 

thee, 

Whether the summer clothe the general 
earth 

With greenness, or the redbreast sit and 
sin 

Betwixt the tufts of snow on the bare 
branch 

Of mossy apple-tree, while the 
thatch 

Smokes in the sun-thaw ; whether the 
eave-drops fall 

Heard only in the trances of the blast, 

Or if the secret ministry of frost 

Shall hang them up in silent icicles, 

Quietly shining to the quiet Moon. 

February, 1798. 1798. 


LOVE 


so shalt thou see 


nigh 


ALL thoughts, all passions, all delights, 
Whatever stirs this mortal frame, 
All are but ministers of Love, 

And feed his sacred flame. 


Oft in my waking dreams do I 

Live o’er again that happy hour, 

When midway on the mount I lay, 
Beside the ruined tower. 


The moonshine, stealing o’er the scene 

Had blended with the lights of eve: 

And she was there, my hope, my joy, 
My own dear Genevieve ! 


She leant against the armed man, 

The statue of the armed knight ; 

She stood and listened to my lay, 
Amid the lingering light. 


Few sorrows hath she of ber own 

My hope! my joy! my Genevieve! 

She loves me best, whene’er I sing 
The songs that make her grieve. 


92 BRITISH POETS 


I played a soft and doleful air, 

I sang an old and moving story— 

An old rude song, that suited well 
That ruin wild and hoary. 


She listened with a flitting blush, 

With downcast eyes and modest grace ; 

For well she knew, I could not choose 
But gaze upon her face. 


I told her of the Knight that wore 

Upon his shield a burning brand ; 

And that for ten long years he wooed 
The Lady of the Land. 


I told her how he pined: and ah! 

The deep, the low, the pleading tone 

With which I sang another’s love, 
Interpreted my own. 


She listened with a flitting blush, 
With downcast eyes, and modest grace 
And she forgave me, that I gazed 

Too fondly on her face ! 


But when I told the cruel scorn 
That crazed that bold and lovely Knight, 
And that he crossed the mountain- 
woods, 
Nor rested day nor night ; 


That sometimes from the savage den, 
And sometimes from the darksome shade 
And sometimes starting up at once 

In green and sunny glade,— 


There came and looked him in the face 
An angel beautiful and bright ; 
And that he knew it was a Fiend, 

This miserable Knight ! 


And that unknowing what he did, 
He leaped amid a murderous band, 
And saved from outrage worse than 
death 
The Lady of the Land! 


And how she wept, and clasped his 
knees ; 
And how she tended him in vain—, 
And ever strove to expiate 
The scorn that crazed his brain ;— 


And that she nursed him in a cave; 
And how his madness went away, 
When on the yellow forest-leaves 

A dying man he lay ;— 


His dying words—but when I reached 

That tenderest strain of all the ditty, 

My faltering voice and pausing harp 
Disturbed her soul with pity! 





All impulses of soul and sense 


Had thrilled my guileless Genevieve ; 
The music and the doleful tale, 
The rich and balmy eve ; 


And hopes, and fears that kindle hope, 

An undistinguishable throng, 

And gentle wishes long subdued, 
Subdued and cherished long! 


She wept with pity and delight, 

She blushed with love, and virgin- 
shame ; 

And like the murmur of a dream, 
I beard her breathe my name. 


Her bosom heaved—she stepped aside, 

As conscious of my look she stepped— 

Then suddenly, with timorous eye 
She fled to me and wept. 


She half enclosed me with her arms, 

She pressed me with a meek embrace : 

And bending back her head, looked up, 
And gazed upon my face. 


‘Twas partly love, and partly fear, 

And partly ’twas a bashful art, 

That I might rather feel, than see, 
The swelling of her heart. 


I calmed her fears, and she was calm, 
And told her love with virgin pride ; 
And so I won my Genevieve, 
My bright and beauteous Bride, 
1798-1799. December 21, 1799. 


THE BALLAD OF THE DARK 
LADIE 


A FRAGMENT 


BENEATH yon birch with silver bark, 

And boughs so pendulous and fair, 

The brook falls scatter’d down the rock : 
And all is mossy there! 


And there upon the moss she sits, 
The Dark Ladié in silent pain ; 
The heavy tear is in her eye, 

And drops and swells again. 


Three times she sends her little page 

Up the castled mountain’s breast, 

If he might find the Knight that wears 
The Griffin for his crest. 


The sun was sloping down the sky, 

And she had linger’d there all day, 

Counting moments, dreaming fears— 
Oh wherefore can he stay ? 


COLERIDGE | 93 


She hears a rustling o’er the brook, 

She sees far off a swinging bough ! 

“°Tis He! ’Tis my betrothed Knight! 
Lord Falkland, it is Thou!” 


She springs, she clasps him round the 
neck, 
She sobs a thousand hopes and fears, 
Her kisses glowing on his cheeks 
She quenches with her tears. 


* * * * 


**My friends with rude ungentle words 
They scoff and bid me fly to thee! 
O give me shelter in thy breast ! 

O shield and shelter me! 


‘*My Henry, I have given thee much, 
I gave what I can ne’er recall. 
I gave my heart, I gave my peace, 

O Heaven! I gave thee all.” 


The Knight made answer to the Maid, 

While to his heart he held her hand, 

‘* Nine castles hath my noble sire, 
None statelier in the land. 


‘*The fairest one shall be my love’s, 

The fairest castle of the nine ! 

Wait only till the stars peep out, 
The fairest shall be thine: 


** Wait only till the hand of eve 

Hath wholly closed yon western bars, 

And through the dark we two will steal 
Beneath the twinkling stars ! ”— 


“The dark? the dark? No! not the 
dark | 
The twinkling stars? How, 
How? 
O God! ’twas in the eye of noon 
He pledged his sacred vow ! 


Henry ? 


‘- And in the eye of noon my love 

Shall lead me from my mother’s door, 

Sweet boys and girls all clothed in white 
Strewing flowers before : 


‘** But first the nodding minstrels go 

With music meet for lordly bowers, 

The children next in snow-white vests, 
Strewing buds and flowers ! 


** And then my love and I shall pace, 
My jet black hair in pearly braids, 
Between our comely bachelors 
And blushing bridal maids.” 
* % * % 


798, 1884. 


LINES 


WRITTEN IN THE ALBUM AT ELBINGERODE, 
IN THE HARTZ FOREST 


I stoop on Brocken’s sovran height, and 


saw 
Woods crowding upon woods, hills over 
hills, 


A surging scene, and only limited 

By the blue distance. Heavily my way 

Downward I dragged through fir groves 
evermore, 

Where bright green moss heaves in 
sepulchral forms 

Speckled with sunshine; and, but sel- 
dom heard, 

The sweet bird’s song became an hollow 
sound : 

And the breeze, murmuring indivisibly, 

Preserved its solemn murmur most dis- 
tinct 

From many a note of many a waterfall, 

And the brook’s chatter ; ’mid whose 
islet-stones 

The dingy kidling with its tinkling bell 

Leaped frolicsome, or old romantic goat 

Sat, his white beard slow waving. I 
moved on ; 

In low and languid mood: for T had 
found 

That outward forms, the loftiest, still 
receive 

Their finer influence from the Life 
within ;— 

Fair cyphers else: fair, but of import 
vague 

Or unconcerning, where the heart not 
finds 

History or prophecy of friend, or child, 

Or gentle maid, our first and early love, 

Or father, or the venerable name 

Of our adored country! O thou Queen, 

Thou delegated Deity of Earth, 

O dear, dear England ! how my longing 
eye 

Turned westward, shaping in the steady 
clouds 

Thy sands and high white cliffs ! 


My native Land ! 

Filled with the thought of thee this 
heart was proud, 

Yea, mine eye swam with tears: that 
all the view 

From sovran Brocken, woods and woody 
hills, 

Floated away, like a departing dream, 


94 | BRITISH POETS 





Feeble and dim! Stranger, these im- 
’ 


pulses 

Blame thou not lightly ; nor will I pro- 
fane, 

With hasty judgment or injurious 
doubt, 


That man’s sublimer spirit, who can feel 
That God is everywhere! the God who 
framed 
Mankind to be one mighty family, 
Himself our Father, and the World our 
Home. 
May 17, 1799. 


ODE TO TRANQUILLITY 


TRANQUILLITY ! thou better name 
Than all the family of Fame ! 
Thou ne’er wilt leave my riper age 
To low intrigue, or factious rage ; 
For oh! dear child of thoughtful 
Truth, 
To thee I gave my early youth, 
And left the bark, and blest the stead- 
fast shore, 
Ere yet the tempest rose and scared me 
with its roar. 


September 17,.1799. 


Who late and lingering seeks thy 
shrine, — 
On him but seldom, Power divine, 
Thy spirit rests ! Satiety 
And Sloth, poor counterfeits of thee, 
Mock the tired worldling. Idle Hope 
And dire Remembrance interlope, 
To vex the feverish slumbers of the 
mind : 
The bubble floats before, the spectre 
stalks behind, 


But me thy gentle hand will lead 
At morning through the accustomed 
mead : 
And in the sultry summer’s heat 
Will build me up a mossy seat ; 
And when the gust of Autumn 
crowds, 
And breaks the 
clouds, 
Thou best the thought canst raise, the 
heart attune, 
Light as the busy clouds, calm as the 
gliding moon. 


busy moonlight 


The feeling heart, the searching 
soul, 

To thee I dedicate the whole ! 

And while within myself I trace 

The greatness of some future race, 


Aloof with hermit-eye I scan 





The present works of present man— 

A wild and dream-like trade of blood 
and guile, 

Too foolish for a tear, too wicked for a 

smile ! ISVOL. December 4, 1801. 


DEJECTION : AN ODE 2 


Late, late yestreen I saw the new Moon, 
With the old Moon in her arms ; 

And I fear, I fear, my master dear ! 

We shall have a deadly storm, 


Ballad of Sir Patrick Spence. 


I 


WELL! If the Bard was weather-wise, 
who made 
The grand old ballad of Sir Patrick 
Spence, 
This night. so tranquil now, will not 
go hence 
Unroused by winds, that ply a busier 
trade 
Than those which mould yon cloud in 
lazy flakes, 
Or the dull sobbing draft, that moans 
and rakes 
Upon the strings of this Afolian 
lute, 
Which better far were mute. 
For lo ! the New-moon winter-bright ! 
And overspread with phantom light, 
(With swimming phantom light o’er- 
spread 
But rimmed and circled by a silver 
thread) 
I see the old Moon in her lap, foretelling 
The coming-on of rain and squally 
blast, 
And oh! that even now the gust were 
swelling, 
And the slant night-shower driving 
loud and fast ! 
Those sounds which oft have raised me, 
whilst they awed, 
And sent my soul abroad, 
Might now perhaps their wonted impulse 
ive, 
Might startle this dull pain, and make it 
move and live ! 


1 This Ode was originally written to William 
Wordsworth, who was addressed as ‘*Edmund”’ 
in the poem when first printed, on the day of 
Wordsworth’s marriage, October 4, 1802. In that: 
copy, the name ‘“‘Edmund” occurs at every point 
where ‘‘Lady”’ is found in the later versions and 
also where the name ‘Otway’ oecurs, in the 
seventh stanza; there is a corresponding differ- 
ence of the personal pronouns, and some other 
slight differences of text, the most important of 
which is in the conclusion, as noted below. 


COLERIDGE 95 


II 


A grief without a pang, void, dark, and 
drear, 
Astifled, drowsy, unimpassioned grief, 
Which finds no natural outlet, no re- 
hef, 
In word, or sigh, or tear— 
O Lady ! in this wan and heartless mood, 
To other thoughts by yonder throstle 
woo'd, 
All this long eve, so balmy and serene, 
Have I been gazing on the western sky, 
And its peculiar tint of yellow. green ; 
And still I gaze—and with how blank 
an eye ! 
And those thin clouds above, in flakes 
and bars, 
That give away their motion to the stars : 
Those stars, that glide behind them or 
between, 
Now sparkling, now bedimmed, but al- 
ways seen ; 
Yon crescent Moon, as fixed as if it grew 
In its own cloudless, starless lake of blue : 
I see them all so excellently fair, 
I see, not feel, how beautiful they are ! 


III 
My genial spirits fail ; 
And what can these avail 
To lift the smothering weight from off 
my breast ? 
It were a vain endeavor, 
Though I should gaze for ever 
On that green light that lingers in the 
west ; 
I may not hope from outward forms to 
win 
The passion and the life, whose foun- 
tains are within. 


IV 


O Lady ! we receive but what we give, 
And in our life alone does Nature live ; 
Ours is her wedding-garment, ours her 
shroud ! 
And would we aught behold, of higher 
worth, 
Than that inanimate cold world allowed 
To the poor loveless ever-anxious crowd, 
Ah! from the soul itself must issue 
forth 
A light, a glory, a fair luminous cloud 
Enveloping the Earth— 
And from the soul itself must there be 
sent 
A sweet and potent voice, of its own 
birth, 
Of all sweet sounds the life and element ! 


es 
O pure of heart! thou need’st not ask 
of me 
What He strong music in the soul may 
e! 


What, and wherein it doth exist, 
This light, this glory, this fair luminous 
mist, 
This beautiful 
power. 
Joy, virtuous Lady! 
was given, 
Save to the pure, and in their purest 
hour, 
Life, and Life’s effluence, cloud at once 
and shower, 
Joy, Lady! is the spirit and the power, 
Which wedding Nature to us gives in 
dower, 
A new Earth and new Heaven, 
Undreamt of by the sensual and the 
proud— 
Joy is the sweet voice, Joy the luminous 
cloud— 
We in ourselves rejoice ! 
And thence flows all that charms or ear 
or sight, 
All melodies the echoes of that voice, 
All colors a suffusion from that light. 


and beauty-making 


Joy that ne’er 


VAL 


There was a time when, though my path 
was rough, 
This joy within me dallied with dis- 
tress, 
And all misfortunes were but as the stuff 
Whence Fancy made me dreams of 
happiness : 
For hope grew round me, like the twin- 
ing vine, 
And fruits, and foliage, not my own, 
seemed mine. 
But now afflictions bow me down to 
earth : 
Nor care I that they rob me of my 
mirth ; 
But oh! each visitation 
Suspends what nature gave me at my 
birth, 
My shaping spirit of Imagination. 
For not to think of what I needs must 
feel, 
But to be still and patient, all I can; 
And haply by abstruse research to steal 
From my own nature all the natural 
man— 
This was my sole resource, my only 
plan ; 


96 BRITISH POETS 





Till that which suits a part infects the 
whole, 

And now is almost grown the habit of 
my soul. 


VII 


Hence, viper thoughts, that coil around 
my mind, 
Reality’s dark dream ! 
I turn from you, and listen to the wind, 
Which long has raved unnoticed. 
What a scream 
Of agony by torture lengthened out 
That lute sent forth! Thou Wind, that 
rav’st without, 
Bare crag, or mountain-tairn, or 
blasted tree, 
Or pine-grove whither woodman never 
clomb, 
Or lonely house, long held the witches’ 
home, 
Methinks were fitter instruments for 
thee, 
Mad Lutanist! who in this month of 
showers, 
Of dark-brown gardens, and of peeping 
flowers, 
Mak’st Devils’ yule, with worse than 
wintry song, 
The blossoms, buds, and timorous leaves 
among. 
Thou Actor, perfect in 
sounds! 
Thou mighty Poet, even to frenzy bold ! 
What tell’st thou now about? 
’Tis of the rushing of an host in rout, 
With groans of trampled men, with 
smarting wounds— 
At once they groan with’ pain, and 
shudder with the cold ! 
But hush! there is a pause of deepest 
silence ! 
And all that noise, as of a rushing 
. crowd, 


all tragic 


With groans, and tremulous shudderings, 


—all is over— 
It tells another tale, with sounds less 
deep and loud! 
A tale of less affright, , 
And tempered with delight, 
As Otway’s! self had framed the tender 
lay. 


1 In the first printed copy, ‘‘ Hdmund’s,”’ re- 
ferring to Wordsworth. The following lines are 
evidently an allusion to Wordsworth’s Lucy 
Gray. The conclusion is as follows in the first 
printed copy : 

With light heart may he rise, 
Gay fancy, cheerful eyes, 
And sing his lofty song, and teach me to rejoice ! 


Tis of a little child 
Upon a lonesome wild, 
Not far from home, but she hath lost her 
way ; 
And now moans low in bitter grief and 
fear, 
And now screams loud, and hopes to 
make her mother hear. 


VIII 


Tis midnight, but small thoughts have. 
I of sleep: 
Full seldom may my friend such vigils 
keep ! 
Visit her, gentle Sleep! with wings of 
healing, 
And may this storm be but a moun- 
tain-birth, 
May all the stars hang bright above her 
dwelling, 
Silent as though they watched the 
sleeping Earth! 
With light heart may she rise, 
Gay fancy, cheerful eyes, 
Joy lift her spirit, joy attune her 
voice ; 
To her may all things live, from pole to 
pole, 

Their life the eddying of her living soul! 
O simple spirit, guided from above, 
Dear Lady! friend devoutest of my 

choice, 
Thus mayest thou ever, evermore re- 


joice. 
April 4, 1802. October 4, 1802. 


HYMN BEFORE SUNRISE, IN THE 
VALE OF CHAMOUNI 


Besides the Rivers Arve and Arveiron, which 
have their sources in the foot of Mont Blane, five 
conspicuous torrents rush down its sides; and 
within a few paces of the glaciers the Gentiana 
Major grows in immense numbers, with its 
‘* flowers of loveliest blue.’’ (Coleridge.) 


Hast thou a charm to stay the morning- 
star 

In his steep course ? 
to pause 


So long he seems 


O Epmunp, friend of my devoutest choice, 
O rais’d from anxious dread and busy care, 
By the immenseness of the good and fair 
Which thou see’st everywhere, 

Joy lifts thy spirit, joy attunes thy voice, 
To thee do all things live from pole to pole, 
Their life the eddying of thy living soul ! 

O simple spirit, guided from above, 

O lofty Poet, full of life and love, 


- Brother and friend of my devoutest choice, 


Thus may’st Thou ever, evermore rejoice ! 


COLERIDGE 97 





On thy bald awful head, O sovran 
BuLanc! 

The Arve and Arveiron at thy base 

_ Rave ceaselessly ; but thou, most awful 
Form ! 

Risest from forth thy silent sea of pines, 

How silently! Around thee and above 

Deep is the air and dark, substantial, 
black, 

An ebon mass: methinks thou piercest 
it, 

As with a wedge! 
again, 

It is thine own calm home, thy crystal 
shrine, 

Thy habitation from eternity ! 

O dread and silent Mount! I gazed upon 


But when I look 


thee, 

Till thou, still present to the bodily 
sense, 

Didst vanish from my thought:  en- 
tranced in prayer 

I worshipped the Invisible alone. 


Yet, like some sweet beguiling melody, 
So sweet, we know not we are listening 
to it, 
Thou, the meanwhile, 
with my Thought, 
Yea, with my Life and Life’s own secret 


wast blending 


Oy: 
Till tha dilating Soul, enrapt, transfused, 
Into the mighty vision passing—there 
' Asin her natural form, swelled vast to 
Heaven ! 


Awake, my soul! not only passive 
praise 
Thou owest ! 
‘tears, __ 
Mute thanksand secret ecstasy ! Awake, 


Voice of sweetsong! Awake, my heart, 


not alone these swelling 


awake ! 

Green vales and icy cliffs, all join my 
Hymn. 

Thou first and chief, sole sovereign of 
the Vale ! 

O struggling with the darkness all the 


night, 
And visited all night by troops of stars, 
Or when they climb the sky or when 
they sink: 
Companion of the morning-star at dawn, 
Thyself Earth’s rosy star, and of the 
dawn. 
Co-herald: wake, O wake, and utter 
praise ! 
Who sank thy sunless pillars deep in 
Earth ? 


7 


Who fill’d thy countenance with rosy 
light ? 

Who made thee parent of perpetual 
streams ? 


And you, ye five wild torrents fiercely 

glad! ; 

Who called you forth from night and 
utter death, 

From dark and icy caverns called you 
forth, 

Down those precipitous, black, jagged 
rocks, 

For ever shattered and the same for 
ever ? 

Who gave you your invulnerable life, 

Your strength, your speed, your fury, 
and your joy, 

Unceasing thunder and eternal foam ? 

And who commanded (and the silence 
came), 

Here let the billows stiffen, and have 
rest ? 


Ye Ice-falls! ye that from the moun- 
tain’s brow 
Adown enormous ravines slope amain— 
Torrents, methinks, that heard a mighty 
voice, 
And stopped at once amid their maddest 
plunge! 
Motionless torrents! silent cataracts ! 
Who made you glorious as the Gates of 
Heaven 
Beneath the keen full moon? 
. the sun 
Clothe you with rainbows ? 
living flowers 
Of loveliest blue, spread garlands at 
your feet ?— 
Gop! let the torrents, like a shout of 
nations, 
Answer! and let the ice-plains echo, 
Gop! 
Gop ! sing ye meadow-streams with 
gladsome voice ! 
Ye pine-groves, with your soft and soul- 
like sounds ! 
And they too have a voice, yon piles of 
snow, 
And in their perilous fall shall thunder, 
GoD ! 


Who bade 
Who, with 


Ye living flowers that skirt the eternal 
frost ! 
Ye wild goats sporting round the eagle’s 
nest ! 
Ye eagles, play-mates of the mountain- 
storm ! 


98 BRITISH POETS 





Ye lightnings, the dread arrows of the 
clouds ! 

Ye signs and wonders of the element ! 

Utter forth Gop, and fill the hills with 
praise ! 


Thou too, hoar Mount! with thy sky- 

pointing peaks, 

Oft from whose feet the avalanche, un- 
heard, 

Shoots downward, glittering through the 
pure serene 

Into the depth of clouds, that veil thy 
breast— 

Thou too again, stupendous Mountain ! 
thou 

That as I raise my head, awhile bowed 
low 

In adoration, upward from thy base 

Slow travelling with dim eyes suffused 
with tears, 

Solemnly seemest, like a vapory cloud, 

To rise before me—Rise, O ever rise, 

Rise like a cloud of incense from the 
Earth ! 

Thou kingly Spirit throned among the 
hills, 

Thou dread ambassador from Earth to 
Heaven, 

Great Hierarch! tell thou the silent 


sky, 
And tell the stars, and tell yon rising 


sun 
Earth, with her thousand voices, praises 
Gop. 


1802. September 11, 1802. 


THE GOOD, GREAT MAN 


“How seldom, friend! a good great man 
inherits 
Honor or wealth with all his worth 
and pains ! 
It sounds like stories from the land of 
spirits 
If any man obtain that which he 
merits 
Or any merit that which he obtains.” 


REPLY TO THE ABOVE 


For shame, dear friend, renounce this 
canting strain! 

What would’st thou have a good great 
man obtain ? 

Place ? titles? salary ? agilded chain ? 

Or throne of corses which his sword had 
slain ? 

Greatness and goodness are not means, 
but ends ! 


Hath he not always treasures, always 
friends, 

The good great man? three treasures, 
LovE, and LIGHT, 

And CALM THOUGHTS, regular as infant’s 
breath : 

And three firm friends, more sure than 
day and night, 

HIMSELF, his MAKER, and the ANGEL 
DEATH! i 

1802, September 23, 1802. 


THE PAINS OF SLEEP 


ERE on my bed my limbs I lay, 

It hath not been my use to pray 
With moving lips or bended knees ; 
But silently, by slow degrees, 

My spirit I to Love compose, 

In humble trust mine eyelids close, 
With reverential resignation, 

No wish conceived, no thought exprest, 
Only a sense of supplication ; 

A sense o’er all my soul imprest 
That Iam weak, yet not unblest, 
Since in me, round me, everywhere 
Eternal Strength and Wisdom are. 


But yester-night I pray’d aloud 

In anguish and in agony, 

Up-starting from the fiendish crowd 

Of shapes and thoughts that tortured 
me: 

A lurid light, a trampling throng, 

Sense of intolerable wrong, 

And whom I scorned, those only strong ! 

Thirst of revenge, the powerless will 

Still baffled, and yet burning still ! 

Desire with loathing strangely mixed 

On wild or hateful objects fixed. ~ 

Fantastic passions! maddening brawl! 

And shame and terror over all ! 

Deeds to be hid which were not hid, 

Which all confused I could not know 

Whether I suffered, or I did : 

For all seem’d guilt, remorse or woe, 

My own or others still the same 

Life-stifling fear, soul-stifling shame ! 


So two nights passed : the night’s dis- 
may . 

Saddened and stunned the coming day. 

Sleep, the wide blessing, seemed to me 

Distemper’s worst calmity. 

The third night, when my own loud 
scream 

Had waked me from the fiendish dream, 

O’ercome with sufferings strange and 
wild, 


COLERIDGE | 99 


I wept as I had been a child : 

And having thus by tears subdued 

My anguish to a milder mood, 

Such punishments, I said, were due 

To natures deepliest stained with sin: 

For aye entempesting anew 

The unfathomable hell within 

The horror of their deeds to view, 

To know and loathe, yet wish and do! 

Such griefs with such men well agree, 

But wherefore, wherefore fall on me? 

To be beloved is all I need, 

And whom I love, I love indeed. 
1803. 1816. 


TO WILLIAM WORDSWORTH 


COMPOSED ON THE NIGHT AFTER HIS RE- 
CITATION OF A POEM ON THE GROWTH 
OF AN INDIVIDUAL MIND 


FRIEND of the wise! and Teacher of the 
Good ! 

Into my heart have I received that Lay 

More than historic, that prophetic Lay 

Wherein (high theme by thee first sung 
aright) 

Of the foundations and the building up 

Of a Human Spirit thou hast dared to 
tell 

What may be told, to the understanding 
mind 

Revealable ; and what within the mind 

By vital breathings secret as the soul 

Of vernal growth, oft quickens in the 
heart 

Thoughts all too deep for words !— 

Theme hard as high ! 

Of smiles spontaneous, and mysterious 
fears 

(The first-born they of Reason and twin- 
birth), 

Of tides obedient to external force, 

And currents self-determined, as might 
seem, 

Or by some inner Power; of moments 
awful, 


Now in thy inner life, and now abroad, 

When power streamed from thee, and 
thy soul received 

The light reflected, as a light bestowed— 

Of fancies fair, and milder hours of 
youth, 

Hyblean murmurs of poetic thought 

Industrious in its joy, in vales and glens 

Native or outland, lakes and famous 
hills ! 

Or on the lonely high-road, when the 
stars 


 Theangel of the 


Were rising: or by secret mountain- 
streams, 

The guides and the companions of thy 
way ! 


Of more than Fancy, of the Social Sense 

Distending wide, and man beloved as 
man, 

Where France in all her towns lay vi- 
brating 

Like some becalmed bark beneath the 
burst 

Of Heaven’s immediate thunder, when 
no cloud 

Is visible, or shadow on the main. 

For thou wert there, thine own brows 
garlanded, 

Amid the tremor of a realm aglow, 

Amid a mighty nation jubilant, 

When from the general heart of human- 

kind 

sprang 

Deity ! 

——Of that dear Hope afflicted and 
struck down, 

So summoned homeward, thenceforth 
calm and sure 

From the dread watch-tower of man’s 
absolute self 

With ight unwaning on her eyes, to 
look 

Far on—herself a glory to behold, 

vision! Then (last 


Hope forth lke a full-born 


strain ) 
Of Duty, chosen Laws controlling choice, 
Action and joy !—An orphic song in- 


deed, 
A song divine of high and passionate 
thoughts 


To their own music chanted ! 


O great Bard! 
Ere yet that last strain dying awed the 
air, 
With steadfast eye I viewed thee in the 
choir 
Of ever-enduring men. The truly great 
Have all oneage, and from one visible 
space 
Shed influence ! 
and act, 
Are permanent, and Time is not with 
them, 
Save as it worketh for them, they in it. 
Nor less a sacred Roll than those of old, 
And to be placed, as they, with gradual 
fame 
Among the archives of mankind, thy 
work 


They, both in power 


100 





Makes audible a linked lay of Truth, 

Of Truth profound a sweet continuous 
lay, 

Not learnt, but native, her own natural 


notes ! 
1 Ah! as [I listen’d with a heart forlorn, 


The pulses of my being beat anew : 


And even as life returns upon the 
drowned, 

Life’s joy rekindling roused a throng of 
pains— 

Keen pangs of Love, awakening as a 
babe 


Turbulent, with an outcry in the heart ; 

And fears self-willed, that shunned the 
eye of hope; 

And hope that scarce would know itself 
from fear ; 

Sense of past youth, and manhood come 
in vain, 

And genius given, and knowledge won 
in vain ; 

And all which I had culled in wood- 
walks wide, 

And all which patient toil had reared, 
and all 

Commune with thee had opened out— 
but flowers 

Strewed on my corse, and borne upon 
my bier, 

In the same coffin, for the self-same 
grave ! 


That way no more! and ill beseems 
it me, 
Who came a welcomer in herald’s guise, 
Singing of glory, and futurity, 
To wander back on such unhealthful 


road, 

Plucking the poisons of self-harm! And 
ill 

Such intertwine beseems_ triumphal 
wreaths 


1 In place of this line and the next, there stood 
in the manuscript copy of January 1807 the 
following lines : 

Dear shall it be to every human heart, 

To me how more than dearest ! me, on whom 

Comfort from thee, and utterance of thy love, 

Came with such heights and depths of harmony. 

Such sense of wings unlifting, that its might 

Scatter’d and quell’d me, till my thoughts be- 
came 

A bodily tumult ; and thy faithful hopes, 

Thy hopes of me, dear Friend, by me unfelt ! 

Were troublous to me, almost as a voice, 

Familiar once, and more than musical ; 

As a dear woman’s voice to one east forth, 

A wanderer with a worn-out heart forlorn, 

Mid strangers pining with untended wounds. 

O Friend, too well thou know’st, of what sad 
years 

The long suppression had benumb’d my soul. ... 





BRITISHS2GETS 





Strew’d before thy advancing ! 
Nor do thou, 
Sage Bard! impair the memory of that 
hour 
Of thy communion with my nobler 
mind 
By pity or grief, already felt too long ! 
Nor let my words import more blame 
than needs. 
The tumult rose and ceased: for Peace 
is nigh 
Where wisdom’s voice has found a 
listening heart. 
Amid the howl of more than wintry 
storms, 
The haleyon hears the voice of vernal 
hours 
Already on the wing. 
Eve following eve, 
Dear tranquil time, when the sweet sense 
of Home 
Is sweetest ! moments for their own sake 
hailed 
And more desired, more precious, for 
thy song, 
In silence lstening, like a devout 


child, 

My soul lay passive, by thy various 
' strain 

Driven as in surges now beneath the 
stars, 

With momentary stars of my own 
birth, 


Fair constellated foam, still darting off 

Into the darkness; now a tranquil 
sea, 

Outspread and bright, yet swelling to 
the moon. 


And when—O Friend! 
and guide! 
Strong in thyself, and powerful to give 
strength !— 

Thy long sustained Song finally closed, 

And thy deep voice had ceased—yet 
thou thyself 

Wert still before my eyes, and round us 
both 

That happy vision of beloved faces— 

Scarce conscious, and yet conscious of 
its close 

I sate, my being blended in one thought 

(Thought was it ? or aspiration ? or re- 


my comforter 





solve ?) 

Absorbed, yet hanging still upon the 
sound— 

And when I rose, I found myself in 
prayer. 


January, 1807. 1817. 


COLERIDGE 


SONG FROM ZAPOLYA 


A sunny shaft did I behold, 
From sky to earth it slanted : 
And poised therein a bird so bold— 
Sweet bird, thou wert enchanted ! 


He sunk, he rose, hetwinkled, he trolled 
Within that shaft of sunny mist ; 
His eyes of fire, his beak of gold, 
All else of amethyst ! 


And thus he sang! Adieu! adieu! 
Love’s dreams prove seldom true. 
The blossoms they make no delay ; 
The sparkling dew-drops will not stay. 
Sweet month of May, 
We must away ; 
Far far away ! 
To-day ! to-day ! 


1815. 1817. 


YOUTH AND AGE 


VERSE, a breeze mid blossoms straying, 
Where Hope clung feeding, like a bee— 
Both were mine! Life went a-maying 
With Nature, Hope, and Poesy, 
When [ was young! 
When I was young ?—Ah, woeful When ! 
Ah! for the change ’twixt Now and 
Then! 
This breathing house not built with 
hands, 
This body that does me grievous wrong, 
O’er aery cliffs and glittering sands, 
How lightly then it flashed along :— 
Like those trim skiffs, unknown of yore, 
On winding lakes and rivers wide, 
That ask no aid of sail or oar, 
That fear no spite of wind or tide! 
Nought cared this body for wind or 
weather 
When Youth and I lived in’t together. 
Flowers are lovely ; Love is flower-like; 
Friendship is a sheltering tree ; 
O!the joys, that came down shower-like, 
Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty, 
Ere I was old! 
Eretwas old? Ah woeful Ere, 
Which tells me, Youth’s no longer here! 
O, Youth! for years so many andsweet, 
*Tis known, that Thou and I were one, 
Vil think it but a fond conceit— 
It cannot be that Thou art gone! 
Thy vesper-bell hath not yet toll’d :— 
And thou wert aye a masker bold ! 
What strange disguise hast now put on, 
To make believe, that thou art gone ? 
I see these locks in silvery slips, 


Io! 


This drooping gait, this altered size: 

But Spring-tide blossoms on thy lips, 

And tears take sunshine from thine eyes! 

Life is but thought: so think I will 

That Youth and I are house-mates still. 

Dew-drops are the gems of morning, 

But the tears of mournful eve! 

Where no hope is, life ’s a warning 

That only serves to make us grieve, 
When we are old: 

That only serves to make us grieve 

With oft and tedious taking-leave 

Like some poor nigh-related guest, 

That may not rudely be dismist ; 

Yet hath out-stay’d his welcome while, 

And tells the jest without the smile. 
1828—Apru, 1882. 1828—June, 1832. 


WORK WITHOUT HOPE 


ALL Nature seems at work. Slugs leave 
their lair— 

The bees are stirring—birds are on the 
wing— 

And Winter slumbering in the open air, 

Wears on his smiling face a dream of 
Spring ! 

And I the while, the sole unbusy thing, 

Nor honey make, nor pair, nor build, 
nor sing. 

Yet well I ken the banks where ama- 

ranths blow, 

Have traced the fount whence streams 
of nectar flow. 
Bloom, O ye amaranths ! 
whom ye may, 


bloom for 


For me ye bloom not! Glide, rich 
streams, away ! 
With lips unbrightened, wreathless 


brow, I stroll: 
And would you learn the spells that 
drowse my soul ? 
Work without Hope draws nectar in a 
sieve, 
And Hope without an object cannot live. 
February, 1827. 1828. 


THE GARDEN OF BOCCACCIO 


OF late, in one of those most weary 
hours, 

When life seems emptied of all genial 
powers, 

A dreary mood, Which he who ne’er has 
known 

May bless his happy lot, I sate alone ; 

And, from the numbing spell to win re- 
lief, [grief. 

Call’d on the Past for thought of glee or 


I02 


In vain! bereft alike of grief and glee, 

I sate and cow’r’d o’er my own vacancy ! 

And as I watched the dull continuous 
ache, 

Which, all else slumbering, seem’d alone 
to wake ; 

O Friend! long wont to notice yet con- 
ceal, 

And soothe by silence what words can- 
not heal, j 

I but half saw that quiet hand of thine 

Place on my desk this exquisite design, 

Boccaccio’s Garden and its faery, 

The love, the joyaunce, and the gal- 
lantry ! 

An Idyll, with Boccaccio’s spirit warm, 

Framed in the silent poesy of form. 

Like flocks a-down a newly-bathed steep 

Emerging froma mist: orlikeastream 
Of music soft, that not dispels the sleep, 
But casts in happier moulds the 

slumberer’s dream, 

Gazed by an idle eye with silent might 


The picture stole upon my inward 
sight. 

A tremulous warmth crept gradual o’er 
my chest, 

As though an infant’s finger touch’d my 
breast. 


And one by one (I know not whence) 
were brought 

All spirits of power that most had stirr’d 
my thought 

In selfless boyhood, ona new world tost 

Of wonder, and in its own fancies lost ; 

Or charm’d my youth, that, kindled from 


above, 
Loved ere it loved, and sought a form 
for love; ; 


Or lent a lustre to the earnest scan 

Of manhood, musing what and whence 
is man! 

Wild strain of Scalds, that in the sea- 
worn caves 

Rehearsed their war-spell to the winds 
and waves: 

Or fateful hymn of those prophetic 
maids, 

That call’d on Hertha in deep forest 
glades ; 

Or minstrel lay, that cheer’d the baron’s 


feast ; 

Or rhyme of city pomp, of monk and 
priest, 

Judge, mayor, and many a guild in long 
array, 


To high-church pacing on the great 
saint’s day. 
And many averse which to myself Isang, 


BRITISH POETS 


That woke the tear yet stole away the 
pang. 

Of hopes which in lamenting I renew’d. 

And last. a matron now, of sober mien, 

Yet radiant still and with no earthly 
sheen, 

Whom as a faery child my childhood 
woo'd 

Even in my dawn of thought—Philos- 
ophy ; 

Though then unconscious of herself, 
pardie, 

She bore no other name than Poesy ; 

And, like a gift from heaven, in lifeful 
glee, 

That had but newly left a mother’s knee, 

Prattled and play’d with bird and flower, 
and stone, 

As if with elfin playfellows well known, 

And life reveal’d to innocence alone. 


Thanks, gentle artist ! now I can descry 

Thy fair creation with a mastering eye, 

And all awake! And now in fix’d gaze 
stand, 

Now wander through the Eden of thy 
hand ; 

Praise the green arches, on the fountain 
clear 

See fragment shadows of the crossing 
deer ; 

And with that serviceable nymph I stoop 

The crystal from its restless pool to 
Scoop. 

I see no longer! I myself am there, 

Sit on the ground-sward, and the 
banquet share. 

Tis I, that sweep that lute’s love-echo- 
ing strings, 

And gaze upon the maid who gazing 
sings ; 

Or pause and listen to the tinkling bells 

Frow the high tower, and think that 
there she dwells. 

Vith old Boccaccio’s soul I stand possest, 

And breathe an air like life, that swells 
my chest. 


The brightness of the world, O thou 
once free, 

And always fair, rare land of courtesy ! 

O Florence! with the Tuscan fields and 
hills 

And famous Arno, fed with all their 
rills ; 

Thou brightest star of star-bright Italy ! 

Rich, ornate, populous, all treasures 
thine, 

The golden corn, the olive, and the vine, 


COLERIDGE 


Fair cities, gallant mansions, castles old, 

And forests, where beside his leafy hold 

The sullen boar hath heard the distant 
horn, 

And whets his tusks against the gnarled 
thorn ; 

Palladian palace with its storied halls ; 

Fountains, where Love les listening to 
their falls ; 

Gardens, where flings the bridge its airy 
span, 

And Nature makes her happy home 
with man: 

Where many a gorgeous flower is duly 


fed 

With a own rill, on its own spangled 
i 

And wreathes the marble urn, or leans 
its head, 

A mimic mourner, that with veil with- 
drawn 

Weeps liquid gems, the presents of the 
dawn ;— 

Thine all delights, and every muse is 
thine ; 

And more than all, the embrace and 
intertwine 

Of all with all in gay and twinkling 
dance ! 


Mid gods of Greece and warriors of 

romance, 

Boceace sits, unfolding on his 

knees 

The new found roll of old Mzeonides ; 

But from his mantle’s fold, and near the 
heart, 

Peers Ovid’s Holy Book of Love’s sweet 
smart ! 1 


See ! 


O all-enjoying and all-blending sage, 

Long be it mine to con thy mazy page, 

Where half conceal’d, the eye of fancy 
views 

Fauns, nymphs, and winged saints, all 
gracious to thy muse! 


17 know few more striking or more interesting 
proofs of the overwhelming influence which tbe 
study of the Greek and Roman classics exercised 
on the judgments, feelings, and imaginations of 
the literati of Europe at the commencement of 
the restoration of literature, than the passage in 
the Filocopo of Boccaccio, where the sage in- 
structor, Racheo, as soon as the young prince 
and the beautiful girl Biancofiore had learned 
their letters, sets them to study the Holy Book, 
Ovid’s Art of Love. ‘‘IncominciO Racheo a 
mettere il suo officio in esecuzione con intera 
sollecitudine. E loro, in breve tempo, insegnato 
a conoscer le lettere, fece leggere il santo libro 
d@’Ovvidio, nel quale il sommo poeta mostra, come 
i santi fuochi di Venere si debbano ne’ freddi 
‘cuori accendere.”’ 


103 


Still in thy garden let me watch their 


pranks, 

And see in Dian’s vest between the 
ranks 

Of the trim vines, some maid that half 
believes 

The vestal fires, of which her lover 

. grieves, 

With that sly satyr peeping through the 
leaves ! 1828. 1829. 


PHANTOM OF FACT 


A DIALOGUE IN VERSE 


AUTHOR 

A LOVELY form there sate beside my 
bed, 

And such a feeling calm its presence 
shed, 

A tender love so pure from earthly 
leaven, 

That I unnethe the fancy might con- 
trol, 

’Twas my own spirit newly come from 
heaven, 


Wooing its gentle way into my soul! 
But ah! the change—It had not stirr’d, 


and yet— 

Alas! that change how fain would I 
forget ! 

That shrinking back, like one that had 
mistook ! 

That weary, wandering, disavowing 
look ! 

‘Twas all another, feature, look, and 
frame, 


And still, methought, I knew, it was 
the same ! 


FRIEND 


This riddling tale, to what does it be- 
long? 

Is’t history ? vision? or an idle song ? 

Or rather say at once, within what 
space 

Of time this wild disastrous change took 
place? 


AUTHOR 


Call it a moment’s work (and such it 
seems) 

This tale’s a fragment from the life of 
dreams ; 

But say. that years matur’d the silent 
strife, ‘ 

And ’tis a record from the dream of life. 

1830, 1834. 


SCOTT 


LIST OF REFERENCES 
EpItTIoNns 


Poetical Works, edited by William Minto, 2 volumes, Edinburgh, 
1887-88. Poetical Works, edited, with revision of text, by W.J. Rolfe, 
Boston, 1888. Poetical Works, edited by Andrew Lang, 2 volumes, The 
Macmillan Company. Poetical Works (Globe Edition), edited by F. T. 
Palgrave, The Macmillan Company (not complete). * Complete Works 
(Cambridge Edition), edited by H. E. Scudder, Houghton & Mifflin. Poems 
(The Aldine Poets), 5 volumes, The Macmillan Company. Complete 
Poetical and Dramatic Works (Riverside Edition), 5 volumes, Hough- 
ton & Mifflin. Marmion (Students’ Edition), edited by W.J. Rolfe, 
Houghton & Mifflin. * Marmion (Longmans’ English Classics), edited by 
v. M. Lovett. ‘ 

BioGRAPHY 


* Locxnartr (J. G.), Life of Sir Walter Scott (The standard biography). 
*Hurron (R. H.), Scott, Anglish Men of Letters Series (containing two 
chapters of excellent criticism on Scott’s poetry). Yonexr (C. D.) Scott, 
Great Writers Series. See also Scort’s Journal and Letters. 


CriticaAL Essays, ETC. 


Jerrrey (Lord Francis), Edinburgh Review, No. 32, Art. 1, Lady of 
the Lake ; No. 36, Art. 6, Vision of Don Roderick ; No. 48, Art. 1, Lord 
of the Isles. Also in his Critical Essays. Hueo (V.), Littérature et 
Philosophie (1834). Cartyur, Miscellanies, I. * Ruskin, Fors Clavigera. 
* Saarre (John C.), Aspects of Poetry ; Homeric Spirit of Scott. * Pat- 
GRAVE (F. T.), Introduction to Globe Edition of Scott’s Poetical Works. 
Sar TsBury (G.), Essays on English Literature (Second Series). Rossrrrt1 
(W. M.), Lives of Famous Poets. SrEpuen (Leslie), Hours in a Library, 
Vol. 1. Prescorr (W. H.), Biographical and Critical Miscelanies. Lane 
(A.), Letters to Dead Authors. Lane (A.), Essays in Little. Howztts 
(W. D.), My Literary Passions. Hay (John), Speech at the Unveiling of 
the Bust of Scott in Westminster Abbey. Crocxerrt (S. R.), The Scott 
Country. | 

Bretu (C. D.), Some English Poets. Brooxs (8. W.), English Poetry 
and Poets. Dawson (W. J.), Makers of Modern English. Dervery (J.), 
Comparative Estimate of Modern English Poets. Minto (W.), Literature 
of the Georgian Era. Pierson (William), Epic Poems of Walter Scott, 
compared with the like Poetry of Thomas Moore. Rerxrp (H.), Lectures 
on British Poets. Rusuron (W.), Afternoon Lectures. Swanwick (A.), 
Poets the Interpreters of their Age. Wu1son (J. G.), Poets of Scotland, 


104 


SCO PT 


WILLIAM AND HELEN 


Imitated from Biirger’s Lenore. See Lock- 
hart’s Life of Scott, Volume I, Chap. 7. 


From heavy dreams fair Helen rose, 
And eyed the dawning red: 

“‘Alas, my love, thou tarriest long ! 
O art thou false or dead ?” 


With gallant Frederick’s princely power 
He sought the bold crusade, 

But not a word from Judah’s wars 
Told Helen how he sped. 


With Paynim and with Saracen 
At length a truce was made, 

And every knight returned to dry 
The tears his love had shed. 


Our gallant host was homeward bound 
With many a song of joy ; 

Green waved the laurel in each plume, 
The badge of victory. 


And old and young, and sireand son, 
To meet them crowd the way, 

With shouts and mirth and melody, 
The debt of love to pay. 


Full many a maid her true-love met, 
And sobbed in his embrace, 

And fluttering joy in tears and smiles 
Arrayed full many a face. 


Nor joy nor smile for Helen sad, 
She sought the host in vain ; 

For none could tell her William’s fate, 
If faithless or if slain. 


The martial band is past and gone ; 
She rends her raven hair, 

And in distraction’s bitter mood 
She weeps with wild despair. 


**O, rise, my child,” her mother said, 
‘* Nor sorrow thus in vain ; 

A perjured lover's fleeting heart 
No tears recall again.” 


‘OQ, Mother, what is gone is gone, 
What’s lost forever lorn : 

Death, death alone can comfort me ; 
O had I ne’er been born ! 


‘“*O, break, my heart, O, break at once ! 
Drink my life-blood, Despair ! 

No joy remains on earth for me, 
For me in heaven no ghare.” 


**O, enter not in judgment, Lord!” 
The pious mother prays ; 

‘*Tmpute not guilt to thy frail child ! 
She knows not what she says. 


‘*O, say thy pater-noster, child ! 
O, turn to God and grace ! 

His will, that turned thy bliss to bale, 
Can change thy bale to bliss.” 


‘““Q mother, mother, what is bliss? 
O mother, what is bale ? 

My William’s love was heaven on earth, 
Without it earth is hell. 


‘Why should I pray to ruthless Heaven, 
Since my loved William’s slain ? 

I only prayed for William’s sake, 
And all my prayers were vain.” 


‘*O, take the sacrament, my child. 
And check these tears that flow ; 
By resignation’s humble prayer, 
O, hallowed be thy woe !” 


** No sacrament can quench this fire, 
Or slake this scorching pain ; 

No sacrament can bid the dead 
Arise and live again. 


‘‘O, break, my heart, O, break at once ! 
Be thou my god, Despair ! 

Heaven’s heaviest blow has fallen on me, 
And vain each fruitless prayer.” 


‘* O, enter not in judgment, Lord, 
With thy frail child of clay ! 
She knows not what her tongue has 
spoke ; 
Impute it not, I pray ! 
TOS 


106 


BRITISH POETS 





‘¢ Forbear, my child, this desperate woe, 
And turn to God and grace ; 

Well can devotion’s heavenly glow 
Convert thy bale to bliss.” 


‘““O mother, mother, what is bliss ? 
O mother, what is bale ? 

Without my William what were heaven, 
Or with him what were hell ?” 


Wild she arraigns the eternal doom, 
Upbraids each sacred power, 

Till, spent, she sought her silent room, 
All in the lonely tower. 


She beat her breast, she wrung her 
hands, 
Till sun and day were o’er, 
And through the glimmering lattice 
shone 
The twinkling of the star. 


Then, crash ! the heavy drawbridge fell 
That o’er the moat was hung ; 

And, clatter ! clatter ! on its boards 
The hoof of courser rung. 


The clank of echoing steel was heard 
As off the rider bounded ; 

And slowly on the winding stair 
A. heavy footstep sounded. 


And hark ! and hark ! a knock — tap! 
tap ! 
A rustling stifled noise ;— 
Door-latch and tinkling staples ring ; — 
At length a whispering voice. 


‘*‘ Awake, awake, arise, my love! 
How, Helen, dost thou fare ? 
Wak’st thou, or sleep’st ! laugh’st thou, 
or weep’st ? 
Hast thought on me, my fair? ”’ 


‘My love! my love !—so late by night !— 
I waked, I wept for thee: 

Much have I borne since dawn of morn ; 
Where, William, couldst thou be ?”’ 


**' We saddle late—from Hungary 
I rode since darkness fell ; 

And to its bourne we both return 
Before the matin-bell.” 


‘QO, rest this night within my arms, 
And warm thee in their fold ! 
Chill howls through hawthorn bush the 
wind :-- 
My love is deadly cold.” 


‘*Let the wind howl through hawthorn 
bush ! 
This night we must away ; 
The steed is wight, the spur is bright ; 
I cannot stay till day.” 


‘¢Busk, busk, and boune! Thou mount’st 
behind 
Upon my black barb steed : 
O’er stock and stile, a hundred miles, 
We haste to bridal bed.” 


‘* To-night—to-night a hundred miles !— 
O dearest William, stay! 
The bell strikes twelve—dark, dismal 
hour ! 
O, wait, my love, till day!” 


‘* Look here, look here—the moon shines 
clear— 
Full fast I ween we ride: 
Mount and away! for ere the day 
We reach our bridal bed. 


“The black barb snorts, the bridle 
rings ; 
Haste, busk, and boune, and seat thee! 
The feast is made, the chamber spread, 
The bridal guests await thee.” 


Strong love prevailed : she busks, she 
bounes, 
She mounts the barb behind, 
And round her darling William’s waist 
Her lily arms she twined. 


And, hurry! hurry ! off they rode, 
As fast as fast might be ; 
Spurned from the courser’s thundering 
heels 
The flashing pebbles flee. 


And on the right and on the left, 
Ere they could snatch a view, 
Fast, fast each mountain, mead, and 


And cot and castle flew. 


‘* Sit fast—dost fear ?—The moon shines 


clear— 
Fleet goes my barb—keep hold! 
Fear’st thou? ”»—‘‘O no!” she faintly 
Sais 


‘* But why so stern and cold ? 


‘What yonder rings ? what yonder 
sings ? 
Why shrieks the owlet gray?” 
“°T is death-bell’s clang, ’t is funeral 
song, 
The body to the clay. 


SCOT 


‘With song and clang at morrow’s 
dawn 
Ye may inter the dead : 
To-night I ride with my young bride 
To deck our bridal bed. 


“Come with thy choir, thou coffined 
guest, 
To swell our nuptial song ! 
Come, priest, to bless our marriage 
feast ! 
Come all, come all along ! ” 


Ceased clang and song ; down sunk the 
bier ; 
The shrouded corpse arose : 
And hurry ! hurry ! all the train 
The thundering steed pursues. 


And forward ! forward ! on they go; 
High snorts the straining steed ; 

Thick pants the rider’s laboring breath, 
As headlong on they speed. 


‘*O William, why this savage haste ! 
And where thy bridal bed ?” 

“Tis distant far, low, damp, and chill, 
And narrow, trustless maid.” 


‘*No room for me? ”—‘‘ Enough for 
both ;— 
Speed, speed, my barb, thy course! ” 
O’er thundering bridge, through boiling 
surge, 
He drove the furious horse. 


Tramp! tramp! along the land they 
rode, 
Splash! splash! along the sea ; 
The scourge is wight, the spur is bright, 
The flashing pebbles flee. 


Fled past on right and left how fast 
Each forest, grove, and bower! 
On right and left fled past how fast 

Each city, town, and tower! 


** Dost fear ? dost fear? The moon shines 
clear, 
Dost fear to ride with me ?— 
Hurrah! hurrah ! the dead can ride ! ’— 
“*Q William, let them be !— 
‘‘See there, see there! What yonder 
swings 
And creaks, mid whistling rain ? ”’— 
‘Gibbet and steel, the accursed wheel ; 
A murderer in his chain.— 


\ 


107 


‘* Hollo! thou felon, follow here : 
To bridal bed we ride ; 

And thou shalt prance a fetter dance 
Before me and my bride.” 


And, hurry! hurry! clash, clash, clash! 
The wasted form descends ; 

And fleet as wind through hazel bush 
The wild career attends. 


Tramp! tramp! along the land they 
rode, 
Splash ! splash! along the sea ; 
The scourge is red, the spur drops blood, 
The flashing pebbles flee. 


How fled what moonshine faintly 
showed! 

How fled what darkness hid ! 
How fled the earth beneath their feet, 


The Heaven above their head! 


‘* Dost fear ? dost fear? The moon shines 
clear, 
And well the dead can ride; 
Dost. faithful Helen, fear for them ? ”— 
‘*O leave in peace the dead ! ”— 


‘* Barb! Barb! methinks I hear the cock, 
The sand will soon be run: 

Barb! Barb! I smell the morning air ; 
The race is well-nigh done.” 


Tramp! tramp! along the land they 
rode, 
Splash ! splash! along the sea ; 
The scourge is red, the spur drops blood, 
The flashing pebbles flee. 


‘** Hurrah! hurrah! well ride the dead ; 
The bride, the bride is come ; 

And soon we reach the bridal bed, 
For, Helen, here’s my home.” 


Reluctant on its rusty hinge 
Revolved an iron door, 

And by the pale moon’s setting beam 
Were seen a church and tower. 


With many ashriek and cry whiz round 
The birds of midnight scared ; 

And rustling like autumnal leaves 
Unhallowed ghosts were heard. 


O’er many a tomb and tombstone pale 
He spurred the fiery horse, 

Till suddenly at an open grave 
He checked the wondrous course. 


108 


The falling gauntlet quits the rein, 
Down drops the casque of steel, 
The cuirass leaves his shrinking side, 

The spur his gory heel. 


The eyes desert the naked skull, 
The mouldering flesh the bone, 
Till Helen’s lily arms entwine 
A ghastly skeleton. 


The furious barb snorts fire and foam, 
And with a fearful bound 

Dissolves at once in empty air, 
And leaves her on the ground. 


Half seen by fits, by fits half heard, 
Pale spectres flit along, 

Wheel round the maid in dismal dance, 
And how! the funeral song ; 


‘“E’en when the heart’s with anguish 
cleft 
Revere the doom of Heaven, 
Her soul is from her body reft ; 
Her spirit be forgiven!” 
1795. 1796. 


THE VIOLET 


See Lockhart’s life of Scott, Vol I, Chapter 
8, and the Century Magazine, July, 1899. 


THE violetin her green-wood bower, 
Where birchen boughs with hazels 
mingle, 
May boast itself the fairest flower 
In glen or copse or forest dingle. 


Though fair her gems of azure hue, 
Beneath the dewdrop’s weight reclin- 
ing ; 
I’ve seen an eye of lovelier blue, 
More sweet through watery 
shining. 


lustre 


The summer sun that dew shall dry 
Kre yet the day be past its morrow, 
Nor longer in my false love’s eye 
Remained the tear of parting sorrow. 
ee LOLs 


TO VA’ DADY 
WITH FLOWERS FROM A ROMAN WALL 
TAKE these flowers which, purple way- 
ing, 
On the ruined rampart grew, 


Where, the sons of freedom braving, 
Rome’s imperial standards flew, 


BRITISH) POETS 


Warriors from the breach of danger 
Pluck no longer laurels there ; 
They but yield the passing stranger 
Wild-flower wreaths for Beauty’s 
hair. L797. 


THE EVE OF SAINT JOHN 


THE Baron of Smaylho’me rose with. 
day, 
He spurred his courser on, 
Without stop or stay, down the rocky 
way, 
That leads to Brotherstone. 


He went not with the bold Buccleuch 
His banner broad to rear ; 

He went not ’gainst the English yew 
To lift the Scottish spear. 


Yet his plate-jack was braced and his 
helmet was laced, 
And his vaunt-brace of proof he wore ; 
At his saddle-gerthe was a good steel 
sperthe, 
Full ten pound weight and more. 


The baron returned in three days’ space 
And his looks were sad and sour; 
And weary was his courser’s pace 
As he reached his rocky tower. 


He came not from where Ancram Moor 
Ran red with English blood ; 
Where the Douglas true and the bold 
Buccleuch 
’Gainst keen Lord Evers stood. 


Yet was his helmet hacked and hewed, 
His acton pierced and tore, 
His axe and his dagger with blood im- 
brued,— 
But it was not English gore. 


He lighted at the Chapellage, 
He held him close and still ; 
And he whistled thrice for his little 
foot-page, 
His name was English Will. 


‘*Come thou hither, my little foot-page, 
Come hither to my knee ; 
Though thou art young and tender of 


age, 
I think thou art true to me. 


‘“Come, tell me all that thou hast seen, 
And look thou tell me true ! 
Since I from Smaylho’me tower have 
been, 


What did thy lady do?” 


SCOTT 


10g 





“My lady, each night, sought the lonely 


light 
That burns on the wild Watchfold ; 
For from height to height the beacons 
bright 
Of the English foemen told. 


‘*The bittern clamored from the moss, 
The wind blew loud and shrill ; 

Yet the craggy pathway she did cross 
To the eiry Beacon Hill. 


**T watched her steps, and silent came 
Where she sat her on a stone ;— 
No watchman stood by the dreary 
flame, 
It burnéd all alone. 


** The second night I kept her in sight 
Till to the fire she came, 
And, by Mary’s might! 
knight 
Stood by the lonely flame. 


an armed 


** And many a word that warlike lord 
Did speak to my lady there ; 
But the rain fell fast and loud blew the 
blast, 
And I heard not what they were. 


‘The third night there the sky was fair, 
And the mountain-blast was still, 

As again I watched the secret pair 
On the lonesome Beacon Hill. 


** And I heard her name the midnight 
hour, 
And name this holy eve; 
‘And say, ‘Come this night to thy 
lady’s bower ; 
Ask no bold baron’s leave. 


‘<*« He lifts his spear with the bold Buc- 
cleuch ; 
His lady is all alone ; 
The door she ’Il undo to her knight so 
true 
On the eve of good Saint John.’ 


**¢T cannot come; I must not come ; 
I dare not come to thee: 
On the eve of Saint John I must wan- 
der alone: 
In thy bower I may not be.’ 


““«Now, out on thee, faint-hearted 
knight ! 
Thou shouldst not say me nay ; 
For the eve is sweet, and when lovers 
meet 
Is worth the whole summer’s day. 


*** And [ll chain the blood-hound, and 
the warder shall not sound, 
And rushes shall be strewed on the 
stair ; 
So, by the black rood-stone and by 
holy Saint John, 
I conjure thee, my love, to be there!’ 


‘** Though the blood-hound be mute and 
the rush beneath my foot, 
And the warder his bugle should not 
blow, 
Yet there sleepeth a priest in the 
chamber to the east, 
And my footstep he would know.’ 


‘** QO, fear not the priest who sleepeth to 
the east, 
For to Dryburgh the way he has ta’en ; 
And there to say mass, till three days do 
pass, 
For the soul of a knight that is 
slayne.’ 


‘‘ He turned him aroundand grimly he 
frowned 
Then he laughed right scornfully— 
‘He who says the mass-rite for the soul 
of that knight 
May as well say mass for me: 


‘** At the lone midnight hour when bad 
spirits have power 
In thy chamber will I be.—’ 
With that he was gone and my lady left 
alone, 
And no more did I see.” 


Then changed, I trow, was that bold 
baron’s brow 
From the dark to the blood-red high ; 
‘* Now, tell me the mien of the knight 
thou hast seen, 
For, by Mary, he shall die !” 


‘*His arms shone full bright in the 
beacon’s red light ; 
His plume it was scarletand blue ; 
On his shield was a hound in a silver 
leash bound, 
And his crest was a branch of the 
yew.” 


‘*Thou liest, thou liest, thou little foot- 
page, 
Loud dost thou lie to me! 
For that knight is cold and low laid in 
mould, 
All under the Eildon-tree.”’ 


IIo 


‘* Yet hear but my word, my noble lord ! 
For I heard her name his name ; 
And that lady’ bright, she called the 
knight 
Sir Richard of Coldinghame.” 


The bold baron’s brow then changed, I 
trow, 
From high blood-red to pale— 
‘““The grave is deep and dark—and the 
corpse is stiff and stark— 
So I may not trust thy tale. 


‘* Where fair Tweed flows round holy 
Melrose, ° 
And Eildon slopes to the plain, 
Full three nights ago by some secret foe 
That gay gallant was slain. 


‘The varying light deceived thy sight, 
And the wild winds drowned the 
name ; 
For the Dryburgh bells ring and the 
white monks do sing 
For Sir Richard of Coldinghame !” 


He passed the court-gate and he oped the 
tower-gate, 
And he mounted the narrow stair 
To the bartizan-seat where, with maids 
that on her wait, 
He found his lady fair. 


That lady sat in mournful mood ; 
Looked over hill and vale; 
Over Tweed’s fair flood and Mertoun’s 
wood, 
And all down Teviotdale.. 


“Now hail, now hail, thou lady bright !” 
‘* Now hail, thou baron true! 
What news, what news, from Ancram 
fight? 
What news from the bold Buccleuch !” 


‘*The Ancram moor is red with gore, 
For many a Southern fell ; 

And Buccleuch has charged us evermore 
To watch our beacons well.” 


The lady blushed red, but nothing she 
said : 
Nor added the baron a word : 
Then she stepped down the stair to her 
chamber fair, 
And so did her moody lord. 
In sleep the lady mourned, and the baron 


tossed and turned, 
And oft to himself he said,— 


BRITISH POETS 





‘*The worms around him creep, and his 
bloody grave is deep— 
It cannot give up the dead ! ” 


It was near the ringing of matin-bell, 
The night was well-nigh done, 

When a heavy sleep on that baron fell, 
On the eve of good Saint John. 


The lady looked through the chamber 
fair, 
By the light of a dying flame ; 
And she was aware of a knight stood 
there— 
Sir Richard of Coldinghame ! 


‘* Alas! away, away!” she cried, 
‘* For the holy Virgin’s sake! ” 

‘* Lady, I know who sleeps by thy side ; 
But, lady, he will not awake. 


‘* By Eildon-tree for long nights three 
In bloody grave have I lain ; 
The mass and the death-prayer are said 
for me, 
But, lady, they are said in vain. 


‘* By the baron’s brand, near Tweed’s fair 
strand, 
Most foully slain I fell ; 
And my restless sprite on the beacon’s 
height | 
For a space is doomed to dwell. 


“At our trysting-place, for a certain 
space, 
I must wander to and fro; 
But I had not had power to come to thy 
bower 
Hadst thou not conjured me so.” 


mastered fear—her brow she 
crossed ; 
‘* How, Richard, hast thou sped ? 
And art thou saved or art thou lost ?” 


The vision shook his head ! 


‘* Who spilleth life shall forfeit life ; 
So bid thy lord believe : 

That lawless love is guilt above, 
This awful sign receive.” 


Love 


He laid his left palm on an oaken beam, 
His right upon her hand ; 

The lady shrunk and fainting sunk, 
For it scorched like a fiery brand. 


The sable score of fingers four 
Remains on that board impressed ; 
And forevermore that lady wore 
A covering on her wrist. 


SCOTT 


There is a nun in Dryburgh bower 
Ne’er looks upon the sun ; 

There is a monk in Melrose tower 
He speaketh word to none. 


That nun who ne’er beholds the day, 
That monk who speaks to none— 
That nun was Smaylho’me’s lady gay, 
That monk the bold baron. 

F799 1 B01; 
CADYOW CASTLE 


WHEN princely Hamilton's abode 
Ennobled Cadyow’s Gothic towers, 
The song went round, the goblet flowed, 
And revel sped the laughing hours. 


Then, thrilling to the harp’s gay sound, 
So sweetly rung each vaulted wall, 

And echoed light the dancer’s bound, 
As mirth and music cheered the hall. 


But Cadyow’s towers in ruins laid, 
And vaults by ivy mantled o’er, 

Thrill to the music of the shade, 
Or echo Evan’s hoarser roar. 


Yet still of Cadyow’s faded fame 
You bid me tell a minstrel tale, 
And tune my harp of Border frame 
On the wild banks of Evandale. 


For thou, from scenes of courtly pride, 
From pleasure’s lighter scenes, canst 
turn, 
To draw oblivion’s pall aside 
And mark the long-forgotten urn. 


Then, noble maid ! at thy command 
Again the crumbled halls shall rise ; 
Lo! as on Evan’s banks we stand, 
The past returns—the present flies. 


Where with the rock’s wood-covered side 
Were blended late the ruins green, 

- Rise turrets in fantastic pride 

And feudal banners flaunt between : 


Where the rude torrent’s brawling course 
Was shagged with thorn and tangling 
sloe, 
The ashler buttress braves its force 
And ramparts frown in battled row. 


’Tis night—the shade of keep and spire 
Obscurely dance on Evan’s stream ; 
And on the wave the warder’s fire 
Is checkering the moonlight beam. 


If! 


Fades slow their light ; the east is gray ; 
The weary warder leaves his tower ; 
Steeds snort, uncoupled stag-hounds bay, 
And merry hunters quit the bower. 


The drawbridge falls—they hurry out— 
Clatters each plank and swinging 
chain, 
As, dashing o’er, the jovial rout 
Urge the shy steed and slack the rein. 


First of his troop, the chief rode on ; 
His shouting merry-men throng be- 
hind ; 
The steed of princely Hamilton 
Was fleeter than the mountain wind. 


From the thick copse the roebucks 
bound, 
The startled red-deer scuds the plain, 
For the hoarse bugle’s warrior-sound 
Has roused their mountain haunts 
again. 


Through the huge oaks of Evandale, 
Whose limbs a thousand years have 
worn, 
What sullen roar comes down the gale 
And drowns the hunter’s pealing 
horn? 


Mightiest of all the beasts of chase 
That roam in woody Caledon, 
Crashing the forest in his race, 
The Mountain Bull comes thundering 
on. 


Fierce on the hunter’s quivered band 
He rolls his eyes of swarthy glow, 
Spurns with black hoof and horn the 
sand, 
And tosses high his mane of snow. 
Aimed well the chieftain’s lance has 
flown; 
Struggling in blood the savage lies ; 
His roar is sunk in hollow groan— 
Sound, merry huntsmen! sound the 
pryse! 


’Tis noon—against the knotted oak 
The hunters rest the idle spear ; 
Curls through the trees the slender 
smoke, 
Where yeomen dight the woodland 
cheer. 


Proudly the chieftain marked his clan, 
On greenwood lap all careless thrown, 


II2 


Yet missed his eye the boldest man 
That bore the name of Hamilton. 


‘‘ Why fills not Bothwellhaugh his place, 
Still wont our weal and woe to share ? 

Why comes he not our sport to grace? 
Why shares he not our hunter’s fare ? ” 


Stern Claud rephed with darkening 
face— 
Gray Paisley’s haughty lord was he— 
** At merry feast or buxom chase 
No more the warrior wilt thou see. 


‘* Few suns have set since Woodhouselee 
Saw Bothwellhaugh’s bright goblets 
foam, 
When to his hearths in social glee 
The war-worn soldier turned him 
home. 


‘‘There, wan from her maternal throes, 
His Margaret, beautiful and mild, 
Sate in her bower, a pallid rose, 
And peaceful nursed her new-born 
child. 


‘‘O change accursed ! past are those days ; 
False Murray’s ruthless spoilers came, 

And, for the hearth’s domestic blaze, 
Ascends destruction’s volumed flame. 


‘* What sheeted phantom wanders wild 
Where mountain Eske through wood- 
land flows, 
Her arms enfold a shadowy child— 
O! is it she, the pallid rose ? 


‘« The wildered traveller sees her glide, 
And hears her feeble voice with awe— 


‘Revenge,’ she cries, ‘on Murray’s 
pride! 

And woe for injured Bothwell- 
haugh !’” 


He ceased—and cries of rage and grief 
surst mingling from the kindred band, 
And half arose the kindling chief, 
And half unsheathed his Arran brand. 


But who o’er bush, o’er stream and rock, 
rides headlong with resistless speed, 

Whose bloody poniard’s frantic stroke 
Drives to the leap his jaded steed ; 


Whose cheek is pale, whose eyeballs 
glare, 
As one some visioned sight that saw, 


BRITISH POETS 


Whose handsare bloody, loose his hair ?— 
’Tis he! ’tis he! ’tis Bothwellhaugh. 


From gory selle and reeling steed 
Sprung the fierce horseman with a 
bound, 
And, reeking from the recent deed, 
He dashed his carbine on the ground. 


Sternly he spoke—‘‘ ’Tis sweet to hear 
In good greenwood the bugle blown, . 
But sweeter to Revenge’s ear 
To drink a tyrant’s dying groan. 


‘* Your slaughtered quarry proudly trode 
At dawning morn o’er dale and down, 
But prouder base-born Murray rode 
Through old Linlithgow’s crowded 
town. 


‘*From the wiid Border’s humbled side, 
In haughty triumph marched he, 

While Knox relaxed his bigot pride 
And smiled the traitorous pomp to see. 


‘* But can stern Power, with allhis vaunt, 
Or Pomp, with all her courtly glare, 

The settled heart of Vengeance daunt, 
Or change the purpose of Despair ? 


‘‘ With hackbut bent, my secret stand, 
Dark as the purposed deed, I chose, 
And marked where mingling in his band 
Trooped Scottish pipes and English 

bows. 


‘* Dark Morton, girt with many a spear, 
Murder’s foul minion, led the van ; 
And clashed their broadswords in the 
rear 
The wild Macfarlanes’ plaided clan. 


‘*Glencairn and stout Parkhead were 
nigh 
Obsequious at their Regent’s rein, 
And haggard Lindesay’s iron eye, 
That saw fair Mary weep in vain, 


‘* Mid pennoned spears, a steely grove, 
Proud Murray’s plumage floated 
high ; 
Scarce could his trampling charger move, 
So close the minions crowded nigh, 


‘* From the raised vizor’s shade his eye, 
Dark-rolling, glanced the ranks along, 

And his steel truncheon, waved on high, 
Seemed marshalling the iron throng. 


SCOT 


113 





“But yet his saddened brow confessed 
A passing shade of doubt and awe; 
Some fiend was whispering in his breast, 

** Beware of injured Bothwellhaugh ! ” 


‘*“The death-shot parts! 
springs ; 
Wild rises tumult’s startling roar ! 
Aud Murray’s plumy helmet rings— 
Rings on the ground to rise no more. 


the charger 


** What joy the raptured youth can feel, 
To hear her love the loved one tell— 
Or he who broaches on his steel 
The wolf by whom his infant fell. 


‘* But dearer to my injured eye 
To see in dust proud Murray roll ; 
And mine was ten times trebled joy 
To hear him groan his felon soul. 


“My Margaret’s spectre glided near. 
With pride her bleeding victim saw, 
And shrieked in his death-deafened ear, 

‘Remember injured Bothwellhaugh !’ 


‘¢ Then speed thee, noble Chatlerault ! 
Spread to the wind thy bannered tree ! 

Each warrior bend his Clydesdale bow — 
Murray is fallen and Scotland free !” 


Vaults every warrior to his steed ; 
Loud bugles join their wild acclaim— 
** Murray is fallen and Scotland freed ! 
Couch, Arran, couch thy spear of 
flame!” 


But see! the minstrel vision fails— 
The glimmering spears are seen no 
more ; 
The shouts of war die on the gales, 
Or sink in Evan’s lonely roar. 


For the loud bugle pealing high, 

The blackbird whistles down the vale, 
And sunk in ivied ruins lie 

The bannered towers of Evandale. 


For chiefs intent on bloody deed. 
And Vengeance shouting o’er the slain, 
Lo! high-born Beauty rules the steed, 
Or graceful guides the silken rein. 


And long may Peace and Pleasure own 
The maids who list the minstrel’s tale ; 
Nor e’er a ruder guest be known 
On the fair banks of Evandale! 


1801, 1808. 
8 





THE MAID OF NEIDPATH 


O, LOVERS’ eyes are sharp to See, 
And lovers’ ears in hearing ; 
And love in life’s extremity 
Can lend an hour of cheering. 
Disease had been in Mary’s bower, 
And slow decay from mourning, 
Though now she sits on Neidpath’s 
tower. 
To watch her love’s returning. 


All sunk and dim her eyes so bright, 
Her form decayed by pining, 

Till through her wasted hand at night 
You saw the taper shining ; 

By fits, a sultry hectic hue 
Across her cheek was flying ; 

By fits, so ashy pale she grew, 
Her maidens thought her dying. 


Yet keenest powers to see and hear 
Seemed in her frame residing ; 
Before the watch-dog pricked his ear, 
She heard her lover’s riding ; 
Ere scarce a distant form was kenned, 
She knew, and waved to greet him ; 
And o’er the battlement did bend, 
As on the wing to meet him. 


He came—-he passed—an heedless gaze, 
As o’er some stranger glancing ; 

Her welcome, spoke in faltering phrase, 
Lost in his courser’s prancing— 

The castle arch, whose hollow tone 
Returns each whisper spoken, 

Could scarcely catch the feeble moan 
Which told her heart was broken. 

1806. 


HUNTING SONG 


WAKEN, lords and ladies gay, 

On the mountain dawns the day, 

All the jolly chase is here, 

With hawk and horse and hunting- 
spear ! 

Hounds are in their couples yelling, 

Hawks are whistling, horns are knelling, 

Merrily, merrily, mingle they, 

‘* Waken, lords and ladies gay.” 


Waken, lords and ladies gay, 

The mist has left the mountain gray, 
Springlets in the dawn are steaming, 
Diamonds on the brake are gleaming : 
And foresters have busy been 

To track the buck in thicket green ; 
Now we come to chant our lay, 

‘* Waken, lords and ladies gay.” 


114 


Waken, lords and ladies gay, 

To the green-wood haste away ; 

We can show you where he lies, 

Fleet of foot and tall of size ; 

We can show the marks he made, 
When ’gainst the oak his antlers frayed ; 
You shall see him brought to bay, 

‘* Waken, lords and ladies gay.” 


BRITISHMPORTS 


Louder, louder chant the lay, 
Waken, lords and ladies gay! 

Tell them youth and mirth and glee 
Run a course as well as we; 

Time, stern huntsman, who can balk, 
Stanch as hound and fleet as hawk ? 
Think of this and rise with day, 


Gentle lords and ladies gay. 1808. 


MARMION 


A TALE OF FLODDEN FIELD 


See Lockhart’s Life of Scott, Vol. III, Chap. 16. 


CANTO FIRST 
THE CASTLE 


Day set on Norham’s castled steep, 

And Tweed’s fair river, broad and deep, 
And Cheviot’s mountains lone ; 

The battled towers, the donjon keep, 

The loophole grates where captives 

weep, ; 

The flanking walls that round it sweep, 
In yellow lustre shone. 

The warriors on the turrets high, 

Moving athwart the evening sky, 
Seemed forms of giant height ; 

Their armor, as it caught the rays, 

Flashed back again the western blaze, 
In lines of dazzling light. 


Saint George’s banner, broad and gay, 
Now faded, as the fading ray 

Less bright, and less, was flung ; 
The evening gale had scarce the power 
To wave it on the donjon tower, 

So heavily it hung. 
The scouts had parted on their search, 

The castle gates were barred ; 
Above the gloomy portal arch, 
Timing his footsteps to a march, 

The warder kept his guard, 
* Low humming, as he paced along, 
Some ancient Border gathering song. 


A distant trampling sound he hears ; 

He looks abroad, and soon appears, 

O’er Horncliff-hill, a plump of spears 
Beneath a pennon gay ; 

A horseman, darting from the crowd 

Like lightning from a summer cloud, 

Spurs on his mettled courser proud, 
Before the dark array, 


ee 


Beneath the sable palisade 

That closed the castle barricade, 

His bugle-horn he blew ; 

The warder hasted from the wall, 

And warned the captain in the hall, 
For well the blast he knew ; 

And joyfully that knight did call 

To sewer, squire, and seneschal. 


‘‘ Now broach ye a pipe of Malvoisie, 
Bring pasties of the doe, 
And quickly make the entrance free, 
And bid my heralds ready be, 
And every minstrel sound his glee, 
And all our trumpets blow ; 
And, from the platform, spare ye not 
To fire a noble salvo-shot ; 
Lord Marmion waits below !” 
Then to the castle’s lower ward 
Sped forty yeomen tall, 
The iron-studded gates unbarred, 
Raised the portcullis’ ponderous guard, 
The lofty palisade unsparred, 
And let the drawbridge fall. 


Along the bridge Lord Marmion rode, 

Proudly his red-roan charger trode, 

His helm hung at the saddle bow ; 

Well by his visage you might know 

He was a stalworth knight and keen, 

And had in many a battle been ; 

The scar on his brown cheek revealed 

A token true of Bosworth field ; 

His eyebrow dark and eye of fire 

Showed spirit proud and prompt to ire, 

Yet lines of thought upon his cheek 

Did deep design and counsel speak. 

His forehead, by his casque worn bare, 

His thick moustache and curly hair, 

Coal-black, and grizzled here and there, 
But more through toil than age, 


SCOrr 


ris 





His square-turned joints and strength of 
limb, j 
Showed him no carpet knight so trim, 
But in close fight a champion grim, 
In camps a leader sage. 


Well was he armed from head to heel, 

In mail and plate of Milan steel ; 

But his strong helm, of mighty cost, 

Was all with burnished gold embossed. 

Amid the plumage. of the crest 

A. falcon hovered on her nest, 

With wings outspread and forward 
breast ; 

F’en such a falcon, on his shield, 

Soared sable in an azure field : 

The golden legend bore aright, 

‘* Who checks at me. to death is dight.” 

Blue was the charger’s broidered rein ; 

Blue ribbons decked his arching mane ; 

The knightly housing’s ample fold 

Was velvet blue and trapped with gold. 


Behind him rode two gallant squires, 
Of noble name and knightly sires: 
They burned the gilded spurs to claim, 
For well could each a war-horse tame, 
Could draw the bow, the sword could 
sway, 
And lightly bear the ring away ; 
Nor less with courteous precepts stored, 
Could dance in hall, and carve at board, 
And frame love-ditties passing rare, 
And sing them to a lady fair. 


Four men-at-arms came at their backs, 

With halbert, bill, and battle-axe ; 

They bore Lord Marmion’s lance so 
strong 

And led his sumpter-mules along, 

And ambling palfrey, when at need 

Him listed ease his battle-steed. 

The last and trustiest of the four 

On high his forky pennon bore ; 

Like swallow’s tail in:shape and hue, 

Fluttered the streamer glossy blue, 

Where, blazoned sable, as before, 

The towering falcon seemed to soar. 

Last, twenty yeomen, two and two 

In hosen black and jerkins blue, 

With falcons broidered on each breast, 

Attended on their lord’s behest. 

Each, chosen for an archer good, 

Knew hunting-craft by lake or wood ; 

Each one a six-foot bow could bend, 

And far a cloth-yard shaft could send ; 

Kach held a boar-spear tough and strong, 

And at their belts their quivers rung. 

Their dusty palfreys and array 

Showed they had marched a weary way. 


‘Tis meet that I should tell you now, 

How fairly armed, and ordered how, 
The soldiers of the guard, 

With musket, pike, and morion, 

To welcome noble Marmion, 

Stood in the castle-yard ; 
Minstrels and trumpeters were there, 
The gunner held his linstock yare, 

For welcome-shot prepared : 
Entered the train, and such a clang 
As then through all his turrets rang 

Old Norham never heard. 


The guards their morrice-pikes advanced, 
The trumpets flourished brave, 

The cannon from the ramparts glanced, 
And thundering welcome gave. 

A blithe salute, in martial sort, 
The minstrels well might sound, 

For, as Lord Marmion crossed the court, 
He scattered angels round. 

‘* Welcome to Norham, Marmion ! 
Stout heart and open hand ! 

Well dost thou brook thy gallant roar, 
Thou flower of English land!” 


Two pursuivants, whom tabards deck, 
With silver scutcheon round their neck, 
Stood on the steps of stone 
By which you reach the donjon gate, 
And there, with herald pomp and state, 
They hailed Lord Marmion : 
They hailed him Lord of Fontenaye, 
Of Lutterward, and Scrivelbaye, 
Of Tamworth tower and town ; 
And he, their courtesy to requite, 
Gave them a chain of twelve marks 
weight, 
All as he lighted down. 
‘* Now, largesse, largesse, Lord Marmion, 
Knight of the crest of gold! 
A blazoned shield, in battle won, 
Ne’er guarded heart so bold.” 


They marshalled him to the castle-hall, 
Where the guests stood all aside, 
And loudly flourished the trumpet-call, 
And the heralds loudly cried,— 
‘*Room, lordlings, room for Lord Mar- 
mion, 
With the crest and helm of gold! 
Full well we know the trophies won 
In the lists at Cottiswold : 
There, vainly Ralph de Wilton strove 
’Gainst Marmion’s force to stand ; 
To him he lost his lady-love, 
And to the king his land. 
Ourselves beheld the listed field, 
A sight both sad and fair ; 


116 


We saw Lord Marmion pierce his shield, 
And saw his saddle bare ; 

We saw the victor win the crest 
He wears with worthy pride, 

And on the gibbet:tree, reversed, 
His foeman’s scutcheon tied. 

Place, nobles, for the Falcon-Knight ! 
Room, room, ye gentles gay. 

For him who conquered in the right, 
Marmion of Fontenaye !” 


Then stepped, to meet that noble lord, 
Sir Hugh the Heron bold, 
Baron of Twisell and of Ford, 
And Captain of the Hold ; 
He led Lord Marmion to the deas, 
Raised o’er the pavement high, 
And placed him in the upper place— 
They feasted full and high : 
The whiles a Northern harper rude 
Chanted a rhyme of deadly feud, 
** How the fierce Thirwalls, and Rid- 
leys all, 
Stout Willimondswick, 
And Hardriding Dick, 
And Hughie of Hawdon, and Will o’ 
the Wall, 
Have set on Sir Albany Featherston- 


haugh, 
And taken his life at the Dead-man’s- 
shaw.” 
Scantly Lord Marmion’s ear could 


brook 
The harper’s barbarous lay, 
Yet much he praised the pains he took, 
And well those pains did pay ; 
For lady’s suit and minstrel’s strain 
By knight should ne’er be heard in vain. 


‘* Now good Lord Marmion,” Heron says, 
‘* Of your fair courtesy, 

I pray you bide some little space 
In this poor tower with me. 

Here may you keep your arms from rust, 
May breathe your war-horse well ; 

Seldom hath passed a week but joust 
Or feat of arms befell. 

The Scots can rein a mettled steed, 
Bnd love to couch a spear ;— 

Saint George ! a stirring life they lead 
That have such neighbors near ! 

Then stay with us a little space, 
Our Northern wars to learn ; 

I pray you for your lady’s grace 
Lord Marmion’s brow grew stern. 


$92 


The Captain marked his altered look, 
And gave the squire the sign ; 
A mighty wassail-bowl he took, 


BRITTSHeaPOLTS 





And crowned it high with wine. 

‘* Now pledge me here, Lord Marmion ; 
But first I pray thee fair, 

Where hast thou left that page of thine 

That used to serve thy cup of wine, 
Whose beauty was so rare ? 

When last in Raby-towers we met, 
The bov I closely eyed, 

And often marked his cheeks were wet 
With tears he fain would hide. 

His was no rugged horse-boy’s hand, 

To burnish shield or sharpen brand, 
Or saddle battle-steed, 

But meeter seemed for lady fair, 

To fan her cheek, or curl her hair, 

Or through embroidery, rich and rare, 
The slender silk to lead ; 

His skin was fair, his ringlets gold, 
His bosom—when he sighed, 

The russet doublet’s rugged fold 
Could scarce repel its pride! 

Say, hast thou given that lovely youth 
To serve in lady’s bower ? 

Or was the gentle page, in sooth, 
A gentle paramour ? ” 


Lord Marmion ill could brook such jest ; 
He rolled his kindling eye, 

With pain his rising wrath suppressed, 
Yet made a calm reply ; 

“That boy thou thought so goodly fair, 

He might not brook the Northern air. 

More of his fate if thou wouldst learn, 

I ieft him sick in Lindisfarne. 

Knough of him.—But, Heron, say, 

Why does thy lovely lady gay 

Disdain to grace the hall to-day ? 

Or has that dame, so fair and sage, 

Gone on some pious pilgrimage ? ”— 

He spoke in covert scorn, for fame 

Whispered light tales of Heron’s dame. 


Unmarked, at least unrecked, the taunt, 
Careless the knight replied : 

‘‘No bird whose feathers gaily flaunt 
Delights in cage to bide ; 

Norham is grim and grated close, 

Hemmed in by battlement and fosse, 
And many a darksome tower, 

And better loves my lady bright 

To sit in liberty and light 
In fair Queen Margaret’s bower. 

We hold our greyhound in our hand, 
Our falcon on our glove, 

But where shall we find leash or band 
For dame that loves to rove? 

Let the wild falcon soar her swing, 

She ’11 stoop when she has tried her 


7 99 
wing.’’— ; 


“s 


ee FP 


LS ta, 


- 





SCOTT 117 


‘* Nay, if with Royal James’s bride 

The lovely Lady Heron bide, 

Behold me here a messenger, 

Your tender greetings prompt to bear ; 

For, to the Scottish court addressed, 

I journey at our king’s behest, 

And pray you, of your grace, provide 

For me and mine a trusty guide. 

I have not ridden in Scotland since 

James backed the cause of that mock 
prince, 

Warbeck, that Flemish counterfeit, 

Who on the gibbet paid the cheat. 

Then did I march with Surrey’s power, 

What time we razed old Ayton tower.” 


‘¢ For such-like need, my lord, I trow, 

Norham can find you guides enow ; 

For here be some have pricked as far 

On Scottish grounds as to Dunbar, 

Have drunk’ the monks of Saint 
Bethan’s ale, 

And driven the beeves of Lauderdale, 

Harried the wives of Greenlaw’s goods, 

And given them light to set their 
hoods.” 


**Now, in good sooth,” Lord Marmion 
cried, 

‘* Were I in warlike-wise to ride, 

A better guard I would not lack 

Than your stout forayers at my back ; 

But as in form of peace I go, 

A friendly messenger, to know, 

Why, through all Scotland, near and 
far; 

Their king is mustering troops for war, 

The sight of plundering Border spears 

Might justify suspicious fears, 

And deadly feud or thirst of spoil 

Break out in some unseemly broil. 

A herald were my fitting guide ; 

Or friar, sworn in. peace to bide ; 

Or pardoner, or travelling priest, 

Or strolling pilgrim, at the least.” 


The Captain mused a little space, 

And passed his hand across his face.— 
‘Fain would I find the guide you want, 
But ill may spare a pursuivant, 

The only men that, safe can ride 

Mine errands on the Scottish side : 
And though a bishop built this fort, 
Few holy brethren here resort ; 

Even our good chaplain, as I ween, 
Since our last siege we have not seen, 
The mass he might not sing or say 
Upon one stinted meal a day ; 

So, safe he sat in Durham aisle, 


And prayed for our success the while. 
Our Norham vicar, woe betide, 

Is all too well in case to ride ; 

The priest of Shoreswood--he could rein 
The wildest war-horse in your train, 
But then no spearman in the hall 

Will sooner swear, or stab, or brawl. 
Friar John of Tillmouth were the man ; 
A blithesome brother at the can, 

A welcome guest in hall and bower, 

He knows each castle, town, and tower, 
In which the wine and ale is good, 
"Twixt Newcastle and Holy-Rood. 

But that good man, as ill befalls, 

Hath seldom left our castle walls, 
Since, on the vigil of Saint Bede, 

In evil hour he crossed the Tweed, 

To teach Dame Alison her creed. 

Old Bughtrig found him with his wife, 
And John, an enemy to strife, 

Sans frock and hood, fled for his life. 
The jealous churl hath deeply sworn 
That, if again he venture o’er 

He shall shrieve penitent no more. 
Little he loves such risks, I know, 

Yet in your guard perchance will go.” 


Young Selby, at the fair hall-board. 

Carved to his uncle and that lord, 

And reverently took up the word : 

‘‘ Kind uncle, woe were we each one, 

If harm should hap to brother John. 

He is a man of mirthful speech, 

Can many a game and gambol teach ; 

Full wellat tables can he play, 

And sweep at bowls the stake away. 

None can a lustier carol bawl, 

The needfullest among us all, 

When time hangs heavy in the hail, 

And snow comes thick at Christmas 
tide, 

And we can neither hunt nor ride 

A foray on the Scottish side. 

The vowed revenge of Bughtrig rude 

May end in worse than loss of hood, 

Let friar John in safety still 

In chimney-corner snore his fill, 

Roast hissing crabs, or flagons swill ; 

Last night, to Norham there came one 

Will better guide Lord Marmion.”— 

‘“ Nephew,” quoth Heron, ‘* by my fay. 

Well hast thou spoke ; say forth thy 
say.”’— 


‘¢ Here is a holy Palmer come, 

From Salem first, and last from Rome: 
One that hath kissed the blessed tomb, 
And visited each holy shrine 

In Araby and Palestine ; 


118 


On hills of Armenie hath been, 

Where Noah’s ark may yet be seen ; 

By that Red Sea, too, hath he trod, 

Which parted at the Prophet’s rod ; 

In Sinai’s wilderness he saw 

The Mount where Israel heard the law, 

Mid thunder-dint, and flashing levin, 

And shadows, mists, and darkness, 
given. 

He shows Saint James’s cockle-shell, 

Of fair Montserrat, too, can tell ; 

And of that Grot where Olives nod, 
Where, darling of each heart and eye, 
From all the youth of Sicily, 

Saint Rosalie retired to God. 


‘“To stout Saint George of Norwich 
merry, 

Saint Thomas, too, of Canterbury. 

Cuthbert of Durham and Saint Bede, 

For his sins’ pardon hath he prayed. 

He knows the passes of the North, 

And seeks far shrines beyond the Forth ; 

Little he eats, and long will wake, 

And drinks but of the stream or lake. 

This were a guide: o’er moor and dale ; 

But when our John hath quaffed his ale, 

As little as the wind that blows, 

And warms itself against his nose, 

Kens he, or cares, which way he goes.” — 


‘“Gramercy !” quoth Lord Marmion, 

‘* Full loath were I that Friar John, 

That venerable man, for me 

Were placed in fear or jeopardy : 

If this same Palmer will me lead 
From hence to Holy-Rood, 

Like his good saint, I'll pay his meed, 

Instead of cockle-shell or bead, 
With angels fair and good. 

I love such holy ramblers ; still 

They know to charm a weary hill 
With song, romance, or lay: 

Some jovial tale, or glee, or jest, 

Some lying legend, at the least, 
They bring to cheer the way.’— 


‘* Ah! noble sir,” young Selby said, 

And finger on his lip he laid. 

‘*This man knows much, perchance e’en 
more 

Than he could learn by holy lore. 

Still to himself he’s muttering, 

And shrinks as at some unseen thing, 

Last night we listened at hiscell; | 

Strange sounds we heard, and, sooth to 
tell, 

He murmured on till morn, howe’er 

No living mortal could be near. 


BRITISH \FOETS 


Sometimes [ thought I heard it plain, 

As other voices spoke again. — 

I cannot tell—I like it not— 

Friar John hath told us it is wrote, 

No conscience clear and void of wrong 

Can rest awake and pray so long. 

Himself still sleeps before his beads 

Have marked ten aves and two 
creeds.” — 


‘¢ Let pass,” quoth Marmion; “by my 
fay, 

This man shall guide me on my way, 
Although the great arch-fiend and he 
Had sworn themselves of company. 
So please you, gentle youth, to call 
This Palmer to the castle-hall.” 
The summoned Palmer came in place: 
His sable cowl o’erhung his face ; 
In his black mantle was he clad, 
With Peter’s keys, in cloth of red, 

On his broad shoulders wrought ; 
The scallop shell his cap did deck ; 
The crucifix around his neck 

Was from Loretto brought ; 
His sandals were with travel tore. 
Staff, budget, bottle, scrip, he wore ; 
The faded palm-branch in his hand 
Showed pilgrim from the Holy Land. 


When as the Palmer came in hall, 
Nor lord nor knight was there more tall, 
Or had a statelier step withal, 
Or looked more high and keen ; 
For no saluting did he wait, 
But strode across the hall of state, 
And fronted Marmion where he sate, 
As he his peer had been. 
But his gaunt frame was worn with 
toil ; 
His cheek was sunk, alas the while ! 
And when he struggled at a smile 
His eye looked haggard wild: 
Poor wretch, the mother that him bare, 
If she had been in presence tiere, 
In his wan face and sunburnt hair 
She had not known her child. 
Danger, long travel, want, or woe, 
Soon change the form that best we 
know— 
For deadly fear can time outgo, 
And blanch at once the hair ; 
Hard toil can roughen form and face, 
And want can quench the eye’s bright 
grace,. 
Nor does old age a wrinkle trace 
More deeply than despair. 
Happy whom none of these befall, 


} But this poor Palmer knew them all. 


, 


eae Pa 


= he x ae ne > 


SCOTT 119 


Lord Marmion then his boon did ask ; 
The Palmer took on him the task, 
So he would march with morning tide, 
To Scottish court to be his guide. 
‘* But I have solemn vows to pay, 
And may not linger by the way, 
To fair Saint Andrew’s bound, 
Within the ocean-cave to pray, 
Where good Saint Rule his holy lay, 
From midnight to the dawn of day, 
Sung to the billows’ sound ; 
Thence to Saint Fillan’s blessed well, 
Whose spring can frenzied dreams dispel 
And the crazed brain restore. 
Saint Mary grant that cave or spring 
Could back to peace my bosom bring, 
Or bid it throb no more!” 


And now the midnight draught of sleep, 
Where wine and spices richly steep, 
In massive bow] of silver deep, 
The page presents on knee. 
Lord Marmion drank a fair good rest, 
The Captain pledged his noble guest, 
The cup went through among the rest, 
Who drained it merrily ; 
Alone the Palmer passed it by, 
Though Selby pressed him courteously. 
This was a sign the feast was o’er ; 
It hushed the merry wassail roar, 
The minstrels ceased to sound. 
Soon in the castle nought was heard 
But the slow footstep of the guard 
Pacing his sober round. 


With early dawn Lord Marmion rose: 

And first the chapel doors unclose ; 

Then, after morning rites were done— 

A hasty mass from Friar John— 

And knight and squire had broke their 

fast 

On rich substantial repast, 

Lord Marmion’s bugle blew to horse. 

Then came the stirrup-cup in course: 

Between the baron and his host, 

No point of courtesy was lost ; 

High thanks were by Lord Marmion paid, 

Solemn excuse the Captain made, 

Till, filing from the gate, had passed 

That noble train, their lord the last. 

Then loudly rung the trumpet call ; 

Thundered the cannon from the wall, 
And shook the Scottish shore ; 

Around the castle eddied slow 

Volumes of smoke as white as snow 
And hid its turrets hoar, 

Till they rolled forth upon the air, 

And met the river breezes there, 

Which gave again the prospect fair. 


CANTO SECOND 


THE CONVENT 


THE breeze which swept away the smoke 
Round Norham Castle rolled, 

When all the loud artillery spoke 

With lightning-flash and thunder-stroke, 
As Marmion left the Hold.— 

It curled not Tweed alone, that breeze, 

For, far upon Northumbrian seas, 
It freshly blew and strong, 

Where, from high Whitby’s cloistered 


pile, 
Bound to Saint Cuthbert’s Holy Isle, 
It bore a bark along. 
Upon the gale she stooped her side, - 
And bounded o’er the swelling tide, 
As she were dancing home ; 
The merry seamen laughed to see 
Their gallant ship so lustily 
Furrow the green sea-foam. 
Much joyed they in their 
freight ; 
For, on the deck, in chair of state, 
The Abbess of Saint Hilda placed, 
With five fair nuns, the galley graced. 


honored 


‘“*T was sweet to see these holy maids, 

Like birds escaped to greenwood shades, 
Their first flight from the cage, 

How timid, and how curious too, 

For all to them was strange and new, 

And all the common sights they view 
Their wonderment engage. 

One eyed the shrouds and swelling sail, 
With many a benedicite ; 

One at the rippling surge grew pale, 
And would for terror pray, 

Then shrieked because the sea-dog nigh 

His round black head and sparkling eye 
Reared o’er the foaming spray ; 

And one would still adjust her veil 

Disordered by the summer gale, 

Perchance lest some more worldly eye 

Her dedicated charms might spy, 

Perchance because such action graced 

Her fair-turned arm and slender waist. 

Light was each simple bosom there, . 

Save two, who ill might pleasure share,— 

The Abbess and the Novice Clare. 


The Abbess was of noble blood, 

But early took the veil and hood, 
Ere upon life she cast a look, 

Or knew the world that she forsook. 
Fair too she was, and kind had been 
As she was fair, but ne’er had seen 
For her a timid lover sigh, 

Nor knew the influence of her eye, 


I20 


Love to her ear was but a name, 
Combined with vanity and shame ; 
Her hopes, her fears, her joys, were all 
Bounded within the cloister wall ; 

The deadliest sin her mind could reach 
Was of monastic rule the breach, 

And her ambition’s highest aim 

To emulate Saint Hilda’s fame. 

For this she gave her ample dower 

To raise the convent’s eastern tower ; 
For this, with carving rare and quaint, 
She decked the chapel of the saint, 
And gave the relic-shrine of cost, 

With ivory and gems embossed. 

The poor her convent’s bounty blest, 
The pilgrim in its halls found rest. 


Black was her garb, her rigid rule 
Reformed on Benedictine school ; 

Her cheek was pale, her form was spare ; 
Vigils and penitence austere 

Had early quenched the light of youth : 
But gentle was the dame, in sooth ; 
Though, vain of her religious sway, 

She loved to see her maids obey, 

Yet nothing stern was she in cell, 

And the nuns loved their Abbess well. 
Sad was this voyage to the dame ; 
Summoned to Lindisfarne, she came, 
There, with Saint Cuthbert’s Abbot old 
And Tynemouth’s Prioress, to hold 

A chapter of Saint Benedict, 

For inquisition stern and strict 

On two apostates from the faith, 

And, if need were, to doom to death. 


Nought say I here of Sister Clare, 

Save this, that she was young and fair ; 
As yet a novice unprofessed, 

Lovely and gentle, but distressed, 

She was betrothed to one now dead, 

Or worse, who had dishonored fled. 
Her kinsmen bade her give her hand 
To one who loved her for her land ; 
Herself, almost heart-broken now, 
Was bent to take the vestal vow, 

And shroud within Saint Hilda’s gloom 
Her blasted hopes and withered bloom. 


She sate upon the galley’s prow, 

And seemed to mark the waves below ; 
Nay, seemed, so fixed her look and eye, 
To count them as they glided by: 

She saw them not—’t was seeming all— 
Far other scene her thoughts recall—, 

A sun-scorched desert, wasteand bare ; 
Nor waves nor breezes murmured there ; 
There saw she where some careless hand 
O’er a dead corpse had heaped the sand, 


BRITISH POETS 


To hide it till the jackals come 

To tear it from the scanty tomb.— 
See what a woful look was given, 
As she raised up her eyes to heaven ! 


Lovely, and gentle, and distressed— 

These charms might tame the fiercest 
breast : 

Harpers have sung and poets told 

That he, in fury uncontrolled, 

The shaggy monarch of the wood, 

Before a virgin, fair and good, 

Hath pacified his savage mood. 

But passions in the human frame 

Oft put the lion’s rage to shame ; 

And jealousy, by dark intrigue, 

With sordid avarice in league, 

Had practised with their bowland knife 

Against the mourner’s harmless life. 

This crime was charged gainst those 
who lay 


Prisoned in Cuthbert’s islet gray. 


And now the vessel skirts the strand 
Of mountainous Northumberland ; 
Towns, towers, and halls successive rise, 


-And catch the nuns’ delighted eyes. 


Monk-Wearmouth soon behind them lay, 

And Tynemouth’s priory and bay ; 

They marked amid her trees the hall 

Of lofty Seaton-Delaval ; 

They saw the Blythe and Wansbeck 

floods 

to the sea through 

woods ; 

They passed the tower of Widderington, 

Mother of many a valiant son ; 

At Coquet-isle their beads they tell 

To the good saint who owned the cell ; 

Then did the Alne attention claim, 

And Warkworth, proud of Percy’s 
name ; 

And next they crossed themselves to 
hear 

The whitening breakers sound so near, 

Where, boiling through the rocks, they 
roar 

On Dunstanborough’s caverned shore ; 

Thy tower, proud Bamborough, marked 
they there, 

King Ida’s castle, huge and square, 

From its tall rock look grimly down, 

And on the swelling ocean frown ; 

Then from the coast they bore away, 

And reached the Holy Island’s bay. 


Rush sounding 


The tide did now its flood-mark gain, 
And girdled in the Saint’s domain ; 
For, with the flow and ebb, its style 





SCOTT I2I 





Varies from continent to isle: 
Dry shod, o’er sands, twice every day 


The pilgrims to the shrine find way ; 


Twice every day the waves efface 

Of staves and sandalled feet the trace. 
As to the port the galley flew, 

Higher and higher rose to view 

The castle with its battled walls, 

The ancient monastery’s halls, 

A solemn, huge, and dark-red pile, - 
Placed on the margin of the isle. 


In Saxon strength that abbey frowned, 
With massive arches broad and round, 
That rose alternate, row and row, 
On ponderous columns, short and low, 
Built ere the art was known, 
By pointed aisle and shafted stalk 
The arcades of an alleyed walk 
To emulate in stone. 
On the deep walls the heathen Dane 
Had poured his impious rage in vain ; 
And needful was such strength to these, 
Exposed to the tempestuous seas, 
Scourged by the winds’ eternal sway, 
Open to rovers fierce as they, 
Which could twelve hundred years with- 
stand 
Winds, waves, and northern pirates’ 
hand. 
Not but that portions of the pile, 
Rebuilded in a later style, 
Showed where the spoiler’s hand had 
been ; B 
Not but the wasting sea-breeze keen 
Had worn the pillar’s carving quaint, 
And mouldered in his niche the saint, 
And rounded with consuming power 
The pointed angles of each tower ; 
Yet still entire the abbey stood, 
Like veteran, worn, but unsubdued. 


Soon as they neared his turrets strong, 
The maidens raised Saint Hilda’s song, 
And with the sea-wave and the wind 
Their voices, sweetly shrill, combined 
And made harmonious close ; 
Then, answering from the sandy shore, 
Half-drowned amid the breakers’ roar, 
According chorus rose : 
Down to the haven of the Isle 
The monks and nuns in order file 
From Cuthbert’s cloisters grim ; 
Banner, and cross, and relics there, 
To meet Saint Hilda’s maids, they bare ; 
And, as they caught the sounds on air, 
They echoed back the hymn. 
The islanders in joyous mood 
Rushed emulously through the flood 


To hale the bark to land ; 
Conspicuous by her veil and hood, 
Signing the cross, the Abbess stood, 

And blessed them with her hand. 


Suppose we now the welcome said, 
Suppose the convent banquet made : 
All through the holy dome, 
Through cloister, aisle, and gallery, 
Wherever vestal maid might pry, 
Nor risk to meet unhallowed eye, 
The stranger sisters roam ; 
Till fell the evening damp with dew, 
And the sharp sea-breeze coldly blew, 
For there even summer night is chill. 
Then, having strayed and gazed their fill, 
They closed around the fire ; 
And all, in turn, essayed to paint 
The rival merits of their saint, 
A theme that ne’er can tire 
A holy maid. for be it known 
That their saint’s honor is their own. 


Then Whitby’s nuns exulting told 
How to their house three barons bold 

Must menial service do, 
While horns blow out a note of shame, 
And monks ery, ‘* Fie upon your name! 
In wrath, for loss of sylvan game, 

Saint Hilda’s priest ye slew.”— 
‘This, on Ascension-day, each year 
While laboring on our harbor-pier, 
Must Herbert, Bruce, and Percy hear.” 
They told how in their convent-cell 
A Saxon princess once did dwell, 

The lovely Edelfled ; 

And how, of thousand snakes, each one 
Was changed into a coil of stone 

When holy Hilda prayed : 
Themselves, within their holy bound, 
Their stony folds had often found. 
They told how sea-fowls’ pinions fail 
As over Whitby’s towers they sail, 
And, sinking down, with flutterings 

faint, 

They do their homage to the saint. 


Nor did Saint Cuthbert’s daughters fail 

To vie with these in holy tale ; 

His body’s resting-place, of old, 

How oft their patron changed, they told ; 

How, when the rude Dane burned their 
vile, 

The monks fled forth from Holy Isle ; 

O’er northern mountain, marsh, and 

‘ moor, 

From sea to sea, from shore to shore, 

Seven years Saint Cuthbert’s corpse they 
bore. 


I22 


They rested them in fair Melrose ; 
But though, alive, he loved it well, 

Not there his relics might repose ; 
For, wondrous tale to tell ! 

In his stone coffin forth he rides, 

A ponderous bark for river tides, 

Yet light as gossamer it glides 

Downward to Tilmouth cell. 

Nor long was his abiding there, 
For southward did the saint repair ; 
Chester-le-Street and Ripon saw 
His holy corpse ere Wardilaw 

Hailed him with joy and fear: 
And, after many wanderings past, 
He chose his lordly seat at last 
Where his cathedral, huge and vast, 

Looks down upon the Wear. 
There, deep in Durham’s Gothic shade, 
His relics are in secret laid ; 

But none may know the place, 
Save of his holiest servants three, 
Deep sworn to solemn secrecy, 

Who share that wondrous grace. 


Who may his miracles declare? 
Even Scotland’s dauntless king 
heir— 

Although with them they led 
Galwegians, wild as ocean’s gale, 
And Loden’s knights, all sheathed in 

mail, 
And the bold men of Teviotdale— 

Before his standard fled. 

*T was he, to vindicate his reign, 
Kidged Alfred’s falchion on the Dane, 
And turned the Conqueror back again, 
When, with his Norman bowyer band, 
He came to waste Northumberland. 


and 


But fain Saint Hilda’s nuns would learn 
If on a rock, by Lindisfarne, 
Saint Cuthbert sits, and toils to frame 
The sea-born beads that bear his name: 
Such tales had Whitby’s fishers told, 
And said they might his shape behold, 
And hear his anvil sound ; 
A deadened clang,—a huge dim form, 
Seen but, and heard, when gathering 
storm 
And night were closing round. 
But this, as tale of idle fame, 
The nuns of Lindisfarne disclaim. 


While round the fire such legends go, 
Far different was the scene of woe 
Where, in a secret aisle beneath, 
Council was held of life and death. 
It was more dark and long, that vault, 
Than the worst dungeon cell ; 


BRITISH POETS 


Old Colwulf built it, for his fault 
In penitence to dwell, 
When he for cowl and beads laid 
down 
The Saxon battle-axe and crown. 
This den, which, chilling every sense 
Of feeling, hearing, sight, 
Was called the Vault of Penitence, 
Excluding air and light, 
Was by the prelate Sexhelm made 
A place of burial for such dead 
As, having died in mortal sin, 
Might not be laid the church within. 
*Twas now a place of punishment ; 
Whence if so loud a shriek were sent 
As reached the upper air, 
The hearers blessed themselves, and said 
The spirits of the sinful dead 
Bemoaned their torments there. 


But though, in the monastic pile, 
Did of this penitential pile, 
Some vague tradition go, 
Few only, save the Abbot, knew 
Where the place lay, and still more few 
Were those who had from him the clew 
To that dread vault to go. 
Victim and executioner 
Were blindfold when transported there. 
In low dark rounds the arches hung, 
From the rude rock the side-walls sprung 
The gravestones, rudely sculptured o’er, 
Half sunk in earth, by time half wore, 
Were all the pavement of the floor ; 
The mildew drops fell one by one, 
With tinkling plash, upon the stone. 
A ecresset, in an iron chain, 
Which served to light this drear domain, 
With damp and darkness seemed to 
strive, 
As if it scarce might keep alive ; 
And yet it dimly served to show 
The awful conclave met below. 


There, met to doom in secrecy, 
Were placed the heads of convents three, 
All servants of Saint Benedict, 
The statutes of whose order strict 
On iron table lay ; 
In long black dress, on seats of stone, 
Behind were these three judges shown 
By the pale crescent’s ray. 
The Abbess of Saint Hilda’s there 
Sat for a space with visage bare, 
Until, to hide her bosom’s swell, 
And tear-drops that for pity fell, 
She closely drew her veil: 
Yon shrouded figure, as I guess, 
By her proud mien and flowing dress, 


SCOTT 


Is Tynemouth’s haughty Prioress, 
And she with awe looks pale ; 
And he, that ancient man, whose sight 
Has long been quenched by age’s night, 
Upon whose wrinkled brow alone 
Nor ruth nor mercy’s trace is shown, 
Whose look is hard and stern, 
Saint Cuthbert’s Abbot is his style, 
For sanctity called through the isle 
The Saint of Lindisfarne. 





Before them stood a guilty pair ;° 
But, though an equal fate they share, 
Yet one alone deserves our care. 
Her sex a page’s dress belied ; 
The cloak and doublet, loosely tied, 
Obscured her charms, but could not 
hide, 
Her cap down o’er her face she drew ; 
And, on her doublet breast, 
She tried to hide the badge of blue, 
Lord Marmion’s falcon crest. 
But, at the prioress’ command, 
A monk undid the silken band 
That tied her tresses fair, 
And raised the bonnet from her head, 
And down her slender form they spread 
In ringlets rich and rare. 
Constance de Beverley they know, 
Sister professed of Fontevraud, 
Whom the Church numbered with the 
dead, 
For broken vows and convent fled. 


When thus her face was given to 
view ,— 

Although so pallid was her hue, 

It did a ghastly contrast bear 

To those bright ringlets 
fair,— 

Her look composed, and steady eye, 

Bespoke a matchless constancy ; 

And there she stood so calm and pale 

That, but her breathing did not fail, 

And motion slight of eye and head, 

And of her bosom, warranted 

That neither sense nor pulse she lacks, 

You might have thought a form of wax, 

Wrought to the very life, was there ; 

So still she was, so pale, so fair. 


glistering 


Her comrade was a sordid soul, 

Such as does murder for a meed ; 
Who, but of fear, knows no control, 
Because his conscience, seared and foul, 

Feels not the import of his deed ; 

One whose brute-feeling ne’er aspires 
Beyond his own more brute desires. 
Such tools the Tempter ever needs © 


123 


To do the savagest of deeds ; 

For them no visioned terrors daunt, 

Their nights no fancied spectres haunt ; 

One fear with them, of all most base, 

The fear of death, alone finds place. 

This wretch was clad in frock and cowl, 

And shamed not loud to moan and howl, 

His body on the floor to dash, 

And crouch, like hound beneath the 
lash ; 

While his mute partner, standing near, 

Waited her doom without a tear. 


Yet well the luckless wretch might 
shriek, 

Well might her paleness terror speak ! 

For there were seen in that dark wall 

Two niches, narrow, deep, and tall ;— 

Who enters at such grisly door 

Shall ne’er, I ween, find exit more. 

In each a slender meal was laid, 

Of roots, of water, and of bread ; 

By each, in Benedictine dress, 

Two haggard monks stood motionless, 

Who, holding high a blazing torch, 

Showed the grim entrance of the porch ; 

Reflecting back the smoky beam, 

The dark-red walls and arches gleam. 

Hewn stones and cement were dis- 
played, 


And building tools in order laid. 


These executioners were chose, 
As men who were with mankind foes, 
And, with despite and envy fired, 
Into the cloister had retired, 
Or who, in desperate doubt of gracc, 
Strove by deep penance to efface 
Of some foul crime the stain ; 
For, as the vassals of her will, 
Such men the Church selected still 
As either joyed in doing ill, 
Or thought more grace to gain 
If in her cause they wrestled down 
Feelings their nature strove to own. 
By strange device were they brought 
there, 
They knew not how, and knew not 
where. 


And now that blind old abbot rose, 

To speak the Chapter’s doom 
On those the wall was to enclose 

Alive within the tomb, 
But stopped because that woful maid, 
Gathering her powers, to speak essayed ; 
Twice she essayed, and twice in vain, 
Her accents might no utterance gain ; 
Nought but imperfect murmurs slip 


124 





From her convulsed and quivering lip ; 
‘Twixt each attempt all was so still, 
You seemed to hear a distant rill— 

°T was ocean’s swells and falls; 

For though this vault of sin and fear 

Was to the sounding surge so near, 

A tempest there you scarce could hear, 
So massive were the walls. 


At length, an effort sent apart 

The blood that curdled to her heart, 
And light came to her eye, 

And color dawned upon her cheek, 

A hectic and a fluttered streak, 

Like that left on the Cheviot peak 
By Autumn’s stormy sky ; 

And when her silence broke at length, 

Still as she spoke she gathered strength, 
And armed herself to bear. 

it was a fearful sight to see 

Such high resolve and constancy 
In form so soft and fair. 


‘*T speak not to implore your grace, 

Well know I for one minute’s space 
Successless might I sue: 

Nor do I speak your prayers to gain ; 

For if a death of lingering pain 

To cleanse my sins be penance vain, 
Vain are your masses too.— 

I listened to a traitor’s tale, 

I left the convent and the veil; 

For three long years I bowed my pride, 

A horse-boy in his train to ride ; 

And well my folly’s meed he gave, 

Who forfeited, to be his slave, 

All here, and all beyond the grave. 

He saw young Clara’s face more fair, 

He knew her of broad: lands the heir, 

Forgot his vows, his faith forswore, 

And Constance was beloved no more. 
’'T is an old tale. and often told ; 

But did my fate and wish agree, 
Ne’er had been read, in story old, 
Of maiden true betrayed for gold. 
That loved, or was avenged, like me! 


‘*The king approved his favorite’s aim ; 
In vain a rival barred his claim, 
Whose fate with Clare’s was plight. 
For he attaints that rival’s fame 
With treason’s charge—and on they came 
In mortal lists to fight. 
Their oaths are said, 
Their prayers are prayed, 
Their lances in the rest are laid, 
They meet in mortal shock ; 
And hark! the throng, with thundering 
cry, 


BRITISH POETS 


Shout ‘Marmion, Marmion! to the sky, 
De Wilton to the block !’ 

Say, ye who preach Heaven shall decide 

When in the lists two champions ride, 
Say, was Heaven’s justice here? 

When, loyal in his love and faith, 

Wilton found overthrow or death 
Beneath a traitor’s spear? 

How false the charge, how true he fell, 

This guilty packet best can tell.” 

Then drew a packet from her breast, 

Paused; gathered voice, and spoke the 

rest. 


‘* Still was false Marmion’s bridal stayed ; 
To Whitby’s convent fled the maid, 
The hated match to shun. 
‘Ho! shifts she thus?’ King Henry 
cried, 
‘Sir Marmion, she shall be thy bride, 
If she were sworn a nun.’ 
One way remained—the king’s command 
Sent Marmion to the Scottish land ; 
I lingered here, and rescue planned 
For Clara and for me: 
This caitiff monk for gold did swear 
He would to Whitby’s shrine repair, 
And by his drugs my rival fair 
A saint in heaven should be ; 
But ill the dastard kept his oath, 
Whose cowardice hath undone us both. 


‘* And now my tongue the secret tells, 

Not that remorse my bosom swells, 

But to assure my soul that none 

Shall ever wed with Marmion. 

Had fortune my last hope betrayed, 

This packet, to the king conveyed, 

Had given him to the headsman’s stroke, 

Although my heart that instant broke.— 

Now, men of death, work forth your 
will, ; 

For I can suffer, and be still ; 

And come he slow, or come he fast, 

It is but Death who comes at last. 


‘Yet dread me from my living tomb, 

Ye vassal slaves of bloody Rome! 

If Marmion’s late remorse should wake, 

Full soon such vengeance will he take 

That you shall wish the fiery Dane 

Had rather been your guest again, 

Behind, a darker hour ascends ! 

The altars quake, the crosier bends, 

The ire of a despotic king 

Rides forth upon destruction’s wing ; 

Then shall these vaults, so strong and 
deep, 

Burst open to the sea-wind’s sweep ; 


SCOPrT 125 





Some traveller then shall find my bones 
Whitening amid disjointed stones, 
And, ignorant of priests’ cruelty, 
Marvel such relics here should be.” 


Fixed was her look and stern her air: 
Back from her shoulders streamed her 
hair ; 
The locks that wont her brow to shade 
Stared up erectly from her head ; 
Her figure seemed to rise more high ; 
Her voice despair’s wild energy ~ 
Had given a tone of prophecy. 
Appalled the astonished conclave sate ; 
With stupid eyes, the men of fate 
Gazed on the light inspired form, 
And listened for the avenging storm ; 
The judges felt the victim’s dread ; 
No hand was moved, no word was said, 
Till thus the abbot’s doom was given, 
Raising his sightless balls to heaven : 
** Sister, let thy sorrows cease ; 
Sinful brother, part in peace !” 
From that dire dungeon, place of doom, 
Of execution too, and tomb, 

Paced forth the judges three ; 
Sorrow it were and shame to tell 
The butcher-work that there befell, 
When they had glided from the cell 

Of sin and misery. 


An hundred winding steps convey 

That conclave to the upper day ; 

But ere they breathed the fresher air 

They heard the shriekings of despair, 
And many a stifled groan. 

With speed their upward way they 

take ,— 

Such speed as age and fear can make,— 

And crossed themselves for terror’s sake, 
As hurrying, tottering on, 

Even in the vesper’s heavenly tone 

They seemed to hear a dying groan, 

And bade the passing knell to toll 

For welfare of a parting soul. 

Slow o’er the midnight wave it swung, 

Northumbrian rocks in answer rung ; 

To Warkworth cell the echoes rolled, 

His beads the wakeful hermit told ; 

The Bamborough peasant raised his 

head, 

But slept ere half a prayer he said ; 

So far was heard the mighty knell, ° 

The stag sprung up on Cheviot Fell, 

Spread his broad nostrils to the wind, 

Listed before, aside, behind, 

Then couched him down beside the hind, 

And quaked among the mountain fern, 

To hear that sound so dull and stern. 


CANTO THIRD 
THE HOSTEL, OR INN 


THE livelong day Lord Marmion rode; 

The mountain path the Palmer showed 

By glen and streamlet winded still, 

Where stunted birches hid the rill. 

They might not choose the lowland road, 

For the Merse forayers were abroad, 

Who, fired with hate and thirst of prey, 

Had scarcely failed to bar their way ; 

Oft on the trampling band from crown 

Of some tall cliff the deer looked down ; 

On wing of jet from his repose 

In the deep heath the blackcock rose ; 

Sprung from the gorse the timid roe, 

Nor waited for the bending bow ; 

And when the stony path began 

By which the naked peak they wan, 

Up flew the snowy ptarmigan. 

The noon had long been passed before 

They gained the height of Lammer- 
moor ; 

Thence winding down the northern 
way, 

Before them at the close of day 

Old Gifford’s towers and hamlet lay. 


No summons calls them to the tower, 
To spend the hospitable bour. 
To Scotland’s camp the lord was gone ; 
His cautious dame, in bower alone, 
Dreaded her castle to unclose, 
So late, to unknown friends or foes. 
On through the hamlet as they paced, 
Before a porch whose front was graced, 
With bush and flagon trimly placed, 
Lord Marmion drew his rein: 
The village inn seemed large, though 
rude ; 
Its cheerful fire and hearty food 
Might well relieve his train. 
Down from their seats the horsemen 
sprung, 
With jingling spurs the court-yard rung ; 
They bind their horses to the stall, 
For forage, food, and firing call, 
And various clamor fills the hall: 
Weighing the labor with the cost, 
Toils everywhere the bustling host. 


Soon, by the chimney’s merry blaze, 
Through the rude hostel might you gaze, 
Might see where in dark nook aloof 
The rafters of the sooty roof 

Bore wealth of winter cheer ; 
Of sea-fowl dried, and solands store, 
And gammons of the tusky boar, 

And savory haunch of deer, 


126 


BRITISH POETS 





The chimney arch projected wide ; 
Above, around it, and beside, 

Were tools for housewives’ hand ; 
Nor wanted, in that martial day, 
The implements of Scottish fray, 

The buckler, lance, and brand. 
Beneath its shade, the place of state. 
On oaken settle Marmion sate, 

And viewed around the blazing hearth 
His followers mix in noisy mirth ; 
Whom with brown ale, in jolly tide, 
From ancient vessels ranged aside 
Full actively their host supplied. 


Theirs was the glee of martial breast, 

And laughter theirs at little jest ; 

And oft Lord Marmion deigned to aid, 

And mingle in the mirth they made ; 

For though, with men of high degree, 

The proudest of the proud was he, 

Yet, trained in camps, he knew the 
art 

To win the soldier’s hardy heart. 

They love a captain to obey, 

Boisterous as March, yet fresh as May ; 

With open hand and brow as free, 

Lover of wine and minstrelsy ; 

Ever the first to scale a tower, 

As venturous in a lady’s bower : — 

Such buxom chief shall lead his host 

From India’s fires to Zembla’s frost. 


Resting upon his pilgrim staff, 
Right opposite the Palmer stood, 
His. thin dark visage seen but half, 
Half hidden by his hood. 
Still fixed on Marmion was his look, 
Which he, who ill such gaze could 
brook, 
Strove by a frown to quell ; 
But not for that, though more than once 
Full met their stern encountering glance, 
The Palmer’s visage fell. 


By fits less frequent from the crowd 

Was heard the burst of laughter loud ; 

For still, as squire and archer stared 

On that dark face and matted beard, 
Their glee and game declined. 

All gazed at length in silence drear, 

Unbroke save when in comrade’s ear 

Some yeoman, wondering in his fear, 
Thus whispered forth his mind : 

“Saint Mary! saw’st thou e’er such 

sight ? 

How pale his cheek, his eye how bright 

Whene’er the firebrand’s fickle light, 
Glances beneath his cowl ! 

Full on our lord he sets his eye ; 


For his best palfrey would not I 
Endure that sullen scowl. ” 


But Marmion, as to chase the awe 
Which thus had quelled their hearts 
who saw 
The ever-varying firelight show 
That figure stern and face of woe, 
Now called upon a squire ; 
‘* Witz-Eustace, know’st thou not some 
lay, 
To speed the lingering night away ? 
We slumber by the fire.” 


‘So please you,” thus the youth rejoined, 
‘Our choicest-minstrel’s left behind. 
Ill may we hope to please your ear, 
Accustomed Constant’s strains to hear. 
The harp full deftly can he strike, 
And wake the lover’s lute alike ; 

To dear Saint Valentine no thrush 
Sings livelier from a springtide bush, 
No nightingale her lovelorn tune 

More sweetly warbles to the moon. 
Woe to the cause, whate’er it be, 
Detains from us his melody, 

Lavished on rocks and billows stern, 
Or duller monks of Lindisfarne. 

Now must I venture as I may, 

To sing his favorite roundelay. ” 


A mellow voice Fitz-Eustace had, 

The air he chose was wild and sad ; 

Such have I heard in Scottish land 

Rise from the busy, harvest band, 

When falls before the mountaineer 

On Lowland plains the ripened ear. 

Now one shrill voice the notes prolong, 

Now a wild chorus swells the song ; 

Oft have I listened and stood still 

As it came softened up the hill, 

And deemed it the lament of men 

Who languished for their native glen, 

And thought how sad would be such 
sound 

On Susquehanna’s swampy ground, 

Kentucky’s wood-encumbered brake, 

Or wild Ontario’s boundless lake, 

Where heart-sick exiles in the strain 

Recalled fair Scotland’s hills again ! 


SONG 


Where shall the lover rest, 
Whom the fates sever 
From his true maiden’s breast, 
Parted forever ? 
Where, through groves deep and high, 
Sounds the far billow, 
Where early violets die, 
Under the willow. 


Te 


SCOTT 


CHORUS 


Eleu loro, etc. Soft shall be his pillow. 


There, through the summer day, 
Cool streams are laving ; 
There, while the tempests sway, 
Scarce are boughs waving; 
There thy rest shalt thou take, 
Parted forever, 
Never again to wake, 
Never, O never! 


CHORUS 


Eleu loro, ete. Never, O never! 
Where shall the traitor rest, 
He the deceiver, 
Who could win maiden’s breast, 
Ruin and leave her? 
In the lost battle, 
Borne down by the flying, 
Where mingles war’s rattle 
With groans of the dying. 


CHORUS 


Eleu loro, etc. There shall he be lying. 
Her wing shall the eagle flap 
O’er the false-hearted ; 
His warm blood the wolf shall lap, 
Ere life be parted. 
Shame and dishonor sit 
By his grave ever ; 
Blessing shall hallow it,— 
Never, O never ! 


CHORUS 


Eleu loro, etc. Never, O never! 
It ceased, the melancholy sound, 
And silence sunk on all around. 
The air was sad; but sadder still 
It fell on Marmion’s ear, 
And plained as if disgrace and ill, 
And shameful death, were near. 
He drew his mantle past his face, 
Between it and the band, 
And rested with his head a space 
Reclining on his hand, 
His thoughts I scan not ; but I ween 
That, could their import have been 
seen, 
The meanest groom in all the hall, 
That e’er tied courser to a stall, 
Would scarce’ have wished to be their 


prey, 
For Lutterward and Fontenaye. 


127 


High minds, of native pride and force, 

Most deeply feel thy pangs, Remorse! 

Fear, for their scourge, mean villains 
have, 

Thou art the torturer of the brave! 

Yet fatal strength they boast to steel 

Their pune to bear the wounds they 
feel, 

Even while they writhe beneath the 
smart 

Of civil conflict in the heart. 

For soon Lord Marmion raised his head, 

And smiling to Fitz-Eustace said ; 

‘* Ts it not strange that, as ye sung, 

Seemed in mine ear a death-peal rung, 

Such as in nunneries they toll 

For some departing sister’s soul ! 

Say, what may this portend ?’ 
Then first the Palmer silence broke,— 
The livelong day he had not spoke,— 
‘*The death of a dear friend.” 


Marmion, whose steady heart and eye 
Ne’er changed in worst extremity ; 
Marmion, whose soul could  scantly 
brook 
Even from his king a haughty look ; 
Whose accent of command controlled 
In camps the boldest of the bold— 
Thought, look, and utterance failed him 
now, 
Fallen was his glance and flushed his 
brow : 
For either in the tone, 
Or something in the Palmer’s look, 
So full upon his conscience strook, 
That answer he found none. 
Thus oft it haps that when within 
They shrink at sense of secret sin, 
A feather daunts the brave ; 
A fool’s wild speech confounds the wise, 
And proudest princes veil their eyes 
Before their meanest slave. 


Well might he falter !—By his aid 

Was Constance Beverley betrayed. 

Not that he augured of the doom 

Which on the living closed the tomb: 

But, tired to hear the desperate maid 

Threaten by turns, beseech, upbraid, 

And wroth because in wild despair 

She practised on the life of Clare, 

Its fugitive the Church he gave, 

Though not a victim, but a slave, 

And deemed restraint in convent 
strange 

Would hide her wrongs and her revenge. 

Himself, proud Henry’s favorite peer, 

Held Komish thunders idle fear ; 


128 


BRITISH? BOLTS 





—— 


Secure his pardon he might hold 

For some slight mulct of penance-gold. 

Thus judging, he gave secret way 

When the stern priests surprised their 
prey. 

His train but deemed the favorite page 

Was left behind to spare his age ; 

Or other if they deemed, none dared 

To mutter what he thought and heard : 

Woe to the vassal who durst pry 

Into Lord Marmion’s privacy ! 


His conscience 
well, 

And safe secured in distant cell ; 

But wakened by her favorite lay, 

And that strange Palmer’s boding say, 

That fell so ominous and drear 

Full on the object of his fear, 

To aid remorse’s venomed throes, 

Dark tales of convent-vengeance rose ; 


slept—he deemed her 


And Constance, late betrayed and 
scorned, 

All lovely on his soul returned ; 

Lovely as when at treacherous call 

She left her convent’s peaceful wall, 

Crimsoned with shame, with terror 
mute, 


Dreading alike escape, pursuit, 
Till love, victorious o’er alarms, 
Hid fears and blushes in his arms. 


‘* Alas!” he thought, ‘‘ how changed that 
mien ! 

How changed these timid looks have 
been, 

Since years of guilt and of disguise 

Have steeled her brow and armed her 
eyes! 

No more of virgin terror speaks 

The blood that mantles in her cheeks ; 

Fierce and unfeminine are there, 

Frenzy for joy, for grief despair ; 

And I the cause—for whom were given 
Her peace on earth, her hopes in 
heaven !— 
Would,” thought he, 

grows, 
‘*T on its stalk had left the rose! 
Oh, why should man’s success remove 
The very charms that wake his love ?— 
Her convent’s peaceful solitude 
Is now a prison harsh and rude ; 
And, pent within the narrow cell, 
How will her spirit chafe and swell! 
How brook the stern monastic laws! 
The penance how—and I the cause !— 
Vigil and  scourge—perchance even 
worse ! 


as. the picture 








And twice he rose to cry, ‘* To horse !”’ 

And twice his sovereign’s mandate came, 

Like damp upon a kindling flame ; 

And twice he thought, ‘‘Gave I not 
_. charger 

She should be safe, though not at 

large? 
They durst not, for their island, shred 
One golden ringlet from her head.” 


While thus in Marmion’s bosom strove 

Repentance and reviving love, 

Like whirlwinds whose contending sway 

I’ve seen Loch Vennachar obey, 

Their host the Palmer’s speech 

heard, 

And talkative took up the word : 
‘* Ay, reverend pilgrim, you whostray 
From Scotland’s simple land away, 

To visit realms afar, 
Full often learn the art to know 
Of future weal or future woe, 
By word, or sign, or star ; 

Yet might a knight his fortune hear, 

If, Knight-like, he despises fear, 

Not far from hence ;—-if fathers old 

Aright our hamlet legend told.” 

These broken words the menials move,— 

For marvels still the vulgar love,—— 

And. Marmion giving license cold, 

His tale the host thus gladly told :— 


had 


THE HOST’S TALE 


‘*A clerk could tell what years have 
flown 

Since Alexander filled our throne,— 

Third monarch of that warlike name,— 

And eke the time when here he came 

To seek Sir Hugo, then our lord : 

A braver never drew a sword ; 

A wiser never, at the hour 

Of midnight, spoke the word of power ; 

The same whom ancient records call 

The founder of the Goblin-Hall. 

I would, Sir Knight, your longer stay 

Gave you that cavern to survey. 

Of lofty roof and ample size, 

Beneath the castle deep it lies: 

To hew the living rock profound, 

The floor to pave, the arch to round, 

There never toiled a mortal arm, 

It all was wrought by word and charm ; 

And I have heard my grandsire’ say 

That the wild clamor and affray 

Of those dread artisans of hell, 

Who labored under Hugo’s spell, 

Sounded as loud as ocean’s war 

Among the caverns of Dunbar, 


SCOTT 129 





“The king Lord Gifford’s castle sought, 

Deep laboring with uncertain thought. 

Even then he mustered all his host, 

To meet upon the western coast ; 

For Norse and Danish galleys plied 

Their oars within the Firth of Clyde. 

There floated Haco’s banner trim 

Above Norweyan warriors grim, 

Savage of heart and large of limb, 

Threatening both continent and isle, 

Bute, Arran, Cunninghame, and Kyle. 

Lord Gifford, deep beneath the ground, 

Heard Alexander's bugle sound, 

And tarried not his garb to change, 

But, in his wizard habit strange, 

Came forth,—a quaint and fearful sight : 

His mantle lined with fox-skins white ; 

His high and wrinkled forehead bore 

A pointed cap, such as of yore 

Clerks say that Pharaoh’s Magi wore ; 

His shoes were marked with cross and 
spell, 

Upon his breast a pentacle ; 

His zone of virgin parchment thin, 

Or, as some tell, of dead man’s skin, 

Bore many a planetary sign, 

Combust, and retrogade, and trine; 

And in his hand he held prepared 

A naked sword without a guard. 


‘* Dire dealings with the fiendish race 
Had marked strange lines upon his face ; 
Vigil and fast had worn him grim, 

His eyesight dazzled seemed and dim, 
As one unused to upper day ; 

Even his own menials with dismay 
Beheld, Sir Knight, the grisly sire 

In this unwonted wild attire ; 
Unwonted, for traditions run 

He seldom thus beheld the sun. 

‘I know,’ he said,—his voice was hoarse 
And broken seemed its hollow force,— 
‘1 know the cause, although untold, 
Why the king seeks his vassal’s hold : 
Vainly from me my liege would know 
His kingdom’s future weal or woe ; 

But yet, if strong his arm and heart, 
His courage may do more than art. 


‘*** Of middle air the demons proud, 
Who ride upon the racking cloud, 

Can read in fixed or wanderi ing star 
The issue of events afar, 

But still their sullen aid withhold. 

Save when by mightier force controlled. 
Such late I summoned to my hall ; 

And though so potent was the call 

That scarce the deepest nook of hell 

I deemed a refuge from the spell, 


2 


Yet, obstinate in silence still, 

The haughty demon mocks my skill. 

But thou,—who little know’st thy might 

As born upon that blessed night 

When yawning graves and dying groan 

Proclaimed hell’s empire overthrown,— 

With untaught valor shalt compel 

Response denied to magic spell.’ 

‘Gramercy,’ quoth our monarch free, 

‘Place him but front to front with me, 

And, by this good and honored brand, 

The gift of Coeur-de-Lion’s hand, 

Soothly I swear that, tide what tide, 

The demon shall a buffet bide.’ 

His bearing bold the wizard viewed, 

And thus, well pleased, his speech re- 
newed : 

‘There spoke the blood of Malcolm !— 
mark 

Forth pacing hence at midnight dark, 

The rampart seek whose circling crown 

Crests the ascent of yonder down: 

A southern entrance shalt thou find ; 

There halt, and there thy bugle wind, 

And trust thine elfin foe to see 

In guise of thy worst enemy. 

Couch then thy lance and spur thy 
steed— 

Upon him! and Saint George to speed ! 

If he.go down, thou soon shalt know 

Whate’er these airy sprites can show ; 

If thy heart fail thee in the strife, 

Iam no warrant for thy life.’ 


‘* Soon as the midnight bell did ring, 
Alone and armed, forth rode the king 


‘To that old camp’s deserted round. 


Sir Knight, you well might mark the 
mound 

Left hand the town,—the Pictish race 

The trench, long since, in blood did 
trace ; 

The moor around is brown and bare, 

The space within is green and fair. 

The spot our village children know, 

For there the earliest wild-flowers grow ; 

But woe betide the wandering wight 

That treads its circle in the night! 

The breadth across, a bowshot clear, 

xives ample space for full career ; 

Opposed to the four points of heaven, 

By four deep gaps are entrance given. 

The southernmost our monarch passed, 

Halted, and blew a gallant blast ; 

And on the north, within the ring, 

Appeared the form of England's king, 

Who then, a thousand leagues afar, 

In Palestine waged holy war: 

Yet arms like England’s did he wield; 


130 


Alike the leopards in the shield, 
Alike his Syrian courser’s frame, 
The rider’s length of limb the same. 
Long afterwards did Scotland know 
Fell Edward was her deadiiest foe. 


“The vision made our monarch start, 
But soon he manned his noble heart, 
And in the first career they ran, 
The Elfin Knight fell. horse and man ; 
Yet did a splinter of his lance 
Through Alexander’s visor glance, 
And razed the skin—a puny wound. 
The king, light leaping to the ground, 
With naked blade his phantom foe 
Compelled the future war to show. 
Of Largs he saw the glorious plain, 
Where still gigantic bones remain, 
Memorial of the Danish war ; 
Himself he saw, amid the field, 
On high his brandished war-axe wield 
And strike proud Haco from his car, 
While allaround the shadowy kings 
Denmark’s grim ravens cowered their 
wings. 
’T is said that in that awful night 
Remoter visions met his sight, 
Foreshowing future conquest far, 
When our sons’ sons wage Northern 
war; 
A royal city, tower and spire, 
Reddened the midnight sky with fire, 
And shouting crews her navy bore 
Triumphant to the victor shore. 
Such signs may learned clerks explain, 
They pass the wit of simple swain. 


“The joyful king turned home again, 
Headed his host, and quelled the Dane ; 
But yearly, when returned the night 
Of his strange combat with the sprite, 
His wound must bleed and smart ; 
Lord Gifford then would gibing say, 
‘Bold as ye were, my liege, ye pay 
The penance of your start.’ 
Long since, beneath Dunfermline’s nave, 
King Alexander fills his grave, 
Our Lady give him rest! 
Yet still the knightly spear and shield 
The Elfin Warrior doth wield 
Upon the brown hill’s breast, 
And many a knight hath proved his 
chance 
In the charmed ring to break a lance, 
But all have foully sped ; 
Save two, as legends tell, and they 
Were Wallace wight and_ Gilbert 
Hay.— 
Gentles, my tale is said.” 


BRITISH POETS 





The quaighs were 
strong, ‘ 
And on the tale the yeoman-throng 
Had made a comment sage and long, 
But Marmion gave a sign, 
And with their lord the squires retire, 
The rest around the hostel fire 
Their drowsy limbs recline ; 
For pillow, underneath each head 
The quiver and the targe were laid. 
Deep slumbering on the hostel floor, 
Oppressed with toil and ale, they snore ; 
The dying flame, in fitful change, 
Threw on the group its shadows strange. 


deep, the liquor 


Apart, and nestling in the hay 

Of a waste loft, Fitz-Eustace lay ; 
Scarce by the pale moonlight were seen 
The foldings of his mantle green: 
Lightly he dreamt, as youth will dream, 
Of sport by thicket, or by stream, 

Of hawk or hound, or ring or glove, 

Or, lighter yet, of lady’s love. 

A cautious tread his slimber broke, 
And, close beside him when he woke, 
In moonbeam half, and half in gloom, 
Stood a tall form with nodding plume ; 
But, ere his dagger Eustace drew, 

His master Marmion’s voice he knew : 


‘* Fitz-Eustace! rise,—I cannot rest ; 

Yon churl’s wild legend haunts my 
breast, 

And graver thoughts have chafed my 
mood ; ; 

The air must cool my feverish blood, 

And fain would I ride forth to see 

The scene of elfin chivalry. 

Arise, and saddle me my steed ; 

And, gentle Eustace, take good heed 

Thou dost not rouse these drowsy 
slaves ; 

T would not that the prating knaves 

Had cause for saying, o’er their ale, 

That I could credit such a tale.” 

Then softly down the steps they shd, 

Eustace the stable door undid, 

And, darkling, Marmion’s steed arrayed, 

While, whispering, thus the baron 
said :— 


‘*Didst never, good my youth, hear tell 
That on the hour when I was born 
Saint George, who graced my sire’s cha- 
pelle, 
Down from his steed of marble fell, 
A weary wight forlorn ? 
The flattering chaplains all agree 
The champion left his steed to me. 


SCOTT 


I would, the omen’s truth to show, 

That I could meet this elfin foe ! 

Blithe would I battle for the right 

To ask one question at the sprite.— 

Vain et for elves, if elves there 
e, 

An empty race, by fount or sea 

To dashing waters dance and sing, 


Or round the green oak wheel their 


ring.” 
Thus speaking, he his steed bestrode, 
And from the hostel slowly rode. 


Fitz-Eustace followed him abroad, 
And marked him pace the village road, 
And listened to his horse’s tramp, 
Till, by the lessening sound, 
He judged that of the Pictish camp 
Lord Marmion sought the round. 
Wonder it seemed, in the squire’s eyes, 
That one, so wary held and wise,— 
Of whom ’twas said, he scarce received 
For gospel what the Church believed,— 
Should, stirred by idle tale, 
Ride forth in silence of the night, 
As hoping half to meet a sprite, 
Arrayed in plate and mail. 
For little did Fitz-Eustace know 
That passions in contending flow 
Unfix the strongest mind ; 
Wearied from doubt to doubt to flee, 
We welcome fond credulity, 
Guide confident, though blind. 


Little for this Fitz-Eustace cared, 
But patient waited till he heard 
At distance, pricked to utmost speed, 
The foot-tramp of a flying steed 
Come townward rushing on ; 
First, dead, as if on turf it trode, 
Then, clattering on the village road,— 
In other pace than forth he yode, 
Returned Lord Marmion, 
Down hastily he sprung from selle, 
And in his haste wellnigh he fell; 
To the squire’s hand the rein he threw, 
And spoke no word as he withdrew: 
But yet the moonlight did betray 
The falcon-crest was soiled with clay ; 
And plainly might Fitz Eustace see, 
By stains upon the charger’s knee 
And his left side, that on the moor 
He had not kept his footing sure. 
Long musing on these wondrous signs, 
At length to rest the squire reclines, 
Broken and short; for still between 
Would dreams of terror intervene : 
Eustace did ne’er so blithely mark 
The first notes of the morning lark, 


E31 


CANTO FOURTH 


THE CAMP 


Eustace, I said, did blithely mark 
The first notes of the merry lark. 
The lark sang shrill, the cock he crew, 
And loudly Marmion’s bugles blew, 
And with their light and lively call 
Brought groom and yeoman to the stall. 
Whistling they came and free of heart, 
But soon their mood was changed ; 
Complaint was heard on every part 
Of some thing disarranged. 
Some clamored loud for armor lost ; 
Some brawled and wrangled with the 
host ; 
‘By Becket’s bones,’ cried one, ‘I fear 
That some false Scot has stolen my 
spear!’ 
Young Blount, Lord Marmion’s second 
squire, 
Found his steed wet with sweat and mire, 
Although the rated horse-boy sware 
Last night he dressed him sleek and fair, 
While chafed the impatient squire like 
thunder, 
Old Hubert shouts in fear and wonder,~ 
Help, gentle Blount! help. comrades all! 
Bevis lies dying in his stall ; 
To Marmion who the plight dare tell 
Of the good steed he loves so well ?’ 
Gaping for fear and ruth, they saw 
The charger panting on his straw ; 
Till one, who would seem wisest, cried, 
‘* What else but evil could betide, 
With that cursed Palmer for our guide ? 
Better we had through mire and bush 
Been lantern-led by Friar Rush.” 
Fitz-Eustace, who the cause _ but 
guessed, 
Nor wholly understood, 
His comrades’ clamorous plaints sup- 
pressed ; 
He knew Lord Marmion’s mood. 
Him, ere he issued forth, he sought, 
And found deep plunged in gloomy 
thought, 
And did his tale display 
Simply, as if he knew of nought 
To cause such disarray. 
Lord Marmion gave attention cold, 
Nor marvelled at the wonders told,— 
Passed them as accidents of course, 
And bade his clarions sound to horse. 


Young Henry Blount, meanwhile, the 
cost 
Had reckoned with their Scottish host ; 


132 


And, as the charge he cast and paid, 

‘* Til thou deserv’st thy hire,” he said ; 

‘Dost see, thou knave. my horse’s plight? 

Fairies have ridden him all the night, 
And left him in a foam ! 

I trust that soon a conjuring band, 

With English cross and blazing brand, 

Shall drive the devils from this land 
To their infernal home; 

For in this haunted den, I trow, 

All night they trampled to and fro.” 

The laughing host looked on the hire: 

‘‘Gramercy, gentle southern squire, 

And if thou com’st among the rest, 

With Scottish broadsword to be blest, 

Sharp be the brand, and sure the blow, 

And short the pang to undergo.” 

Here stayed their talk, for Marmion 

Gave now the signal to set on. 

The Palmer showing forth the way, 

They journeyed all the morning-day. 


The greensward way was smooth and 
good, 

Through Humbie’s and through Saltoun’s 
wood ; 

A forest glade, which, varying still, 

Here gave a view of dale and hill 

There narrower closed till overhead 

A vaulted screen the branches made, 

‘* A pleasant path,” Fitz-Eustace said ; 

‘Such as where errant knights might 
see 

Adventures of high chivalry, 

Might meet some damsel flying fast, 

With hair unbound and looks aghast ; 

And smooth and level course were here, 

In her defence to break a spear. 

Here, too, are twilight nooks and dells; 

And oft in such, the story tells, 

The damsel kind, from danger freed, 

Did grateful pay her champion’s meed.” 

He spoke to cheer Lord Marmion’s mind, 

Perchance to show his lore designed ; 

For Eustace much had pored 

Upon a huge romantic tome, 

In the hall-window of his home, 

Imprinted at the antique dome 

Of Caxton or de Worde, 
Therefore he spoke,—but spoke in vain, 
For Marmion answered nought again. 


Now sudden, distant trumpets shrill, 

In notes prolonged by wood and hill, 
Were heard to echo far ; 

Each ready archer grasped his bow, 

But by the flourish soon they know 
They breathed no point of war. 

Yet cautious, as in foeman’s land, 


BRITISH POETS 


~~ 


Lord Marmion’s order speeds the band 
Some opener ground to gain ; 

And searce a furlong had they rode, 

When thinner trees receding showed 
A little woodland plain. 

Just in that advantageous glade 

The halting troop a line had made, 

As forth from the opposing shade 
Issued a gallant train. 


First came the trumpets, at whose clang 
So late the forest echoes rang ; 
On prancing steeds they forward pressed, 
With scarlet mantle, azure vest ; 
Each at his trump a banner wore, 
Which Scotland’s royal scutcheon bore : 
Heralds and pursuivants, by name 
Bute, Islay, Marchmount, Rothsay, 
came, 
In painted tabards, proudly showing 
Gules, argent, or, and azure glowing. 
Attendant on a king-at-arms, 
Whose hand the armorial truncheon 
held 
That feudal strife had often quelled 
When wildest its alarms. 


He was a man of middle age, 
In aspect manly, grave, and sage, 
As on king’s errand come ; 
But in the glances of his eye 
A penetrating, keen, and sly 
Expression found its home ; 
The flash of that satiric rage 
Which, bursting on the early stage, 
Branded the vices of the age, 
And broke the keys of Rome. 
On milk-white palfrey forth he paced ; 
His cap of maintenance was graced 
With the proud heron-plume. 
From his steed’s shoulder, loin, and 
breast, 
Silk housings swept the ground, 
With Scotland’s arms, device, and crest, 
Embroidered round and round. 
The double tressure might you see, 
First by Achaius borne, 
The thistle and the fleur-de-lis, 
And gallant unicorn. 
So bright the king’s armorial coat 
That scarce the dazzled eye could note, 
In living colors blazoned brave, 
The Lion, which his title gave ; 
A train, which well beseemed his state, 
But all unarmed, around him wait. 
Still is thy name in high account, 
And still thy verse has charms, 
Sir David Lindesay of the Mount, 
Lord Lion King-at-arms ! 


SCOTT 


Down from his horse did Marmion spring - 


Soon as he saw the Lion-King ; 
For well the stately baron knew 
To him such courtesy was due 
Whom royal James himself had crowned, 
And on his temples placed the round 

Of Scotland’s ancient diadem, 
And wet his brow with hallowed wine, 
And on his finger given to shine 

The emblematic gem. 
Their mutual greetings duly made, 
The Lion thus his message said :— 
‘Though Scotland’s King hath deeply 

swore 
Ne’er to knit faith with Henry more, 
And strictly hath forbid resort 
From England to his royal court, 
Yet, for he knows Lord Marmion’s name 
And honors much his warlike fame, 
My liege hath deemed it shame and 
lack 


Of courtesy to turn him back ; 

And by his order I, your guide, 

Must lodging fit and fair provide 

Till finds King James meet time to see 
The flower of English chivalry.” 


Though inly chafed at this delay, 

Lord Marmion bears it as he may. 

The Palmer, his mysterious guide, 

Beholding thus his place supplied, 
Sought to take leave in vain ; 

Strict was the Lion-King’s command 

That none who rode in Marmion’s band 
Should sever from the train. 

‘*England has here enow of spies 

In Lady Heron’s witching eyes:” 

To Marchmount thus apart he said, 

But fair pretext to Marmion made. 

The right-hand path they now decline, 

And trace against the stream the Tyne. 


At length up that wild dale they wind, 
Where Crichtoun Castle crowns the 
bank ; 
' For there the Lion’s care assigned 
A lodging meet for Marmion’s rank. 
That castle rises on the steep 
Of the green vale of Tyne ; 
And far beneath, where slow they creep 
From pool to eddy, dark and deep, 
Where alders moist and willows weep, 
You hear her streams repine. 
The towers in different ages rose, 
Their various architecture shows 
The builders’ various hands ; 
A mighty mass, that could oppose, 
When deadliest hatred fired its foes, 
The vengeful Douglas bands. 


#33 


Crichtoun ! though now thy miry court 
But pens the lazy steer and sheep, 
Thy turrets rude and tottered keep. 

Have been the minstrel’s loved resort. 

Oft have I traced, within thy fort, 

Of mouldering shields the mystic 
sense, 
Scutcheons of honor or pretence, 

Quartered in old armorial sort, 
Remains of rude magnificence. 

Nor wholly yet hath time defaced 
Thy lordly gallery fair, 

Nor yet the stony cord unbraced 

Whose twisted knots, with roses laced, 
Adorn thy ruined stair. 

Still rises unimpaired below 

The court-yard’s graceful portico ; 

Above its cornice, row and row 

Of fair-hewn facets richly show 
Their pointed diamond form, 

Though there but houseless cattle go, 
To shield them from the storm. 

And, shuddering, still may we explore, 
Where oft whilom were captives pent, 

The darkness of thy Massy More. 

Or, from thy grass-grown battlement, 

May trace in undulating line 

The sluggish mazes of the Tyne. 


Another aspect Crichtoun showed 

As through its portal Marmion rode ; 

But yet ’t was melancholy state 

Received him at the outer gate, 

For none were in the castle then 

But women, boys, or aged men. 

With eyes searce dried, the sorrowing 
dame 

To welcome noble Marmion came ; 

Her son, a stripling twelve years old, 

Proffered the baron’s rein to hold : 

For each man that could draw a sword 

Had marched that morning with their 
lord, 

Earl Adam Hepburn,—he who died 

On Flodden by his sovereign’s side. 

Long may his lady look in vain! 

She ne'er shall see his gallant train 

Come sweeping back through Crichtoun- 
Dean. 

’T was a brave race before the name 

Of hated Bothwell stained their fame. 


And here two days did Marmion rest, 
With every right that honor claims, 
Attended as the king’s own guest ;-- 
Such the command of Royal James, 
Who marshalled then his land’s array, 
Upon the Borough-moor that lay. 
Perchance he would not foeman’s eye 


134 


BRITISH) ROLTS 





Upon his gathering host should pry, 

Till full prepared was every band 

To march against the English land. 

Here while they dwelt, did Lindesay’s 
wit 

Oft cheer the baron’s moodier fit ; 

And, in his turn, he knew to prize 

Lord Marmion’s powerful mind and 
wise,— 

Trained in the lore of Rome and Greece, 

And policies of war and peace. 


It chanced, as fell the second night, 
That on the battlements they walked, 

And by the slowly fading light 
Of varying topics talked : 

And, unaware, the herald-bard 

Said Marmion might his toil have spared 
In travelling so far, 

For that a messenger from heaven 

In vain to James had counsel given 
Against the English war ; 

And, closer questioned, thus he told 

A tale which chronicles of old 

In Scottish story have enrolled :— 


SIR DAVID LINDESAY’S TALE 


‘‘ Of all the palaces so fair, 
Built for the royal dwelling 

In Scotland, far beyond compare 
Linlithgow is excelling ; 

And in its park, in jovial June, 

How sweet the merry linnet’s tune, 
How blithe the blackbird’s lay ! 

The wild buck bells from ferny brake, 

The coot dives merry on the lake, 

The saddest heart might pleasure take 
To see all nature gay. 

But June is to our sovereign dear 

The heaviest month in all the year ; 

Too well his cause of grief you know, 

June saw his father’s overthrow. 

Woe to the traitors who could bring 

The princely boy against his king ! 

Still in his conscience burns the sting. 

In offices as strict as Lent 

King James’s June is ever spent. 


‘When last this ruthful month was 
come, 
And in Linlithgow’s holy dome 
The king, as wont, was praying ; 
While for his royal father’s soul 
The chanters sung, the bells did toll, 
The bishop mass was saying— 
For now the year brought round again 
The day the luckless king was slain— 
In Catherine’s aisle the monarch knelt, 
With sackcloth shirt and iron belt, 


And eyes withsorrow streaming ; 
Around him in their stalls of state 
The Thistle’s Knight-Companions sate, 
Their banners o’er them beaming. 
I too was there, and, sooth to tell, 
Bedeafened with the jangling knell, 
Was watching where the sunbeams fell, 
Through the stained casement gleam- 
ing ; ; 
But while I marked what next befell 
It seemed as I were dreaming, 
Stepped from the crowd a ghostly wight, 
In azure gown, with cincture white ; 
His forehead bald, his head was bare, 
Down hung at length his yellow hair.— 
Now, mock me not when, good my lord, 
I pledge to you my knightly word 
That when I saw his placid grace, 
His simple majesty of face, 
His solemn bearing, and his pace 
So stately gliding on,— 
Seemed to me ne’er did limner paint 
So just an image of the saint 
Who propped the Virgin in her faint, 
The loved Apostle John ! 


‘* He stepped before the monarch’s chair, 

And stood with rustic plainness there, 
And little reverence made; 

Nor head, nor body, bowed, nor bent, 

But on the desk his arm he leant, 
And words like these he said, 

In a low voice,—but never tone 

So thrilled through vein, and nerve, and 

bone :— 

‘My mother sent me from afar, 

Sir King, to warn thee not to war,— 
Woe waits on thine array ; 

If war thou wilt, of woman fair, 

Her witching wiles and wanton snare, 

James Stuart, doubly warned, beware : 
God keep thee as He may !’— 

The wondering monarch seemed to seek 
For answer, and found none ; 

And when he raised his head to speak, 
The monitor was gone. 

The marshal and myself had cast 

To stop him as he outward passed ; 

But, lighter than the whirlwind’s blast, 
He vanished from our eyes, 

Like sunbeam on the billow cast, 
That glances but, and dies.” 


While Lindesay told his marvel strange 
The twilight was so pale, 

He marked not Marmion’s color change 
While listening to the tale ; 

But, after a suspended pause, 

The baron spoke: ‘‘ Of Nature’s laws 


SCOTT 


So strong I held the force, 
That never superhuman cause 
Could e’er control their course, 
And, three days since, had judged your 
aim 
Was but to make your guest your 
game ; 
But I have seen, since past the Tweed, 
What much has changed my sceptic 
creed, 
And made me credit aught.”—He stayed, 
And seemed to wish his words unsaid, 
But, by that strong emotion pressed 
Which prompts us to unload our breast 
Even when discovery’s pain, 
To Lindesay did at length unfold 
The tale his village host had told, 
At Gifford, to his train. 
Nought of the Palmer says he there. 
And nought of Constance or of Clare; 
The thoughts which broke his sleep he 
seems 
To mention but as feverish dreams. 


‘*In vain,” said he, ‘‘ to rest I spread 
My burning limbs and couched my head ; 
Fantastic thoughts returned, 
And, by their wild dominion led, 
My heart within me burned. 
So sore was the delirious goad, 
I took my steed and forth I rode, 
And, as the moon shone bright and 
cold, 
Soon reached the camp upon the wold. 
The southern entrance I passed through, 
And halted, and my bugle blew. 
Methought an answer met my ear,— 
Yet was the blast so low and drear, 
So hollow, and so faintly blown, 
It might be echo of my own. 


“Thus judging, for a little space 
I listened ere I left the place, 

But scarce could trust my eyes, 
Nor yet can think they serve me true, 
When sudden in the ring I view, 

In form distinct of shape and hue, 
A mounted champion rise.— 
I’ve fought, Lord-Lion, many a day, 
In single fight and mixed affray, 
And ever, I myself may say, 
Have borne me as a knight ; 
But when this unexpected foe 
Seemed starting from the gulf below,— 
I care not though the truth I show,— 
I trembled with affright ; 
And as I placed in rest my spear, 
My hand so shook for very fear, 
I scarce could couch it right. 


130 


‘“ Why need my tongue the issue tell? 
We ran our course,—my charger fell ;— 
What could he ‘gainst the shock of 
hell ? 
I rolled upon the plain. 
High o’er my head with threatening 
hand . 
The spectre shook his naked brand,— 
Yet did the worst remain : 
My dazzled eyes I upward cast,— 
Not opening hell itself could blast 
Their sight like what I saw ! 
Full on his face the moonbeam strook !— 
A face could never be mistook ! 
I knew the stern vindictive look, 
And held my breath for awe. 
I saw the face of one who, fled 
To foreign climes, has long been dead,— 
I well believe the last ; 
For ne’er from visor raised did stare 
A human warrior with a glare 
So grimly and so ghast. 
Thrice o’er my head he shook the blade ; 
But when to good Saint George I prayed, 
—The first time e’er I asked his aid,— 
He plunged it in the sheath, 
And, on his courser mounting light, 
He seemed to vanish from my sight: 
The moonbeam drooped, and deepest 
night 
Sunk down upon the heath.— 
’T were long to tell what cause I have 
To know his face that met me there, 
Called by his hatred from the grave 
To cumber upper air ; 
Dead or alive, good cause had he 
To be my mortal enemy.” 


Marvelled Sir David of the Mount ; 
Then, learned in story, gan recount 
Such chance had happed of old, 
When once, near Norham, there did 
fight 
A spectre fell of fiendish might, 
In likeness of a Scottish knight, 
With Brian Bulmer bold, 
And trained him nigh to disallow 
The aid of his baptismal vow, 
**And such a phantom, too, ’t is said, 
With Highland broadsword, targe, and 
plaid, 
And fingers red with gore, 
Is seen in Rothiemurcus glade, 
Or where the sable pine-trees shade 
Dark Tomantoul, and Auchnaslaid, 
Dromouchty, or Glenmore. 
And yet, what’er such legends say 
Of warlike demon, ghost, or fay, 
On mountain, moor, or plain, 


136 


BRITISH POETS 





Spotless in faith, in bosom bold, 

True son of chivalr y should hold 
These midnight terrors vain ; 

For seldom have such spirits power 

To harm, save in the evil hour 

When euilt we meditate within 

Or harbor unrepented sin.” 

Lord Marmion turned him half aside, 

And twice to clear his voice he tried, 
Then pressed Sir David’s hand,— 

But nought, at length, in answer said ; 

And here their further converse stayed, 
Each ordering that his band 

Should bowne them with the rising day, 

To Scotland’s camp to take their way,— 
Such was the king’s command. 


Early they took Dun-Edin’s road, 

And I could trace each step they trode ; 
Hill, brook, nor dell, nor rock, nor stone, 
Lies on the path to me unknown. 

Much might it boast of storied lore ; 
But, passing such digression 0o’er, 
Suffice it that their route was laid 
Across the furzy hills of Braid. 

They passed the glen and scanty rill, 
And climbed the opposing bank, until 
They gained the top of Blackford Hill, 


Blackford ! on whose uncultured breast, 
Among the broom and thorn and whin, 

A truant-boy, I sought the nest, 

Or listed, as I lay at rest, 
While rose on breezes thin 

The murmur of the city crowd, 

And, from his steeple jangling loud, 
Saint Giles’s mingling din. 

Now, from the summit to the plain, 

Waves all the hill with yellow grain ; 
And o’er the landscape as I look, 

Nought do I see unchanged remain, 
Save the rude cliffs and chiming brook. 

To me they make a heavy moan 

Of early friendships past and gone. 


But different far the change has been, 
Since Marmion from the crown 

Of Blackford saw that martial scene 
Upon the bent so brown : 

Thousand pavilions, white as snow, 

Spread all the Borough-moor below, 
Upland, and dale, and down. 

A thousand did I say? I ween, 


Thousands on thousands there were seen. 


That checkered all the heath between 
The streamlet and the town, 

In crossing ranks extending far, 

Forming a camp irregular ; 

Oft giving way where still there stood 


Some relics of the old oak wood, 

That darkly huge did intervene 

And tamed the glaring white with green : 
In these extended lines there lay 

A martial kingdom’s vast array. 


For from Hebudes, dark with rain, 
To eastern Lodon’s fertile plain, 
And from the southern Redswire edge 
To furthest Rosse’s rocky ledge, 
I’rom west to east, from south to north, 
Scotland sent all her warriors forth. 
Marmion might hear the mingled hum 
Of myriads up the mountain come,— 
The horses’ tramp and tinkling clank, 
Where chiefs reviewed their vassal rank, 
And charger’s shrilling neigh,— 
And see the shifting lines advance, 
While frequent flashed from shield and 
lance 
The sun’s reflected ray. 


Thin curling in the morning air, 

The wreaths of failing smoke declare 

To embers now the brands decayed, 

Where the night-watch their fires had 
made. 

They saw, slow rolling on the plain, 

Full many a baggage-cart and wain, 

And dire artillery’s clumsy car, 

By sluggish oxen tugged to war ; 

And there were Borthwick’s minke 
Seven, 

And culverins which France had given. 

Ill-omened gift! the guns remain 

The conqueror’s spoil on Flodden plain. 


Nor marked they less where in the air 
A thousand streamers flaunted fair ; 
Various in shape, device, and hue, 
Green, sanguine, purple, red, and blue, 
Broad, narrow, swallow-tailed, and 
square, 
Scroll, pennon, pencil, bandrol, there 
O’er the pavilions flew. 
Highest and midmost, was descried 
The royal banner floating wide ; 
The staff, a pine-tree, strong and 
straight, 
Pitched deeply in a massive stone, 
Which still in memory is shown, 
Yet bent beneath the standard’s 
weight, 
Whene’er the western eid unrolled 
With toil the huge and cumbrous 
fold, 
And gave to view the dazzling field, 
Where in proud Scotland’s royal shield 
The ruddy lion ramped in gold, 


SCOTT 


137 





Lord Marmion viewed the landscape 

bright, 

He viewed it with a chief’s delight, 
Until within him burned his heart, 
And lightning from his eye did part, 

As on the battle-day ; 
Such glance did falcon never dart 
When stooping on his prey. 

**Oh! well, Lord-Lion, hast thou said, 

Thy king from warfare to dissuade 
Were but a vain essay ; 

For, by Saint George, were that host 

mine, 

Not power infernal nor divine 

Should once to peace my soul incline, 

Till I had dimmed their armor’s shine 
In glorious battle-fray !” 

Answered the bard, of milder mood : 

‘Fair is the sight,—and yet ’twere 
good 
That kings would think withal, 

When peace and wealth their land has 

blessed, 

’T is better to sit still at rest 
Than rise, perchance to fall. ” 


Still on the spot Lord Marmion stayed, 
For fairer scene he ne’er surveyed. 
When sated with the martial show 
That peopled all the plain below; 

The wandering eye could o’er it go, 
And mark the distant city glow 

With gloomy splendor red ; 

For on the smoke-wreaths, huge and 
slow, 
That round her sable turrets flow, 

The morning beams were shed, 

And tinged them with a lustre proud, 

Like that which streaks a thunder- 
cloud. 

Such dusky grandeur clothed the height 

Where the huge castle holds its state, 

And all the steep slope down, 

Whose ridgy back heaves to the sky, 
Piled deep and massy, close and high. 

Mine own romantic town! 

But northward far, with purer blaze, 
On Ochil mountains fell the rays, 
And as each heathy top they kissed, 
It gleamed a purple amethyst. 
Yonder the shores of Fife you saw, 
Here Preston-Bay and Berwick-law ; 

And, broad between them rolled, 
The gallant Firth the eye might note, 
Whose islands on its bosom float, 

Like emeralds chased in gold. 
Fitz-Eustace’ heart felt closely pent ; 
As if to give his rapture vent, 

The spur he to his charger lent, 


And raised his bridle hand, 
And making demi-volt in air, 
Cried, ‘‘ Where’s the coward that would 
not dare 
To fight for such a land!” 
The Lindesay smiled his joy to see, 
Nor Marmion’s frown repressed his glee. 


Thus while they looked, a flourish proud, 
Where mingled trump, and clarion loud, 
And fife, and kettle-drum, 
And sackbut deep, and psaltery, 
And war-pipe with discordant cry, 
And cymbal clattering to the sky, 
Making wild music bold and high, 
Did up the mountain come ; 
The whilst the bells with distant chime 
Merrily tolled the hour of prime, 
And thus the Lindesay spoke : 
‘* Thus clamor still the war-notes when 
The king to mass his way has ta’en, 
Or to Saint Catherine’s of Sienne, 
Or Chapel of Saint Rocque. 
To you they speak of martial fame, 
But me remind of peaceful game, 
When blither was their cheer, 
Thrilling in Falkland-woods the air, 
In signal none his steed should spare. 
But strive _ ‘which foremost might 
repa 
To the HOOT of the deer. 


‘** Nor less,” he said, ‘‘ when looking forth 

I view yon Empress of the North 
Sit on her hilly throne, 

Her palace’s imperial bowers, 

Her castle, proof to hostile powers, 

Her stately halls and holy towers— 

Nor less,” he said, ‘‘ Il moan 

To think what woe mischance 
bring, 

And how these merry bells may ring 

The death-dirge of our gallant king, 

Or with their larum call 
The burghers forth to watch and ward, 
’Gainst Southern sack and fires to 

guard 

Dun-Fdin’s leaguered wall.— 

But not for my presaging thought, 
Dream conquest sure or cheaply bought ! 
Lord Marmion, I say nay : 
God is the guider of the field, 
He breaks the champion’s spear 
shield ; 

But thou thyself shalt say, 
When joins yon host in deadly stowre, 
That England’s dames must weep in 

bower, 

Her monks the death-mass sing ; 


may 


and 


138 


For never saw’st thou such a power 
Led on by such a king.” 

And now, down winding to the plain, 

The barriers of the camp they gain, 
And there they made a stay ,— 

There stays the Minstrel till he fling 

His hand o’er every Border string, 

And fit his harp the pomp to sing 

Of Scotland’s ancient court and king, 
In the succeeding lay. 


CANTO FIFTH 


THE COURT 


THE train has left the hills of Braid ; 
The barrier guard have open made— 
So Lindesay bade—the palisade 
That closed the tented ground ; 
Their men the warders backward drew, 
And carried pikes as they rode through 
Into its ample bound. 
Fast ran the Scottish warriors there, 
Upon the Sovthern band to stare, 
And envy with their wonder rose, 
To see such well-appointed foes ; 
Such length of shafts, such mighty 
bows, 
So huge, that many simply thought 
But for a vaunt such weapons wrought, 
And little deemed their force to feel 
Through links of mail and plates of steel 
When, rattling upon Flodden vale, 
The cloth-yard arrows flew like hail. 


Nor less did Marmion’s skilful view 

Glance every line and squadron through, 

And much he marvelled one small land 

Could marshal forth such various band ; 
For men-at-arms were here, 

Heavily sheathed in mail and plate, 

Like iron towers for strength and weight 

On Flemish steeds of bone and height, 
With battle-axe and spear. 

Young knights and squires, a lighter 

train, 

Practised their charges on the plain, 

By aid of leg, of hand, and rein, 
Kach warlike feat to show, 

To pass, to wheel, the croupe to gain, 

And high curvet, that not in vain 

The sword-sway might descend amain 
On foeman’s casque below 

He saw the hardy burghers there 

March armed on foot with faces bare, 
For visor they wore none, 

Nor waving plume, nor crest of knight ; 

But burnished were their corselets 

bright, 


Their brigantines and gorgets light 





BRITISH POETS 


Like very silver shone. 

Long pikes they had for standing fight, 
Two-handed swords they wore, 

And many wielded mace of weight, . 
And bucklers bright they bore. 


On foot the yeoman too, but dressed 
In his steel-jack, a swarthy vest, 
With iron quilted well ; 
Each at his back—a slender store— 
His forty days’ provision bore, 
As feudal statutes tell. 
His arms were halbert, axe, or spear, 
A crossbow there, a hagbut here, 
A dagger-knife, and brand. 
Sober he seemed and sad of cheer, 
As loath to leave his cottage dear 
And march to foreign strand, 
Or musing who would guide his steer 
To till the fallow land. 
Yet deem not in his thoughtful eye 
Did aught of dastard terror lie ; 
More dreadful far his ire 
Than theirs who, scorning danger’s hame 
In eager mood to battle came, 
Their valor like light straw on flame, 
A fierce but fading fire. 


Not so the Borderer :—bred to war, 
He knew the battle’s din afar, 
And joyed to hear it swell. 
His peaceful day was slothful ease ; 
Nor harp nor pipe his ear could please 
Like the loud slogan yell. 
On active steed, with lance and blade, 
The light-armed pricker plied his trade,— 
Let nobles fight for fame ; 
Let vassals follow where they lead, 
Burghers, to guard their townships, 
bleed, 
But war’s the Borderers’ game. 
Their gain, their glory, their delight, 
To sleep the day, maraud the night, ° 
O’er mountain, moss and moor ; 
Joyful to fight they took their way, 
Scarce caring who might ‘win the day, 
Their booty was secure. 
These, as Lord Marmion’s train passed 


Looragnt at first with careless eye, 

Nor marvelled aught, well taught to 
know 

The form and force of English bow. 

But when they saw the lord arrayed 

In splendid arms and rich brocade, 

Each Borderer to his kinsman said,— 

‘* Hist, Ringan ! seest thou there ! 

Canst guess which road they'll homeward 

ride? 


SCOTT 


~oo 





Oh! could we but on Border side, 

By Eusedale glen, or Liddell’s tide, 
Beset a prize so fair! 

That fangless Lion, too, their guide, 

Might chance to lose his glistering hide; 

Brown Maudlin of that doublet pied 
Could make a kirtle rare.” 


Next, Marmion marked the Celtic race, 
Of different language, form, and face, 
A various race of man ; 
_ Just then the chiefs their tribes arrayed, 
And wild and garish semblance made 
The checkered trews and belted plaid, 
And varying notes the war-pipes brayed 
To every varying clan. 
Wild through their red or sable hair 
Looked out their eyes with savage stare 
On Marmion as he passed ; 
Their legs above the knee were bare ; 
Their frame was sinewy, short, and 
spare, 
And hardened to the blast ; 
Of taller race, the chiefs they own 
Were by the eagle’s plumage known. 
The hunted red-deer’s undressed hide 
Their hairy buskins well supplied ; 
The graceful bonnet decked their head ; 
Back from their shoulders hung the 
plaid ; 
A broadsword of unwieldy length, 
A dagger proved for edge and strength, 
A studded targe they wore, 
And ens bows, and shafts,—but, 
oh! 
Short was the shaft and weak the bow 
To that which England bore. 
The Isles-men carried at their backs 
The ancient Danish battle-axe. 
They raised a wild and wondering cry, 
As with his guide rode Marmion by, 
Loud were their clamoring tongues, as 
when 
The clanging sea-fowl] leave the fen 
And, with their cries discordant mixed, 
Grumbled and yelled the pipes betwixt. 


Thus through the Scottish camp they 
passed, 

And reached the city gate at last, 

Where all around, a wakeful guard, 

Armed burghers kept their watch and 
ward. 

Well had they cause of jealous fear, 

When lay encamped in field so near 

The Borderer and the Mountaineer. 

As through the bustling streets they go, 

All was alive with martial show ; 

At every turn with dinning clang 


The armorer’s anvil clashed and rang, 
Or toiled the swarthy smith to wheel 
The bar that arms the charger’s heel, 
Or axe or falchion to the side 

Of jarring grindstone was applied, 
Page, groom, and squire, with hurrying 


pace, 
Through street and lane and market- 
place, 
Bore lance or casque or sword ; 
While burghers, with important face, 
Described each new-come lord, 
Discussed his lineage, told his name, 
His following, and his warlike fame. 
The Lion led to lodging meet, 
Which high o’erlooked the crowded 
street ; 
There must the baron rest 
Til past the hour of vesper tide, 
And then to Holy-Rood must ride,— 
Such was the king’s behest. 
Meanwhile the Lion’s care assigns 
A banquet rich and costly wines 
To Marmion and his train ; 
And when the appointed hour succeeds, 
The baron dons his peaceful weeds, 
And following Lindesay as he leads. 
The palace halls they gain. 


Old Holy-Rood rung merrily 

That night with wassail, mirth, and 
glee: 

King James within her princely bower 

Feasted the chiefs of Scotland’s power, 

Summoned to spend the parting hour ; 

For he had charged that his array 

Should southward march by break of 


day. 
Well loved that splendid monarch aye 
The banquet and the song, 
By day the tourney, and by night 
The merry dance, traced fast and light, 
The maskers quaint, the pageant bright, 
The revel loud and long. 
This feast outshone his banquets past ; 
It was his blithest—and his last. 
The dazzling lamps from gallery gay 
Cast on the court a dancing ray ; 
Here to the harp did minstrels sing, 
There ladies touched a softer string ; 
With long-eared cap and motley vest, 
The licensed fool retailed his jest ; 
His magic tricks the juggler plied ; 
At dice and draughts the gallants vied ; 
While some, in close recess apart, 
Courted the ladies of their heart, 
Nor courted them in vain ; 
For often in the parting hour 
Victorious Love asserts his power 


140 


O’er coldness and disdain ; 

And flinty is her heart can view 

To battle march a lover true—— 

Can hear, perchance, his last adieu, 
Nor own her share of pain. 


Through this mixed crowd of glee and 
game 
The king to great Lord Marmion came, 
While, reverent, all made room. 
An easy task it was, I trow, 
King James’s manly form to know, 
Although, his courtesy to show, 
He doffed to Marmion bending low 
His broidered cap and plume. 
For royal were his garb and mien : 
His cloak of crimson velvet piled, 
Trimmed with the fur of marten wild, 
His vest of changeful satin sheen, 
The dazzled eye beguiled ; 
His gorgeous collar hung adown, 
Wrought with the badge of Scotland’s 
crown, 
The thistle brave of old renown ; 
His trusty blade, Toledo right, 
Descended from a baldric bright ; 
White were his buskins, on the heel 
His spurs inlaid of gold and steel ; 
His bonnet, all of crimson fair, 
Was buttoned with a ruby rare: 
And Marmion deemed he ne’er had seen 
A prince of such a noble mien. 


The monarch’s form was middle size, 

For feat of strength or exercise 
Shaped in proportion fair ; 

And hazel was his eagle eye, 

And auburn of the darkest dye 

His short curled beard and hair. 

Light was his footstep in the dance, 

And firm his stirrup in the lists ; 
And, oh! he had that merry glance 

That seldom lady’s heart resists. 
Lightly from fair to fair he flew, 

And loved to plead, lament and sue,— 
Suit lightly won and short-lived pain, 
For monarchs seldom sigh in vain. 

I said he joyed in banquet bower ; 
But, mid his mirth, ’t was often strange 
How suddenly his cheer would change, 

His look o’ercast and lower, 

If in a sudden turn he felt 

The pressure of his iron belt, 

That bound his breast in penance pain, 
In memory of his father slain. 

Even so ’t was strange how evermore, 
Soon as the passing pang was o’er, 
Forward he rushed with double glee 
Into the stream of revelry. 


BRITISH POETS 


Thus dim-seen object of affright 
Startles the courser in his flight, 

And half he halts, half springs aside, 
But feels the quickening spur applied, 
And, straining on the tightened rein, 
Scours doubly swift o'er hill and plain. 


O’er James’s heart, the courtiers say, 
Sir Hugh the Heron’s wife held sway ; 
To Scotland’s court she came, 
To be a hostage for her lord, 
Who Cessford’s gallant heart had gored, 
And with the king to make accord 
Had sent his lovely dame. 
Nor to that lady free alone 
Did the gay king allegiance own ; 
For the fair Queen of France 
Sent him a turquoise ring and glove, 
And charged him, as her knight and love, 
For her to break a lance, 
And strike three strokes with Scottish 
brand, 
And march three miles on Southron land 
And bid the banners of his band 
In English breezes dance. 
And thus for France’s queen he drest 
His manly limbs in mailed vest, 
And thus admitted English fair 
His inmost councils still to share, 
And thus for both he madly planned 
The ruin of himself and land ! 
And yet, the sooth to tell, 
Nor England’s fair nor France’s queen 
Were worth one pearl-drop, bright and 
sheen, 
From Margaret’s eyes that fell,— 
His own Queen Margaret, who in Lith- 
gow’s bower 
All lonely sat and wept the weary hour. 


The queen sits lone in Lithgow pile, 
And weeps the weary day 
The war against her native soil, 
Her monarch’s risk in battle broil,— 
And in gay Holy-Rood the while 
Dame Heron rises with a smile ’ 
Upon the harp to play. 
Fair was her rounded arm, as o’er 
The strings her fingers flew ; 
And as she touched and tuned them all, 
Ever her bosom’s rise and fall 
Was plainer given to view ; 
For, all for heat, was laid aside 
Her wimple, and her hood untied. 
And first she pitched her voice to sing, 
Then glanced her dark eye on the king, 
And then around the silent ring, 
And laughed, and blushed, and oft did 
say 


SCOTT 


141 





Her pretty oath, by yea and nay, 

She could not, would not, durst not play ! 
At length, en the harp, with glee, 

Mingled with arch simplicity, 

A soft yet lively air she rung, 

While thus the wily lady sung :— 


LOCHINVAR 


LADY HERON’S SONG 


Oh! young Lochinvar is come out of the 
west, 

Through all the wide Border his steed 
was the best; 

And save his good broadsword he 
weapons had none. 

He rode all unarmed and he rode all 
alone. 

So faithful in love and so dauntless in 
war, 

There never was knight like the young 
Lochinvar. 


He stayed not for brake and he stopped 
not for stone, 

Heswam the Eske river where ford there 
was none, 

But ere he alighted at Netherby gate 

The bride had consented, the gallant 
came late : 

For a laggard in love and a dastard in 
war 

Was to wed the fair Ellen of brave Loch- 
invar. 


So boldly he entered the Netherby Hall, 

Among bridesmen, and kinsmen, and 
brothers, and all: 

Then spoke the bride’s father, his hand 
on his sword,— 

For the poor craven bridegroom said 
never a word,— 

‘Oh! come ye in peace here, or come ye 
in war, 

Or to dance at our bridal, young Lord 
Lochinvar ? ’— 


‘I long wooed your daughter, my suit 
you denied ; 

Love swells like the 
like its tide— — 

And now am I come, with this lost love 
of mine, 

To Jead but one measure, drink one cup 
of wine. 

There are maidens in 
lovely by far, 

That would gladly be bride to the young 
Lochinvar.’ 


Solway, but ebbs 


Scotland more 





The bride kissed the goblet ; the knight 
took it up, 

He quaffed off the wine, and he threw 
down the cup. 

She looked down to blush, and she looked 
up to sigh, 

With a smile on her lips and a tear in 
her eye. 

He took her soft hand ere her mother 
could bar,— 

‘Now tread we a measure!’ said young 
Lochinvar. 


So stately his form, and so lovely her 
face, 

That never a hall such a galliard did 
grace ; 

While her mother did fret, and her 
father did fume, 

And the bridegroom stood dangling his 

bonnet and plume ; 

the  bride-maidens 

‘*T were better by far 

To have matched our fair cousin with 
young Lochinvar.’ 


And whispered 


One touch to her hand and one word in 
her ear, 

When they reached the hall-door, and 
the charger stood near ; 

So light to the croupe the fair lady he 
swung, 

So light to the saddle before her he 
sprung ! 

‘She is won! we are gone, over bank, 
bush, and scaur ; 

They'll have fleet steeds that follow,’ 
quoth young Lochinvar. 


There was mounting ’mong Greemes of 
the Netherby clan ; 

Forsters, Fenwicks, and Musgraves, they 
rode and they ran: 

There was racing and chasing on Can- 
nobie Lee, 

But the lost bride of Netherby ne’er did 
they see. 

So daring in love 
war, 

Have ye e’er heard of gallant like young 
Lochinvar ? 


and so dauntless in 


The monarch o’er the siren bung, 

And beat the measure as she sung ; 
And, pressing closer and more near, 

He whispered praises in her ear. 

In loud applause the courtiers vied, 
And ladies winked and spoke aside. 

The witching dame to Marmion 
threw 


142 


A glance, where seemed to reign 
The pride that claims applauses due, 
And of her royal conquest too 

A real or feigned disdain : 

Familiar was the look, and told 

Marmion and she were friends of old. 

The king observed their meeting eyes 

With something like displeased sur- 
prise ; 

For monarchs ill can rivals brook, 

Even in a word, or smile, or look. 

Straight took he forth the parchment 
broad 

Which Marmion’s 
showed : 

‘‘Our Borders sacked by many a raid, 

Our peaceful liege-men robbed,” he said, 

**On day of truce our warden slain, 

Stout Barton killed, his vessels ta’en—- 

Unworthy were we here to reign, 

Should these for vengeance cry in vain; 

Our full defiance, hate, and scorn, 

Our herald has to Henry borne.” 


high commission 


He paused, and led where Douglas stood 
And with stern eye the pageant viewed ; 
I mean that Douglas, sixth of yore, 
Who coronet of Angus bore, 

And, when his blood and heart were 

high, 

Did the third James in camp defy, 

And all his minions led to die 
On Lauder’s dreary flat. 

Princess and favorites long grew tame, 

And trembled at the homely name 
Of Archibald Bell-the-Cat ; 

The same who left the dusky vale 

Of Hermitage in Liddisdale, 

Its dungeons and its towers, 

Where Bothwell’s turrets brave the air, 

And Bothwell bank is blooming fair, 
To fix his princely bowers. 

Though now in age he had laid down 

His armor for the peaceful gown, 

And for a staff his brand, 

Yet often would flash forth the fire 

That could in ¥ outh a monarch’s ire 
And minion’s pride withstand ; 

And even that day at council board, 
Unapt to soothe his sovereign’s mood, 
Against the war had Angus stood, 

And chafed his royal lord. 

His giant-form, like ruined tower, 
Though fallen its muscles’ brawny vaunt, 
Huge-boned, and tall, and grim, and 

aunt, 

Seemed o’er the gaudy scene to lower ; 
His locks and beard in silver grew, 

His eyebrows kept their sable hue, 


BRITISH’ POETS 


Near Douglas when the monarch stood, 
His bitter speech he thus pursued : 

‘‘ Lord Marmion, since these letters say 
That in the North you needs must stay 

While slightest hopes of peace remain. 
Uncourteous speech it were and stern 
To say—Return to Lindisfarne, 

Until my herald come again. 

Then rest you in Tantallon hold ; 

Your host shall be the Douglas bold,— 
A chief unlike his sires of old. 

He wears their motto on his blade, 
Their blazon o’er his towers display ed, 
Yet loves his sovereign to oppose 

More than to face his country’s foes. 

And, i bethink me, by Saint Stephen, 

But e’en this morn to me was given 
A prize, the first fruits of the war, 
Ta’en by a galley from Dunbar, 

A bevy of the maids of heaven. 
Under your guard these holy maids 
Shall safe return to cloister shades, 
And, while they at Tantallon stay, 
Requiem for Cochran’s soul may say.” 
And with the slaughtered favorite’s 

name 
Across the monarch’s brow there came 
A cloud of ire, remorse, and shame. 


In answer nought could Angus speak, 
His proud heart swelled well-nigh to 
break ; 
He turned aside, and down his cheek 
A burning tear there stole. 
His hand the monarch sudden took, 
That sight his kind heart could not 
brook : 
‘* Now, by the Bruce’s soul, 
Angus, my hasty speech forgive ! 
lor sure as doth his spirit live, 
As he said of the Douglas old, 
I well may say of you,—- 
That never king did subject hold, 
In speech more free, in war more bold, 
More tender and more true ; 
Forgive me, Douglas, once again.”— 
And, while the king his hand did strain, 
The old man’s tears fell down like rain, 
To seize the moment Marmion tried, 
And whispered to the king aside : 
‘**Oh! let such tears unwonted plead 
For respite short from dubious deed ! 
A child will weep a bramble’s smart, 
A maid to see her sparrow part, 
A stripling for a woman’s heart ; 
But woe awaits a country when 
She sees the tears of bearded men. 
Then, oh ! what omen, dark and high, 
When Douglas wets his manly eye!” 


SCOTT 


Displeased was James that stranger 
viewed 


And tampered with his changing mood.. 


‘‘ Laugh those that can, weep those that 
may,” 

Thus did the fiery monarch say, 

‘‘Southward I march by break of day ; 

And if within Tantallon strong 

The good Lord Marmion tarries long, 

Perchance our ineeting next may fall 

At Tamworth in his castle-hall.”— 

The haughty Marmion felt the taunt, 

And answered grave the royal vaunt : 

‘*Much honored were my humble home, 

If in its halls King James should come ; 

But Nottingham has archers good, 

And Yorkshire men are stern of mood, 

Northumbrian prickers wild and rude. 

On Derby Hills the paths are steep, 

In Ouse and Tyne the fords are deep ; 

And many a banner will be torn, 

And many a knight to earth be borne, 

And many a sheaf of arrows spent, 

Ere Scotland’s king shall cross the Trent : 

Yet pause, brave prince, while yet you 
may !”— 

The monarch lightly turned away, 

And to his nobles loud did eall, 

‘* Lords, to the dance,—a hall! a hall!” 

Himself his cloak and sword flung by, 

And led Dame Heron gallantly : 

And minstrels, at the royal order, 

Rung out ‘ Blue Bonnets o’er the Border.’ 


Leave we these revels now to tell 

What to Saint Hilda’s maids befell, 

Whose galley. as they sailed again 

To Whitby, by a Scot was ta’en. 

Now at Dun-Edin did they bide 

Till James should of their fate decide, 
And soon by his command 

Were gently summoned to prepare 

To journey under Marmion’s care, 

As escort honored, safe, and fair, 
Again to English land. 

The abbess told her chaplet o’er, 

Nor knew which Saint she should 

implore ; 

For, when she thought of Constance, sore 
She feared Lord Marmion’s mood. 

And judge what Clara must have felt ! 

The sword that hung in Marmion’s belt 
Had drunk De Wilton’s blood. 

Unwittingly King James had given, 
As guard to Whitby’s shades, 

The man most dreaded under heaven 
By these defenceless maids ; 

Yet what petition could avail, 

Or who would listen to the tale 


143 


Of woman, prisoner, and nun, 

Mid bustle of a war begun? 

They deemed it hopeless to avoid 
The convoy of their dangerous guide. 


Their lodging, so the king assigned, 

To Marmion’s as their guardian, joined ; 

And thus it fell that, passing nigh, 

The Palmer caught the abbess’ eye, 
Who warned him by a scroll 

She had a secret to reveal 

That much concerned the Church’s weal 
And health of sinner’s soul ; 

And, with deep charge of secrecy, 
She named a place to meet 

Within an open balcony. 

That hung from dizzy pitch and high 
Above the stately street, 

To which, as common to each home, 

At night they might in secret come. 


At night in secret there they came, 
The Palmer and the holy dame. 
The moon among the clouds rode high, 
And all the city hum was by. 
Upon the street, where late before 
Did din of war and warriors roar, 

You might have heard a pebble fall, 
A beetle hum, a cricket sing, 
An owlet flap his boding wing 

On Giles’s steeple tall. 


‘| The antique buildings, climbing high, 


Whose Gothic frontlets sought the sky, 
Were here wrapt deep in shade ; 


There on their brows the moonbeam 
broke 

Through the faint wreaths of silvery 
smoke, 


And on the casements played. 

And other light was none to see, 
Save torches gliding far, 

Before some chieftain of degree 

Who left the royal revelry 
To bowne him for the war.— 

A solemn scene the abbess chose, 

‘A solemn hour, her secret to disclose. 


‘‘O holy Palmer !” she began,— 

‘‘For sure he must be sainted man, 
Whose blessed feet have trod the ground 
Where the Redeemer’s tomb is found,—— 
For his dear Church’s sake, my tale 
Attend, nor deem of light avail, 
Though I must speak of worldly love,— 
How vain to those who wed above !— 
De Wilton and Lord Marmion wooed 
Clara de Clare, of Gloster’s blood ;— 
Idle it were of Whitby’s dame 

To say of that same blood I came ;— 


144 


BRITISH POETS 





And once, when jealous rage was high, 

Lord Marmion said despiteously, 

Wilton was traitor in his heart, 

And had made league with “Martin 
Swart 

When he came here on Simnel’s part, 

And only cowardice did restrain 

His rebel aid on Stokefield’s plain,— 

And down he threw his glove. The 
thing 

Was tried, as wont, before the king; 

Where frankly did De Wilton own 

That Swart in Guelders he had known, 

And that between them then there 
went 

Some scroll of courteous compliment. 

For this he to his castle sent ; 

But when his messenger returned, 

Judge how De Wilton’s fury burned ! 

For in his packet there were laid 

Letters that claimed disloyal aid 

And proved King Henry’s cause be- 
trayed. 

His fame, thus blighted, in the field 

He strove to clear by spear 
shield ;— 

To clear his fame in vain he strove, 

For wondrous are His ways above! 

Perchance some form was unobserved, 

Perchance in prayer or faith he 
swerved, 

Else how could guiltless champion quail, 

Or how the blessed ordeal fail? 


and 


‘‘ His squire, who now De Wilton saw 
As recreant doomed to suffer law, 

Repentant, owned in vain 
That while he had the‘scrolls in care 
A stranger maiden, passing fair, 

Had drenched him with a beverage 
rare ; 

His words no faith could gain. 
With Clare alone he credence won, 
Who, rather than wed Marmion, 

Did to Saint Hilda’s shrine repair, 

To give our house her livings fair 
And die a vestal votaress there. 

The impulse from the earth was given, 
But bent her to the paths of heaven. 
A purer heart, a lovelier maid, 

Ne’er sheltered her in Whitby’s shade, 
No, not since Saxon Edelfled ; 

Only one trace of earthly stain, 

That for her lover’s loss 
She cherishes a sorrow vain, 

And murmurs at the cross.— 

And then her heritage : —-it goes 

Along the banks of Tame; 

Deep fields of grain the reaper mows, 


In meadows rich the heifer lows, 
The falconer and huntsman knows 
Its woodlands for the game. 
Shame were it to Saint Hilda dear,’ 
And I, her humble votaress here, 
Should do a deadly sin, 
Tier temple spoiled before mine eyes, 
If this false Marmion such a prize 
By my consent should win ; 
Yet hath our boisterous monarch sworn 
That Clare shall from our house be torn, 
And grievous cause have I to fear 
Such mandate doth Lord Marmion bear. 


‘* Now, prisoner, helpless, and betrayed 
To evil power, I claim thine aid, _ 
By every step that thou hast trod | 
To holy shrine and grotto dim, 
By every martyr’s tortured limb, 
By angel, saint, and seraphim, © 
And by the Church of God ! 
For mark: when Wilton was betrayed, 
And with his squire forged letters laid, 
She was, alas! that sinful maid © 
By whom the deed was done,— 
Oh! shame and horror to be said ! 
She was—a perjured nun ! 
No clerk in all the land like her 
Traced quaint and varying character. 
Perchance you may a marvel deem, 
That Marmion’s paramour 
For such vile thing she was—-should 
scheme 
Her lover’s nuptial hour ; 
But o’er him thus she hoped to gain, 
As privy to his honor’s stain, 
Illimitable power. 
For this she secretly retained 
Each proof that might the plot reveal, 
Instructions with his hand and seal ; 
And thus Saint Hilda deigned, 
Through sinners’ perfidy impure, 
Her house’s glory to secure 
And Clare’s immortal weal. 





‘© °T were long and needless here to tell 

How to my hand these papers fell ; 
With me they must not stay. 

Saint Hilda keep her abbess true ! 

Who knows what outrage he might do 
While journeying by the way ?— 

O blessed Saint, if e’er again 

I venturous leave thy calm domain, 

To travel or by land or main, 
Deep penance may I pay !— 

Now, saintly Palmer, mark my prayer: 

I give this packet to thy care, 

For thee to stop they will not dare ; 
And oh! with cautious speed 


Sear 


To Wolsey’s hand the papers bring, 
That he may show them to the king: 
And for thy well-earned meed, 
Thou holy man, at Whitby’s shrine 
A weekly mass shall still be thine 
While priest can sing and read.— 
What ail’st thou?—Speak ! ”—For as he 
took 
The charge a strong emotion shook 
His frame, and ere reply 
They heard a faint yet shrilly tone, 
Like distant clarion feebly blown, 
That on the breeze did die ; 
And loud the abbess shrieked in fear, 
‘Saint Withold, save us !—What is here ; 
Look at yon City Cross! 
See on its battled tower appear 
Phantoms, that scutcheons seem to rear 
And blazoned banners toss !”’— 


Dun-Edin’s Cross, a pillared stone, 

Rose on a turret octagon ;— 

But now is razed that monument, 
Whence royal edict rang, 

And voice of Scotland’s law was sent 
In glorious trumpet-clang. 

Oh! be his tomb as lead to lead 

Upon its dull destroyers head !— 

A minstrel’s malison is said.— 

Then on its battlements they saw 

A vision, passing Nature’s law, 
Strange, wild, and dimly seen ; 

Figures that seemed to rise and die, 

Gibber and sign, advance and fly, 

While nought confirmed could ear or eye 
Discern of sound or mien. 

Yet darkly did it seem as there 

Heralds and pursuivants prepare, 

With trumpet sound and blazon fair, 
A summons to proclaim ; 

But indistinct the pageant proud, 

As fancy forms of midnight cloud 

When flings the moon upon her shroud 
A wavering tinge of flame ; 

It flits, expands, and shifts, till loud, 

From midmost of the spectre crowd, 
This awful summons came :— 


‘** Prince, prelate, potentate, and peer, 
Whose names I now shall call, 
Scottish or foreigner, give ear! 
Subjects of him who sent me here, 
At his tribunal to appear 
I summon one and all: 
I cite you by each deadly sin 
That e’er hath soiled your hearts within ; 
I cite you by each brutal lust 
That e’er defiled your earthly dust,— 
By wrath, by pride, by fear, 
Io 


145 


By each o’ermastering passion’s tone, 
By the dark grave and dying groan ! 
When forty days are passed and gone, 
I cite you, at your monarch’s throne 

To answer and appear.”— 

Then thundered forth aroll of names :— 
The first was thine, unhappy James ! 

Then all thy nobles came ; 

Crawford, Glencairn, Montrose, Argyle, 
Ross, Bothwell, Forbes, Lennox, Lyle,— 
Why should I tell their separate style ? 

Each chief of birth and fame, 

Of Lowland, Highland, Border, Isle. 

Foredoomed to Flodden’s carnage pile, 
Was cited there by name: 

And Marmion, Lord of Fontenaye, 

Of Lutterward, and Scrivelbaye ; 

De Wilton, erst of Aberley, 

The self-same thundering 

say.— 

But then another spoke: 
**Thy fatal summons I deny 
And thine infernal lord defy, 
Appealing me to Him on high, 

Who burst the sinner’s yoke.” 

At that dread accent, with a scream, 
Parted the pageant like a dream, 

The summoner was gone, 

Prone on her face the abbess fell, 
And fast, and fast, her beads did tell ; 
Her nuns came, startled by the yell, 

And found her there alone. 

She marked not, at the scene aghast, 
What time or how the Palmer passed. 


voice did 


Shift we the scene.—The camp doth 
move ; 
Dun-Edin’s streets are empty now, 
Save when, for weal of those they love, 
To pray the prayer and vow the vow, 
The tottering child, the anxious fair, 
The gray-haired sire, with pious care, 
To chapels and to shrines repair.— 
Where is the Palmer now? and where 
The abbess, Marmion, and Clare ?— 
Bold Douglas! to Tantallon fair 
They journey in thy charge: 
Lord Marmion rode on his right hand, 
The Palmer still was with the band : 
Angus, like Lindesay, did command 
That none should roam at large. 
But in that Palmer’s altered mien 
A wondrous change might now be seen ; 
Freely he spoke of war, 
Of marvels wrought by single hand 
When lifted for a native land, 
And still looked high, as if he planned 
Some desperate deed afar. 
His courser would he feed and stroke, 


146 


And, tucking up his sable frock, 
Would first his mettle bold provoke, 
Then soothe or quell his pride. 
Old Hubert said that never one 
He saw, except Lord Marmion, 
A steed so fairly ride. 


Some half-hour’s march behind there 
came, 
By Eustace governed fair 
A troop escorting Hilda’s dame, 
With all her nuns and Clare. 
No audience had Lord Marmion sought ; 
Ever he feared to aggravate 
Clara de Clare’s suspicious hate ; 
And safer ’t was, he thought, 
To wait till, from the nuns removed, 
The influence of kinsmen loved, 
And suit by Henry’s self approved, 
Her slow consent had wrought. 
His was no flickering flame, that dies 
Unless when fanned by looks and sighs 
And lighted oft at lady’s eyes ; 
He longed to stretch his wide command 
O’er luckless Clara’s ample land : 
Besides, when Wilton with him vied, 
Although the pang of humbled pride 
The place of jealousy supplied, 
Yet conquest, by that meanness won 
He almost loathed to think upon, 
Led him, at times, to hate the cause 
Which made him burst through honor’s 
laws. 
If e’er he loved, ’twas her alone 
Who died within that vault of stone. 


And now, when close at hand they saw 
North Berwick’s town and lofty Law, 
Fitz-Eustace bade them pause awhile 
Before a venerable pile 
Whose turrets viewed afar 
The lofty Bass, the Lambie Isle, 
The ocean’s peace or war. 
At tolling of a bell, forth came 
The convent’s venerable dame, 
And prayed Saint Hilda’s abbess rest 
With her, a loved and honored guest, 
Till Douglas should a bark prepare 
To waft her back to Whitby fair. 
Glad was the abbess, you may guess, 
And thanked the Scottish prioress ; 
And tedious were to tell, I ween, 
The courteous speech that passed be- 
tween. 
O’erjoyed 
leave ; 
But when fair Clara did intend, 
Like them, from horseback to descend, 
Fitz-Eustace said: ‘I grieve, 


the nuns their palfreys 


BRITISH POETS 





Fair lady, grieve e’en from my heart, 

Such gentle company to part ;— 
Think not discourtesy, 

But lords’ commands must be obeyed, 

And Marmion and the Douglas said 
That you must wend with me. 

Lord Marmion hath a letter broad, 

Which to the Scottish earl he showed, 

Commanding that beneath his care 

Without delay you shall repair 

To your good kinsman, Lord Fitz-Clare.” 


The startled abbess loud exclaimed ; 
But she at whom the blow was aimed 
Grew pale as death and cold as lead,— 
She deemed she heard her death-doom 
read. 
‘*Cheer thee, my child !” the abbess said, 
‘They dare not tear thee from my hand, 
To ride alone with armed band.’ 
‘*Nay, holy mother, nay,” 
Fitz Eustace said, ‘‘ the lovely Clare 
Will be in Lady Angus’ care, 
In Scotland while we stay ; 
And when we move an easy ride 
Will bring us to the English side, 
Female attendance to provide 
Befitting Gloster’s heir ; 
Nor thinks nor dreams my noble lord, 
By slightest look, or act, or word, 
To harass Lady Clare. 
Her faithful guardian he will be, 
Nor sue for shghtest courtesy 
That e’en to stranger falls, 
Till he shall place her safe and free 
Within her kinsman’s halls.” 
He spoke, and blushed with earnest 
grace ; 
His faith was painted on his face, 
And Clare’s worst fear relieved, 
The Lady Abbess loud exclaimed 
On Henry, and the Douglas blamed, 
Entreated, threatened, grieved, 
To martyr, saint, and prophet prayed, 
Against Lord Marmion inveighed, 
And called the prioress to aid, 
To curse with candle, bell, and book. 
Her head the grave Cistertian shook : 
‘The Douglas and the king,” she said, 
‘‘ Tn their commands will be obeyed ; 
Grieve not, nor dream that harm can 
fall 
The maiden in Tantallon Hall.” 


The abbess, seeing strife was vain, 
Assumed her wonted state again,— 

For much of state she had,— 
Composed her veil, and raised her head, 
And ‘* Bid,” in solemn voice she said, 


SCOTT 


‘Thy master, bold and bad, 
The records of his house turn o’er, 
And, when he shall there written see 
That one of his own ancestry 
Drove the monks forth of Coventry, 
Bid him his fate explore ! 
Prancing in pride of earthly trust, 
His charger hurled him to the dust, 
And, by a base plebeian thrust, 
He died his band before. 
God judge ’twixt Marmion and me: 
He is a chief of high degree, 
And I a poor recluse, 
Yet oft in holy writ we see 
Even such weak minister as me 
May the oppressor bruise ; 
For thus, inspired, did Judith slay 
The mighty in his sin, 
And Jael thus, and Deborah ”— 
Here hasty Blount broke in : 
** Fitz-Eustace, we must march our band ; 
Saint Anton fire thee! wilt thou stand 
All day, with bonnet in thy hand, 
To hear the lady preach ? 
By this good light ! if thus we stay, 
Lord Marmion for our fond delay 
Will sharper sermon teach. 
Come, don thy cap and mount thy horse ; 
The dame must patience take perforce.” 
‘<Submit we then to force,” said Clare, 
** But let this barbarous lord despair 
His purposed aim to win ; 
Let him take living, land, and life, 
But to be Marmion’s wedded wife 
In me were deadly sin: 
And if it be the king’s decree 
That I must find no sanctuary 
In that inviolable dome 
Where even a homicide might come 
And safely rest his head, 
Though at its open portals stood, 
Thirsting to pour forth blood for blood, 
The kinsmen of the dead, 
Yet one asylum is my own 
Against the dreaded hour,— 
A low, a silent, and a lone, 
Where kings have little power. 
One victim is before me there.— 
Mother, your blessing, and in prayer 
Remember your unhappy Clare!” 
Loud weeps the abbess, and bestows 
Kind blessings many a one; 
Weeping and wailing loud arose, 
Round patient Clare, the clamorous woes 
Of every simple nun. 
His eyes the gentle Eustace dried, 
And scarce rude Blount the sight could 
bide, 


147 


Then took the squire her rein, 

And gently led away her steed, 

And by each courteous word and deed 
To cheer her strove in vain. 


But scant three miles the band had rode. 
When o’er a height they passed, 
And, sudden, close before them showed 
His towers Tantallon vast, 
Broad, massive, high, and stretching far, 
And held impregnable in war. 
On a projecting rock they rose, 
And round three sides the ocean flows. 
The fourth did battled walls enclose 
And double mound and fosse. 
By narrow drawbridge, outworks strong, 
Through studded gates, an entrance 
long, 
To the main court they cross. 
It was a wide and stately square ; 
Around were lodgings fit and fair, 
And towers of various form, 
Which on the court projected far 
And broke its lines quadrangular. 
Here was square keep, there turret high, 
Or pinnacle that sought the sky. 
Whence oft the warder could descry 
The gathering ocean-storm. 


Here did they rest.—The princely care 
Of Douglas why should I declare, 
Or say they met reception fair? 
Or why the tidings say, 
Which varying to Tantallon came, 
By hurrying posts or fleeter fame, 
With every varying day ? 
And, first, they heard King James had 
won 
Etall, and Wark, and Ford; and then, 
That Norham Castle strong was ta’en. 
At that sore marvelled Marmion, 
And Douglas hoped his monarch’s hand 
Would soon subdue Northumberland ; 
But whispered news there came, 
That while his host inactive lay, 
And melted by degrees away, 
King James was dallying off the day 
With Heron’s wily dame. 
Such acts to chronicles I yield ; 
Go seek them there and see: 
Mine is a tale of Flodden Field, 
And not a history.— 
At length they heard the Scottish host 
On that high ridge had made their post 
Which frowns o’er Millfield Plain ; 
And that brave Surrey many a band 
Had gathered in the Southern land, 
And marched into Northumberland, 
And camp at Wooler ta’en. 


148 


BRITISH EROETS 





Marmion, like charger in the stall, 

That hears, without, the trumpet-call, 
Began to chafe and swear :— 

‘¢ A sorry thing to hide my head 

In castle, like a fearful maid, 
When such a field is near. 

Needs must I see this battle-day ; 

Death to my fame if such a fray 

Were fought, and Marmion away ! 
The Douglas, too, I wot not why, 
Hath bated of his courtesy ; 

No longer in his halls 7’ stay: ” 

Then bade his band they should array 

For march against the dawning day. 


CANTO SIXTH 


THE BATTLE 


WHILE great events were on the gale, 

And each hour brought a varying tale, 

And the demeanor, changed and cold, 

Of Douglas fretted Marmion, bold, 

And, like the impatient steed of war, 

He snuffed the battle from afar, 

And hopes were none that back again 

Herald should come from Terouenne, 

Where England’s king in leaguer lay, 

Before decisive battle-day,— 

While these things were, the mournful 
Clare 

Did in the dame’s devotions share ; 

For the good countess ceaseless prayed 

To Heaven and saints her sons to aid, 

And with short interval did pass 

From prayer to book, from book to mass, 

And all in high baronial pride,— 

A life both dull and dignified : 

Yet. as Lord Marmion nothing pressed 

Upon her intervals of rest, 

Dejected Clara well could bear 

The formal state, the lengthened prayer, 

Though dearest to her wounded heart 

The hours that she might spend apart. 


I said Tantallon’s dizzy steep 

Hung o’er the margin of the deep. 

Many a rude tower and rampart there 

Repelled the insult of the air, 

Which, when the tempest vexed the sky, 

Half breeze, half spray, came whistling 
by. 

Above the rest a turret square 

Did o’er its Gothic entrance bear, 

Of sculpture rude, a stony shield ; 

The Bloody Heart was in the field, 

And in the chief three mullets stood, 

The cognizance of Douglas blood. 

The turret held a narrow stair, 

Which, mounted, gave you access where 


A parapet’s embattled row 

Did seaward round the castle go. 

Sometimes in dizzy steps descending, 

Sometimes in narrow circuit bending, 

Sometimes in platform broad extending, 

Its varying circle did combine 

Bulwark, and bartizan, and line, 

And bastion, tower, and vantage-coign, 

Above the booming ocean leant 

The far-projecting battlement ; 

The billows burst in ceaseless flow 

Upon the precipice below. 

Where’er Tantallon faced the land, 

Gate-works and walls were strongly 
manned ; 

No need upon the sea-girt side: 

The steepy rock and frantic tide 

Approach of human step denied, 

And thus these lines and ramparts rude 

Were left in deepest solitude. 


And, for they were so lonely, Clare 
Would to these battlements repair, 
And muse upon her sorrows there, 
And list the sea-bird’s cry, 
Or slow, like noontide ghost, would 
glide 
Along the dark-gray bulwarks’ side, 
And ever on the heaving tide 
Look down with weary eye. 
Oft did the cliff and swelling main 
Recall the thoughts of Whitby’s fane,— 
A home she ne’er might see again ; 
For she had laid adown, 
So Douglas bade, the hood and veil, 
And frontlet of the cloister pale, 
And Benedictine gown : 
It were unseemly sight, he said, 
A novice out of convent shade.— 
Now her bright locks with sunny glow 
Again adorned her brow of snow ; 
Her mantle rich, whose borders round 
A deep and fretted broidery bound, 
In golden foldings sought the ground ; 
Of holy ornament, alone 
Remained a cross with ruby stone ; 
And often did she look 
On that which in her hand she bore, 
With velvet bound and broidered o’er, 
Her breviary book. 
In such a place, so lone, so grim, 
At dawning pale or twilight dim, 
It fearful would have been 
To meet a form so richly dressed, 
With book in hand, and cross on breast, 
And such a woful mien. 
Fitz-Eustace, loitering with his bow, 
To practise on the gull and crow, 
Saw her at distance gliding slow, 


SCOTT 


And did by Mary swear 
Some lovelorn fay she might have been, 
Or in romance some spell-bound queen, 
For ne’er in work-day world was seen 
A form so witching fair. 


Once walking thus at evening tide 

It chanced a gliding sail she spied, 

And sighing thought—*‘ The abbess there 

Perchance does to her home.-repair ; 

Her peaceful rule, where Duty free 

Walks hand in hand with Charity, 

Where oft Devotion’s tranced glow 

Can such a glimpse of heaven bestow 

That the enraptured sisters see 

High vision and deep mystery,— 

The very form of Hilda fair, 

‘Hovering upon the sunny air. 

And smiling on her. votaries’ prayer. 

Oh! wherefore to my duller eye 

Did still the Saint her form deny ? 

Was it that, seared by sinful scorn, 

My heart could neither melt nor burn? 

Or lie my warm affections low 

With him that taught them first to 
glow ? 

Yet, gentle abbess, well I knew 

To pay thy kindness grateful due, 

And well could brook the mild com- 
mand 

That ruled thy simple maiden band. 

How different now, condemned to bide 

My doom from this dark tyrant’s pride !— 

But Marmion has to learn ere long 

That constant mind and hate of wrong 

Descended to a feeble girl 

From Red de Clare, stout Gloster’s Earl ; 

Of such a stem a sapling weak. 

He ne’er shall bend, although he break. 

* But see!—what makes this armor 
here ?”’— 

For in her path there lay 
Targe, corselet, helm ; she viewed them 


near.— 

‘*The breastplate pierced !—Ay, much I. 
fear, 

Weak fence wert thou ’gainst foeman’s 
spear 


That hath made fatal entrance here, 

As these dark blood-gouts say.— 
Thus Wilton! Oh! not corslet’s ward, 
Not truth, as diamond pure and hard, 
Could be thy manly bosom’s guard 

On yon disastrous day !”— 

She raised her eyes in mournful mood,— 
Wilton himself before her stood ! 

It might have seemed his passing ghost, 
For every youthful grace was lost, 


What skillful limner e’er 








149 


And joy unwonted and surprise 
Gave their strange wildness to his 
eyes.— 
Expect not, noble dames and lords, 
That I can tell such scene in words: 
would choose 
To paint the rainbow’s varying hues, 
Unless to mortal it were given 
To dip his brush in dyes of heaven ? 
Far less can my weak line declare 
Each changing passion’s shade : 
Brightening to rapture from despair, 
Sorrow, surprise, and pity there, 
And joy with her angelic air, 
And hope that paints the future fair 
Their varying hues displayed ; 
Each o’er its rival’s ground extending, 
Alternate conquering, shifting, blend- 
ing, 
Till all fatigued the conflict yield, 
And mighty love retains the field. 
Shortly I tell what then he said, 
By many a tender word delayed, 
And modest blush, and bursting sigh, 
And question kind, and fond reply ;— 


DE WILTON’S HISTORY 


‘‘Forget we that disastrous day 
When senseless in the lists I lay. 
Thence dragged,—but how I cannot 
know 
For sense and recollection fled,— 
I found me ona pallet low 
Within my ancient beadsman’s shed. 
Austin,—remember’st thou, my Clare, 
How thou didst blush when the old man, 
When first our infant love began, 
Said we would make a matchless 
pair ?— 
Menials and friends and kinsmen fied 
“rom the degraded traitor’s bed — 
eh only held. my burning head, 
And tended me for many a day 
While wounds and fever held their sway. 
But far more needful was his care 
When sense returned to wake despair 
For I did tear the closing wound, 
And dash me frantic on the ground, 
If eer I heard the name of Clare. 
At length, to calmer reason brought, 
Much by his kind attendance wrought, 
With him I left my native strand, 
And, in a palmer’s weeds arrayed 
My hated name and form to shade, 
T journeyed many a land, 
No more a lord of rank and birth, 
But mingled with the dregs of earth. 
Oft Austin for my reason feared, 


150 


When I would sit, and deeply brood 
On dark revenge and deeds of blood, 
Or wild mad schemes upreared. 
My friend at length fell sick, and said 
God would remove him soon ; 
And while upon his dying bed 
He begged of me a boon-- 
If e’er my deadliest enemy 
Beneath my brand should conquered lie, 
Even then my mercy should awake 
And spare his life for Austin’s sake. 


‘« Still restless as a second Cain, 
To Scotland next my route was ta’en, 
Full well the paths I knew. 
Fame of my fate made various sound, 
That death in pilgrimage I found, 
That I had perished of my wound,— 
None cared which tale was true ; 
And living eye could never guess 
De Wilton in his palmer’s dress, 
For now that sable slough is shed, 
And trimmed my shaggy beard and 
head, 
I scarcely know me in the glass. 
A chance most wondrous did provide 
That I should be that baron’s guide-- 
I will not name his name !—— 
Vengeance to God alone belongs ; 
But, when I think on all my wrongs, 
My blood is liquid flame ! 
And ne’er the time shall I forget 
When, in a Scottish hostel set, 
Dark looks we did exchange : 
What were his thoughts I cannot tell, 
But in my bosom mustered Hell 
Its plans of dark revenge. 


* A word of vulgar augury 
That broke from me, I scarce knew 
why, 

Brought on a village tale, 

Which wrought upon his moody sprite, 

And sent him armed forth by night. 
I borrowed steel and mail 

And weapons from his sleeping band ; 
And, passing from a postern door, 

We met and countered, hand to, hand,— 
He fell on Gifford-moor. 

For the death-stroke my brand I drew,— 

Oh! then my helmed head he knew, 
The palmer’s cowl was gone,— 

Then had three inches of my blade 

The heavy debt of vengeance paid,— 

My hand the thought of Austin stayed ; 
I left him there alone,— 

O good old man! even from the grave 

Thy spirit could thy master save: 

If I had slain my foeman, ne’er 


BRITISH POETS 


Had Whitby’s abbess in her fear 
Given to my hand this packet dear, 
Of power to clear my injured fame 
And vindicate De Wilton’s name.— 
Perchance you heard the abbess tell 
Of the strange pageantry of hell 
That broke our secret speech—— 
It rose from the infernal shade, 
Or featly was some juggle played, 
A tale of peace to teach. 
Appeal to Heaven I judged was best 
When my name came among the rest. 


‘* Now here within Tantallon hold 

To Douglas late my tale I told, 

To whom my house was known of old. 

Won by my proofs, his falehion bright 

This eve anew shall dub me knight. 

These were the arms that once did turn 

The tide of fight on Otterburne, 

And Harry Hotspur forced to yield 

When the Dead Douglas won the field. 

These Angus gave—his armorer’s care 

Ere morn shall every breach repair ; 

For nought, he said, was in his halls, 

But ancient armor on the walls, 

And aged chargers in the stalls, 

And women, priests, and gray-haired 
men ; 

The rest were all in Twisel glen. 

And now I watch my armor here, 

By law of arms, till midnight’s near ; 

Then, once again a belted knight, 

Seek Surrey’s camp with dawn of light. 


‘* There soon again we meet, my Clare! 
This baron means to guide thee there : 
Douglas reveres his king’s command, 
Kilse would he take thee from his band. 
And there thy kinsman Surrey, too, 
Will give De Wilton justice due. 
Now meeter far for martial broil, 
Firmer my limbs and strung by toil, 
Once more’’—-‘t O Wilton ! must we then 
Risk new-found happiness again, 
Trust fate of arms once more? 
And is there not an humble glen 
Where we, content and poor, 
Might build a cottage in the shade, 
A shepherd thou, and I to aid 
Thy task on dale and moor ?— 
That reddening brow !—too well I know 
Not even thy Clare can peace bestow 
While falsehood stains thy name : 
Go then to fight! Clare bids thee go! 
Clare can a warrior’s feelings know 
And weep a warrior’s shame, 
Can Red Earl Gilbert’s spirit feel, 
Buckle the spurs upon thy heel 


SOP Tey 





And belt thee with thy brand of steel, 
And send thee forth to fame!” 


That night upon the rocks and bay 
The midnight moonbeam slumbering 


lay, 
And poured its silver light and pure 
Through loophole and through embra- 
sure 
Upon Tantallon tower and hall: 
But chief where arched windows wide 
Illuminate the chapel’s pride 
The sober glances fall. 
Much was there need; though seamed 
with scars, 
Two veterans of the Douglas’ wars, 
Though two gray priests were there, 
And each a blazing torch held high, 
You could not by their blaze descry 
The chapel’s carving fair. 
Amid that dim and smoky light, 
Checkering the silvery moonshine bright, 
A bishop by the altar stood, 
A noble lord of Douglas blood, 
With mitre sheen and rochet white. 
Yet showed his meek and thoughtful eye 
But little pride of prelacy ;: 
More pleased that in a barbarous age 
He gave rude Scotland Virgil’s page 
Than that beneath his rule he held 
The bishopric of fair Dunkeld. 
Beside him ancient Angus stood, 
Doffed his furred gown and sable hood ; 
O’er his huge form and visage pale 
He wore a cap and shirt of mail, 
And leaned his large and wrinkled hand 
Upon the huge and sweeping brand 
Which wont of yore in battle fray 
His foeman’s limbs to shred away, 
As wood-knife lops the sapling spray. 
He seemed as, from the tombs around 
Rising at judgment-day, 
Some giant Douglas may be found 
In all his old array ; 
So pale his face, so huge his limb, 
So old his arms, his look so grim. 


Then at the altar Wilton kneels, 
And Clare the spurs bound on his heels ; 
And think what next he must have felt 
At buckling of the falchion belt! 
And judge how Clara changed her hue 
While fastening to her lover’s side 
A friend, which, though in danger tried, 
He once had found untrue ! 
Then Douglas struck him with his blade : 
‘*Saint Michael and Saint Andrew aid, 
I dub thee knight. 
Arise, Sir Ralph, De Wilton’s heir ! 


I5t 


For king, for church, for lady fair, 
See that thou fight.” 

And Bishop Gawain, as he rose, 

Said: ‘* Wilton ! grieve not for thy-woes, 
Disgrace, and trouble ; 

For He who honor best bestows . 
May give thee double.” 

De Wilton sobbed, for sob he must : 

‘* Where’er I meet a Douglas, trust 
That Douglas is my brother ! ” 

‘“Nay, nay,” old Angus said, ‘‘ not so; 

To Surrey’s camp thou now must go, 
Thy wrongs no longer smother. 

I have two sons in yonder field ; 

And, if thou meet’st them under shield, 

Upon them bravely—do thy worst, 

And foul fall him that blenches first ! ” 


Not far advanced was morning day 
When Marmion did his troop array 
To Surrey’s camp to ride; ° 
He had safe-conduct for his band 
Beneath the royal seal and hand, 
And Douglas gave a guide. 
The ancient earl with stately grace 
Would Clara on her palfrey place, 
And whispered in an undertone, 
‘* Let the hawk stoop, his prey is flown.” 
The train from out the castle drew, 
But Marmion stopped to bid adieu : 
‘* Though something I might plain,” he 
said, 
‘Of cold respect to stranger guest, 
Sent hither by your king’s behest, 
While in Tantallon’s towers I stayed, 
Part we in friendship from your land, 
And, noble earl, receive my hand.”— 
But Douglas round him drew his cloak, 
Folded his arms, and thus he spoke :— 
‘* My manors, halls, and bowers shall still 
Be open at my sovereign’s will 
To each one whom he lists, howe’er 
Unmeet to be the owner’s peer. 
My castles are my king’s alone, 
From turret to foundation-stone— 
The hand of Douglas is his own, 
And never shall in friendly grasp 
The hand of such as Marmion clasp.” 


Burned Marmion’s swarthy cheek like 
fire 

And shook his very frame for ire, 

And—*‘ This to me!” he said, 

** An ’t were not for thy hoary beard, 

Such hand as Marmion’s had not spared 
To cleave the Douglas’ head ! 

And first I tell thee, haughty peer, 

He who does England’s message here, 

Although the meanest in her state, 


152 


May well, proud Angus, be thy mate; 
And, Douglas, more I tell thee here, 
Even in thy pitch of pride, 
Here in thy hold, thy vassals near,.— 
Nay, never look upon your lord, 
And lay your hands upon your sword,— 
I tell thee, thou ’rt defied ! 
And if thou saidst I am not peer 
To any lord in Scotland here, 
Lowland or Highland, far or near, 
Lord Angus, thou hast lied!” 
On the earl’s cheek the flush of rage 
O’ercame the ashen hue of age: 
Yierce he broke forth,—‘‘ And darest thou 
then 
To beard the lion in his den, 
The, Douglas in his hall ? 
And hopest thou hence unscathed to 
-  gO?— 
No, by Saint Bride of Bothwell, no! 
Up drawbridge, grooms—what, warder, 
ho! 
Let the portcullis fall,—” 
Lord Marmion turned,—well was _ his 
need,— 
And dashed the rowels in his steed, 
Like arrow through the archway sprung 
The ponderous grate behind him rung ; 
To pass there was such scanty room, 
The bars descending razed his plume. 


The steed along the drawbridge flies 

Just as it trembled on the rise ; 

Not lighter does the swallow skim 

Along the smooth lake’s level brim : 

And when Lord Marmion reached his 
band, 

He halts, and turns with clenched hand, 

And shout of loud defiance pours, 

And shook his gauntlet at the towers. 

‘* Horse! horse!” the Douglascried, ‘‘and 
chase ! ” 

But soon he reined his fury’s pace : 

‘* A royal messenger he came, 


Though most unworthy of the name.—° 


A letter forged! Saint Jude to speed ! 
Did ever knight so foul a deed ? 4 


1 Lest the reader should partake of the Earl’s 
astonishment and consider the crime as incon- 
sistent with the manners of the period, I have to 
remind him of the numerous forgeries (partly 
executed by a female assistant ) devised by 
Robert of Artois, to forward his suit against the 
Countess Matilda ; which, being detected, ocea- 
sioned his flight into England, and proved the 
remote cause of Edward the Third’s memorable 
wars in France. John Harding, also, was ex- 
pressly hired by Edward IV. to forge such docu- 
ments asmight appear to establish the claim of 
fealty asserted over Scotland by the. English 
monarchs. (Scott's note.) 


BRIEISH SBOETS 





At first in heart it liked me ill 

When the king praised his clerkly skill. 
Thanks to Saint Bothan, son of mine, 
Save Gawain, ne’er could pen a line; 
So swore I, and I swear it still, 

Let my boy-bishop fret his fill.— 
Saint Mary mend my fiery mood! 

Old age ne’er cools the Douglas blood, 
I thought to slay him where he stood. 
‘T is pity of him too,” he cried : 

‘* Bold can he speak and fairly ride, 

I warrant him a warrior tried.” 

With this his mandate he recalls, 

And slowly seeks his castle halls. 


The day in Marmion’s journey wore ; 

Yet, ere his passion’s gust was o’er, 

They crossed the heights of Stanrig-moor, 

His troop more closely there he scanned, 

And missed the Palmer from the band. 

‘* Palmer or not,” young Blount did say, 

‘‘ He parted at the peep of day ; 

Good sooth, it was in strange array.” 

**In what array ?” said Marmion quick. 

‘* My lord, I ill can spell the trick ; 

But all night long with clink and bang 

Close to my couch did hammers clang ; 

At dawn the falling drawbridge rang, 

And from a loophole while I peep, 

Old Bell-the-Cat came from the keep, 

Wrapped in a gown of sables fair, 

As fearful of the morning air; 

Beneath, when that was blown aside, 

A rusty shirt of mail I spied, 

By Archibald won in bloody work 

Against the Saracen and Turk; | 

Last night it hung not in the hall; 

I thought some marvel would befall. 

And next I saw them saddled lead 

Old Cheviot forth, the earl’s best steed, 

A matchless horse, thoughsomething old, 

Prompt in his paces, cool and bold. 

I heard the Sheriff Sholto say 

The earl did much the Master pray 

To use him on the battle-day, 

But he preferred ”’—‘‘ Nay, Henry, cease ! 

Thou sworn  horse-courser, hold thy 
peace.— 

Eustace, thou bear’st a brain—I pray, 

What did Blount see at break of day ?”— 


‘‘In brief, my lord, we both descried— 

For then I stood by Henry’s side— 

The Palmer mount and outwards ride 
Upon the earl’s own favourite steed. 

All sheathed he was in armour bright, 

And much resembled that same knight 

Subdued by you in Cotswold fight ; 
Lord Angus wished him speed.”— 


sO Teh 


th 





The instant that Fitz-Eustace spoke, 
A sudden light on Marmion broke :— 
‘* Ah! dastard fool, to reason lost !” 
He muttered ; ‘‘ °T was nor fay nor ghost 
-I met upon the moonlight wold, 
But living man of earthly mould. 
O dotage blind and gross! 
Had I but fought as wont, one thrust 
Had laid De Wilton in the dust, 
My path no more to cross.— 
How stand we now ?—he told his tale 
To Douglas, and with some avail ; 
°T was therefore gloomed his rugged 
brow.— 
Will Surrey dare to entertain 
°Gainst Marmion charge disproved and 
vain ? 
Small risk of that, I trow. 
Yet Clare’s sharp questions must I shun, 
Must separate Constance from the nun— 
Oi! what a tangled web we weave 
When first we practise to deceive ! 
A Palmer too !—no wonder why 
I felt rebuked beneath his eye ; 
I might have known there was but one_ 
Whose look could quell Lord Marmion.” 


Stung with these thoughts, he urged to 
speed 
His troop, and reached at eve the Tweed, 
Where Lennel’s convent closed their 
march, 
There now is left but one frail arch, 
Yet mourn thou not its cells; 
Our time a fair exchange has made: 
Hard by, in hospitable shade 
A reverend pilgrim dwells, 
Well worth the whole Bernardine brood 
That e’er wore sandal, frock, or hood. 
Yet did Saint Bernard’s abbot there 
Give Marmion entertainment fair, 
' And lodging for his train and Clare. 
Next morn the baron climbed the tower, 
To view afar the Scottish power, 
Encamped on Flodden edge ; 
The white pavilions made a show 
Like remnants of the winter snow 
Along the dusky ridge. 
Long Marmion looked :—at length his 
eye 
Unusual movement might descry 
Amid the shifting lines ; 
The Scottish host drawn out appears, 
For, flashing on the hedge of spears, 
The eastern sunbeam shines. 
Their front now deepening, now extend- 


ing, 
Their flank inclining, wheeling, bend- 
ing, 





Now drawing back, and now descend- 
ing, 

The skilful Marmion well could know 

They watched the motions of some foe 

Who traversed on the plain below. 


Even so it was. From Flodden ridge 
The Scots beheld the English host 
Leave Barmore-wood, their evening 

post, 
And heedful watched thein as they 
crossed 

The Till by Twisel Bridge.} 

High sight it is and haughty, while 
They dive into the deep defile ; 
Beneath the caverned cliff they fall, 
Beneath the castle’s airy wall. 

By rock, by oak, by hawthorn-tree. 
Troop after troop are disappearing ; ° 
Troop after troop their banners rear- 

in 

Upon the eastern bank you see ; 

Still pouring down the rocky den 
Where flows the sullen Till, 

And rising from the dim-wood glen, 

Standards on standards, men on men, 
In slow succession still, 

And sweeping o’er the Gothic arch, 

And pressing on, in ceaseless march, 
To gain the opposing hill. 

That morn, to many a trumpet clang, 

Twisel! thy rock’s deep echo rang, 

And many a chief of birth and rank, 

Saint Helen ! at thy fountain drank. 

Thy hawthorn glade, which now we see 

In spring-tide bloom so lavishly, 

Had then from many an axe its doom, 

To give the marching columns room. 

And why stands Scotland idly now, 

Dark Flodden! on thy airy brow, 


1On the evening previous to the memorable 
battle of Flodden, Surrey’s head-quarters were 
at Barmore-wood, and King James held an in- 
accessible position on the ridge of Flodden-hill, 
one of the last and lowest eminences detached 
from the ridge of Cheviot. The Till, a deep and 
slow river, winded between the armies. On the 
morning of the 9th September, 1513, Surrey 
marched in a northwesterly direction, and 
crossed the Till, with his van and artillery, at 
Twifel-bridge, nigh where that river joins the 
Tweed, his rear-guard column passing about a 
mile higher, by a ford. This movement had 
the double effect of placing his army between 
King James and his supplies from Scotland 
and of striking the Scottish monarch with sur- 
prise, as he seems to have relied on the depth 
of the river in his front. But as the passage, 
both over the bridge and through the ford, was 
difficult and slow, it seems possible that the 
English might have been attacked to great ad- 
vantage, while struggling with these natural ob- 
stacles.—(Scott). 


ve 


154 


Since England gains the pass the while, 
And struggles through the deep defile ? 
What checks the fiery soul of James ? 
Why sits that champion of the dames 
Inactive on his steed, 
And sees, between him and his land, 
Between him and Tweed’s southern 
strand, 
His host Lord Surrey lead ? 
What vails the vain knight-errant’s 
brand ?— 
O Douglas, for thy leading wand ! 
Fierce Randolph, for thy speed! 
Oh! for one hour of Wallace wight, 
Or well-skilled Bruce, to rule the fight 
And cry, ‘‘ Saint Andrew and our right!” 
Another sight had seen that morn, 
From Fate’s dark book a leaf been torn, 
And Flodden had been  Bannock- 
bourne !— 
The precious hour has passed in vain, 
And England’s host has gained the plain, 
Wheeling their march and circling still 
Around the base of Flodden hill. 


Ere yet the bands met Marmion's eye, 
Fitz-Eustace shouted loud and high, 
‘* Hark! hark! my lord,an English drum! 
And see ascending squadrons come 
Between Tweed’s river and the hill, 
Foot, horse, and cannon! Hap what hap, 
My basnet to a prentice cap, 
Lord Surrey’s o’er the Till !— 
Yet more! yet more !—how fair arrayed 
They file from out the hawthorn shade, 
And sweep so gallant by! 
With all their banners bravely spread, 
And all their armor flashing high, 
Saint George might waken from the 
‘dead, 
To see fair England’s standards fly.”"— 
““Stint in thy prate,” quoth Blount, 
‘thou ’dst best, 
And listen to our lord’s behest.” — 
With kindling brow Lord Marmion said, 
‘‘ This instant be our band arrayed ; 
The river must be quickly crossed, 
That we may join Lord Surrey’s host. 
If fight King James,—as well I trust 
That fight he will, and fight he must,— 
The Lady Clare behind our lines 
Shall tarry while the battle joins.” 


Himself he swift on horseback threw, 
Scarce to the abbot bade adieu, 

Far less would listen to his prayer 

To leave behind the helpless Clare. 
Down to the Tweed his band he drew, 
And muttered as the flood they view, 


BRITISED POETS 


‘The pheasant in the falcon’s claw, 
He scarce will yield to please a daw ; 
Lord Angus may the abbot awe, 
So Clare shall bide with me.” 
Then on that dangerous ford and deep 
Where to the Tweed Leat’s eddies creep, 
He ventured desperately : 
And not a moment will he bide 
Till squire or groom before him ride ; 
Headmost of all he stems the tide, 
And stems it gallantly. 
Eustace held Clare upon her horse, 
Old Hubert led her rein, 
Stoutly they braved the current’s course, 
And, though far downward driven per- 
force, 
The southern bank they gain. 
Behind them straggling came to shore, 
As best they might, the train : 
Each o’er his head his yew-bow bore, 
A caution not in vain ; 
Deep need that day that every string, 
By wet unharmed, should sharply ring. 
A moment then Lord Marmion stayed, 
And breathed his steed, his men arrayed, 
Then forward moved his band, 
Until, Lord Surrey’s rear-guard won, 
He halted by a cross of stone, 
That on a hillock standing lone 
Did all the field command. 


Hence might they see the full array 
Of either host for deadly fray ; 
Their marshalled lines stretched east 
and west, 
And fronted north and south, 
And distant salutation passed 
From the loud cannon mouth ; 
Not in the close successive rattle 
That breathes the voice of modern battle, 
But slow and far between. 
The hillock gained, Lord 
stayed : 
‘‘ Here, by this cross,” he gently said, 
‘* You well may view the scene. 
Here shalt thou tarry, lovely Clare : 
Oh ! think of Marmion in thy prayer !-- 
Thou wilt not ?—well, no less my care 
Shall, watchful, for thy weal prepare.— 
You, Blount and Eustace, are her guard, 
With ten picked archers of my train ; 
With England if the day go hard, 
To Berwick speed amain.— 
But if we conquer, cruel maid, 
My spoils shall at your feet be laid, 
When here we meet again.” 
He waited not for answer there, 
And would not mark the maid’s despair, 
Nor heed the discontented look 


Marmion 


oer Eh 


From either squire, but spurred amain, 
And, dashing through the battle-plain, 
His way to Surrey took. 


*“*The good Lord Marmion, by my life! 
Welcome to danger’s hour !— 

Short greeting serves in time of strife.— 
Thus have I ranged my power: 

Myself will rule this central host, 
Stout Stanley fronts their right, 

My sons command the vaward post, 
With Brian Tunstall, stainless knight ; 
Lord Dacre, with his horsemen light, 
Shall be in rearward of the fight, 

And succor those that need it most. 
Now, gallant Marmion, well I know, 
Would gladly to the vanguard go; 

Edmund, the Admiral, Tunstall there, 

With thee their charge will blithely 

share ; 

There fight thine own retainers too 

Beneath De Burg, thy steward true.” 

** Thanks, noble Surrey !” Marmion said, 

Nor further greeting there he paid, 

But, parting like a thunderbolt, 

First in the vanguard made a halt, 
Where such a shout there rose 

Of ‘** Marmion ! Marmion!” that the cry, 

Up Flodden mountain shrilling high, 
Startled the Scottish foes. 


Blount and Fitz-Eustace rested still 
With Lady Clare upon the hill, 
On which—for far the day was spent— 
The western sunbeams now were bent ; 
The cry they heard, its meaning knew, 
Could plain their distant comrades view : 
Sadly to Blount did Eustaee say, 
‘‘Unworthy office here to stay ! 
No hope of gilded spurs to-day.— 
But see! look up— on Flodden bent 
The Scottish foe has fired his tent.” 
And sudden, as he spoke, 
From the sharp ridges of the hill, 
Ail downward to the banks of Till, 
Was wreathed in sable smoke. 
Volumed and vast, and rolling far, 
The cloud enveloped Scotland's war 
As down the hill they broke ; 
' Nor martial shout, nor minstrel tone, 
Announced their march; their tread 
alone, 
At times one warning trumpet blown, 
At times a stifled hum, 
Told England, from his mountain-throne 
King James did rushing come. 
Scarce could they hear or see their foes 
Until at weapon-point they close.— 
They close in clouds of smoke and dust, 


a 


With sword-sway and with lance’s 
thrust ; 
And such a yell was there, 
Of sudden and portentous birth, 
As if men fought upon the earth, 
And fiends in upper air: 
Oh! life and death were in the shout, 
Recoil and rally. charge and rout, 
And triumph and despair. 
Long looked the anxious squires; their 


eye 
Could in the darkness nought descry. 


At length the freshening western blast 
Aside the shroud of battle cast ; 
And first the ridge of mingled spears 
Above the brightening cloud appears, 
And in the smoke the pennons flew, 
As in the storm the white seamew. 
Then marked they, dashing broad and 
far, 
The broken billows of the war, 
And plumed crests of chieftains brave 
Floating like foam upon the wave ; 
But nought distinct they see: 
Wide raged the battle on the plain ; 
Spears shook and _ falchions flashed 
amain ; 
Fell England’s arrow-flight like rain ; 
Crests rose, and stooped, and rose again, 
Wild and disorderly. 
Amid the scene of tumult, high 
They saw Lord Marmion’s falcon fly ; 
And stainless Tunstall’s banner white, 
And Edmund Howard's lion bright, 
Still bear them bravely in the fight, 
Although against them come 
Of gallant Gordons many a one, 
And many a stubborn Badenoch-man, 
And many a rugged Border clan, 
With Huntly and with Home.— 


Far on the left, unseen the while, 
Stanley broke Lennox and Argyle, 
Though there the western mountaineer 
Rushed with bare bosom on the spear. 
And flung the feeble targe aside, 
And with both hands the broadsword 
plied. 
’T was vain.—But Fortune, on the right, 
With fickle smile cheered Scotland’s 
fight. 
Then fell that spotless banner white, 
The Howard’s lion fell ; 
Yet still Lord Marmion’s falcon flew 
With wavering flight, while fiercer grew 
Around the battle-yell. 
The Border slogan rent the sky ! 
A Home! a Gordon ! was the cry: 


156 


Loud were the clanging blows ; 
Advanced,—forced back,—now 
now high, 
The pennon sunk and rose ; 
As bends the bark’s mast in the gale, 
When rent are rigging, shrouds, and sail, 
It wavered mid the foes. 
No longer Blount the view could bear : 
‘‘By heaven and all its saints! I swear 
I will not see it lost ! , 
Fitz-Eustace, you with Lady Clare 
May bid your beads and patter prayer,— 
I gallop to the host.” 
And to the fray he rode amain, 
Followed by all the archer train. 
The fiery youth, with desperate charge, 
Made for a space an opening large,— 
The rescued banner rose,— 
But darkly closed the war around, 
Like pine-tree rooted from the ground 
It sank among the foes, 
Then Eustace mounted too,—yet stayed, 
As loath to leave the helpless maid, 
When, fast as shaft can fly, — 
Bloodshot his eyes, his nostrils spread, 
The loose rein dangling from his head, 
Housing and saddle bloody red, 
Lord Marmion’s steed rushed by : 
And Eustace, maddening at the sight, 
A look and sign to Clara cast 
To mark he would return in haste, 
Then plunged into the fight. 


low, 


Ask me not what the maiden feels, 
Left in that dreadful hour alone : 
Perchance her reason stoops or reels ; 
Perchance a courage, not her own, 
Braces her mind to desperate tone.— 
The scattered van of England wheels ;— 
She only said, as loud in air 
The tumult roared. ‘‘ Is Wilton there? ”— 
They fly, or, maddened by despair, 
Fight but to die,—‘‘ Is Wilton there?” 
With that, straight up the hill there rode 
Two horsemen drenched with gore, 
And in their arms, a helpless load, 
A wounded knight they bore. 
His hand still strained. the broken brand ; 
His arms where smeared with blood and 
sand. 
Dragged from among the horses’ feet, 
With dinted shield and helmet beat, 
The falcon-crest and plumage gone, 
Can that be haughty Marmion!... 
Young Blount his armor did unlace, 
And, gazing on his ghastly face, 
Said, ‘‘ By Saint George, he’s gone! 
That spear-wound has our master sped, 
And see the deep cut on his head! 


BRITISH POETS 


Good-night to Marmion.” — 
*Unnurtured Blount! thy brawlng 
cease : 
He opes_ his 
‘** peace !” 


eyes,” said Eustace ; 


When, doffed his casque, he felt free air, 

Around gan Marmion wildly stare : 

‘‘ Where’s Harry Blount? Fitz-Eustace 

where ? 

Linger ye here, ye hearts of hare! 

Redeem my pennon,—charge again ! 

Cry, ‘Marmion to the rescue !’—Vain! 

Last of my race, on battle-plain 

That shout shall ne’er be heard again !— 

Yet my last thought is England’s—fly, 
To Dacre bear my signet-ring : 

Teli him his squadrons up to bring.-- 
Fitz-Eustace, to Lord Surrey hie: 

Tunstall lies dead upon the field, 

His lifeblood stains the spotless shield ; 

Edmund is down; my life is reft ; 

The Admiral alone is left. 

Let Stanley charge with spur of fire.— 

With Chester charge, and Lancashire, 

Full upon Scotland’s central host, 

Or victory and England’s lost.— 

Must I bid twice ?—hence, varlets ! fly !— 
Leave Marmion here alone—to die.” 
They parted, and alone he lay ; 

Clare drew her from the sight away, 
Till pain wrung forth a lowly moan, | 
And half he murmured, ‘* Is there none 

Of all my halls have nurst, 

Page, squire, or groom, one cup to bring 

Of blessed water from the spring, 

To slake my dying thirst ! ” 


O Woman! in our hours of ease 
Uncertain, coy, and hard to please, 
And variable as the shade 
By the light quivering aspen made ; 
When pain and anguish wring the 
brows, 
A ministering angel thou !— 
Scarce were the piteous accents said, 
When with the baron’s casque the maid 
To the nigh streamlet ran : 
Forgot were hatred, wrongs, and fears ; 
The plaintive voice alone she hears, 
Sees but the dying man. 
She stooped her by the runnel’s side, 
But in abhorrence backward drew ; 
For, oozing from the mountain’s side 
Where raged the war, a dark-red tide 
Was curdling in the streamlet blue. 
Where shall she turn ?—behold her 
mark 
A little fountain cell, 


Se 1. 


ae 





Where water, clear as diamond spark, 
In a stone basin fell. 

Above, some half-worn letters say, 

Drink. weary. pilgrim. drink. and. 


pray. 

For. the. Rind. soul. of, Sibyl. Grey. 

Who. built. this. cross. and. well. 
She filled the helm and back she hied, 
And with surprise and joy espied 

A monk supporting Marmion’s head ; 
A pious man, whom.duty brought 
To dubious verge of battle fought, 

To shrive the dying, bless the dead. 


Deep drank Lord Marmion of the wave, 
And, as she stooped his brow to lave— 
‘- Is it the hand of Clare,” he said, 
‘Or injured Constance, bathes 
head ? ” 
Then, as remembrance rose,— 
** Speak not to me of shrift or prayer ! 
I must redress her woes. 
Short space, few words, are mine to 
spare ; 
Forgive and listen, gentle Clare!” 
‘* Alas!” she said, ‘‘ the while.— 
Oh! think of your immortal weal ! 
In vain for Constance is your zeal ! 
She—died at Holy Isle.”— 
Lord Marmion started from the ground 
As light as if he felt no wound, 
Though in the action burst the tide 
In torrents from his wounded side. 
‘* Then it was truth,” he said—‘‘ I knew 
That the dark presage must be true.— 
I would the Fiend, to whom belongs 
The vengeance due to all her wrongs, 
Would spare me but a day! 
For wasting fire, and dying groan, 
And priests slain on the altar stone, 
Might bribe him for delay. 
It may not be !—this dizzy trance— 
Curse on yon base marauder’s lance, 
And doubly cursed my failing brand ! 
A sinful heart makes feeble hand.” 
Then fainting down on earth he sunk, 
Supported by the trembling monk. 


my 


With fruitless labor Clara bound 

And strove to stanch the gushing 
wound : 

The monk with unavailing cares 

Exhausted all the Church’s prayers. 

Ever, he said, that, close and near, 

A lady’s voice was in his ear, 

And that the priest he could not hear ; 

For that she ever sung. 

** In the lost battle borne down by the fly- 

ing, 


Where mingles war’s rattle with groans 
of the dying!” 
So the notes rung.— 
** Avoid thee, Fiend !—with cruel hand 
Shake not the dying sinner’s sand !— 
Oh! look, my son, upon yon sign 
Of the Redeemer’s grace divine ; 
Ob! think on faith and bliss !— 
By many a death-bed I have been, 
And many a sinner’s parting seen, 
But never aught like this.” 
The war, that for a space did fail, 
Now trebly thundering swelled the 
gale, 
And ‘* Stanley !” was the cry.— 
A light on Marmion’s visage spread, 
And fired his glazing eye ; 
With dying hand above his head 
He shook the fragment of his blade, 
And shouted ‘** Victory !— 
Charge, Chester, charge! On, Stanley, 
on!” 
Were the last words of Marmion. 


By this, though deep the evening fell, 
Still rose the battle’s deadly swell, 

For still the Scots around their king, 
Unbroken, fought in desperate ring. 
Where's now their victor vaward wing, 

Where Huntley, and where Home ?— 
Oh! for a blast of that dread horn, 

On Fontarabian echoes borne, 

That to King Charles did come, 
When Rowland brave, and Olivier, 
And every paladin and peer, 

On Roncesvalles died ! 

Such blasts might warn them, not in 
vain, 

To quit the plunder of the slain 

And turn the doubtful day again, 

While yet on Flodden side 
Afar the Royal Standard flies, 

And round it toils and bleeds and dies 

Our Caledonian pride! 

In vain the wish—for far away, 

While spoil and havoc mark their way, 

Near Sibyl’s Cross the plunderers stray.— 

‘*O lady,” cried the monk, ‘‘ away!” 
And placed her on her steed, 

And led her to the chapel fair 

Of Tilmouth upon Tweed. 

There all the night they spent in prayer, 
And at the dawn of morning there 
She met her kinsman, Lord Fitz-Clare. 


But as they left the darkening heath 
More desperate grew the strife of death. 
The English shafts in volleys hailed, 
In headlong charge their horse assailed ; 


158 


Front, flank, and rear, the squadrons 


sweep 
To break the Scottish circle deep 
That fought around their king. 
But yet, though thick the shafts as snow, 
Though charging knights lke whirl- 
winds go, 
Though billmen ply the ghastly blow, 
Unbroken was the ring ; 
The stubborn spearmen still made good 
Their dark impenetrable wood, 
Each stepping where his comrade stood 
The instant that he fell. 
No thought was there of dastard flight ; 
Linked in the serried phalanx tight, 
Groom fought like noble, squire like 
knight, 
As fearJessly and well, 
Till utter darkness closed her wing 
- O’er their thin host and wounded king. 
Then skilful Surrey’s sage commands 
Led back from strife his shattered bands ; 
And from the charge they drew, 
As mountain-waves from wasted lands 
Sweep back to ocean blue. 
Then did their loss his foemen know ; 
Their king, their lords, their mightiest 
low, 
They melted from the field, as snow, 
When streams are swoln and south winds 
blow, 
Dissolves in silent dew. 
Tweed’s echoes heard the ceaseless plash, 
While many a broken band 
Disordered through her currents dash, 
To gain the Scottish land ; 
To town and tower, to down and dale, 
To tell red Flodden’s dismal tale, 
And raise the universal wail. 
Tradition, legend, tune, and song 
Shall many an age that wail prolong ; 
Still from the sire the son shall hear 
Of the stern strife and carnage drear 
Of Flodden’s fatal field. 
Where shivered was fair Scotland’s spear 
And broken was her shield ! 


Day dawns upon the mountain’s side.— 
There, Scotland! lay thy bravest pride, 
Chiefs, knights, and nobles, many a one; 
The sad survivors all are gone.— 
View not that corpse mistrustfully, 
Defaced and mangled though it be ; 
Nor to yon Border castle high 
Look northward with upbraiding eye ; 
Nor cherish hope in vain 
That, journeying far on foreign strand, 
The Royal Pilgrim to his land 
May yet return again, 


BRITISH POETS 


He saw the wreck his rashness wrought ; 

Reckless of life, he desperate fought, 
And fell on Flodden plain : 

And well in death his trusty brand, 

Firm clenched within his manly hand, 
Beseemed the monarch slain. 

But oh! how changed since yon blithe 

night !— 
Gladly I turn me from the sight 
Unto my tale again. 


Short is my tale :—Fitz-Eustace’ care 

A pierced and mangled body bare 

To moated Lichfield’s lofty pile ; 

And there, beneath the southern aisle, 

A tomb with Gothic sculpture fair 

Did long Lord Marmion’s image bear.— 

Now vainly for its site you look ; 

’T was levelled when fanatic Brook 

The fair cathedral stormed and took, 

But, thanks to Heaven and good Saint 
Chad, 

A guerdon meet the spoiler had !— 

There erst was martial Marmion found, 

His feet upon a couchant hound, 

His hands to heaven upraised ; 
And all around, on scutcheon rich, 
And tablet carved, and fretted niche, 
His arms and feats were blazed. 

And yet, though all was carved so fair, 

And priests for Marmion breathed the 
prayer, 

The last Lord Marmion lay not there. 

From Ettrick woods a peasant swain 

Followed his lord to Flodden plain,— 

One of those flowers whom plaintive lay 

In Scotland mourns as ‘*‘ wede away :” 

Sore wounded, Sibyl’s Cross he spied, 

And dragged him to its foot, and died 

Close by the noble Marmion’s side, 

The spoilers stripped and gashed the 
slain, 

And thus their corpses were mista’en ; 

And thus in the proud baron’s tomb 

The lowly woodsman took the room. 


Less easy task it were to show 
Lord Marmion’s nameless grave and low. 
They dug his grave e’en where he lay, 

But every mark is gone : 

Time’s wasting hand has done away 
The simple Cross of Sibyl Grey, 

And broke her font of stone ; 

But yet from out the little hill 
Oozes the slender springlet still. 

Oft halts the stranger there. 
For thence may best his curious eye 
The memorable field descry ; 

And shepherd boys repair 


SCOTT 


To seek the water-flag and rush, 
And rest them by the hazel bush, 
And plait théir garlands fair, 

Nor dream they sit upon the grave 

That holds the bones of Marmion 
brave.— 

When thou shalt find the little hill, 

With thy heart commune and be still. 

If ever in temptation strong 

Thou left’st the right path for the 

wrong, 

If every devious step thus trod 

Still led thee further from the road, 

Dread thou to speak presumptuous doom 

On noble Marmion’s lowly tomb ; 

But say, ‘‘ He died a gallant knight, 

With sword in hand, for England’s 
right.” 


I do not rhyme to that dull elf 

Who cannot image to himself 

That all through Flodden’s dismal night 

Wilton was foremost in the fight, 

That when brave Surrey’s steed was 

slain 

*Twas Wilton mounted him again; 

*Twas Wilton’s brand that deepest hewed 

Amid the spearmen’s stubborn wood : 

Unnamed by Holinshed or Hall, 

He was the living soul of all; 

That, after fight, his faith made plain, 

He won his rank and lands again, 

And charged his old paternal shield, 

With bearings won on Flodden Field. 

Nor sing I to that simple maid 

To whom it must in terms be said 

That king and kinsmen did agree 

To bless fair Clara’s constancy ; 

Who cannot, unless I relate, 

Paint to her mind the bridal’s state,— 

That Wolsey’s voice the blessing spoke, 

More, Sands, and Denny, passed the joke; 

That bluff King Hal the curtain drew, 

And Katherine’s hand the stocking 

threw ; 

And afterwards, formany a day, 

That it was held enough to say, 

In blessing to a wedded pair, 

** Love they like Wilton and like Clare !” 
November, 1806-—January, 1808. 

February 23, 1808. 


SOLDIER, REST! THY WARFARE 
O’ER 


SOLDIER, rest! thy warfare o’er, 
Sleep the sleep that knows not break- 


ing ; 
Dream of battled fields no more, 


199 


Days of danger, nights of waking. 
In our isle’s enchanted hall, 

Hands unseen thy couch arestrewing, 
Fairy strains of music fall, 

Every sense in slumber dewing. 
Soldier, rest! thy warfare o’er, 
Dream of fighting fields no more ; 
Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking, 
Morn of toil, nor night of waking. 


No rude sound shall reach thine ear, 
Armor’s clang, or war-steed champing, 
Trump nor pibroch summon here 
Mustering clan or squadron tramping. 
Yet the lark’s shrill fife may come 
At the daybreak from the fallow, 
And the bittern sound his drum, 
Booming from the sedgy shallow. 
Ruder sounds shall none be near, 
Guards nor warders challenge here, 
Here’s no war-steed’s neigh and champ- 
ing, ; 
Shouting clans or squadrons stamping. 


Huntsman, rest! thy chase is done ; 

While our slumbrous spells assail ye, 
Dream not, with the rising sun, 

Bugles here shall sound reveillé. 
Sleep! the deer is in his den ; 

Sleep! thy hounds are by thee lying: 
Sleep! nor dream in yonder glen 

How thy gallant steed lay dying. 
Huntsman, rest ! thy chase is done ; 
Think not of the rising sun, 
For at dawning to assail ye 
Here no bugles sound reveillé. 

From The Lady of the Lake, 1810. 


HAIL TO THE CHIEF WHO IN 
TRIUMPH ADVANCES! 


Hat to the Chief who in triumph ad- 
vances ! 
Honored and blessed be the ever-green 
Pine! 
Long may the tree, in his banner that 
glances, 
Flourish, the shelter and grace of our 
line! 
Heaven send it happy dew, 
Earth lend it sap anew, 
Gayly to bourgeon and broadly to grow, 
While every Highland glen 
Sends our shout back again, 
* Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho! 
ieroe !” 


Ours is no sapling, chance-sown by the 
fountain, 


160 





Blooming at Beltane, in winter to 
fade ; 
When the whirlwind has stripped every 
leaf on the mountain, 
The more shall Clan-Alpine exult in 
her shade. 
Moored in the rifted rock, 
Proof to the tempest’s shock, 
Firmer he roots him the ruder it blow ; 


Menteith and Breadalbane, then 
Echo his praise again, 
“ Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, ho! 
ieroe !” 
Proudly our pibroch has thrilled in Glen 
Fruin, 
And Bannochar’s groans to our slogan 
replied : 


Glen-Luss and Ross-dhu, they are smok- 
ing in ruin, 
And the best of Loch 
dead on her side. 
Widow and Saxon maid 
Long shall lament our raid, 
Think of Clan-Alpine with fear and 
with woe; 
Lennox and Leven-glen 
Shake when they hear again, 
‘*Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, 
ieroe !”’ 


Lomond lie 


ho ! 


Row, vassals, row, for the pride of the 
Highlands ! 
Stretch to your oars for the ever-green 
Pine ! 
O that the rosebud that graces yon is- 
lands 
Were wreathed ina garland around 
him to twine ! 
O that some seedling gem, 
Worthy such noble stem 
Honored and blessed in their 
might grow ! 
Loud should Clan-Alpine then 
Ring from her deepmost glen, 
‘*Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu, 
ieroe!” 
From The Lady of the Lake. 


shadow 


ho! 


CORON ACH 


HE is gone on the mountain, 
He is lost to the forest, 
Like a summer-dried fountain, 
When our need was the sorest. 
The font, reappearing 
From the rain-drops ‘shall borrow, 
But to us comes no cheering, 
To Duncan no morrow ! 





BRYETISHVEVELS 


The hand of the reaper 
Takes the ears that are hoary, 
But the voice of the weeper 
Wails manhood in glory. 
The autumn winds rushing 
Waft the leaves that are searest, 
But our flower was in flushing, 
When blighting was nearest. 


Fleet foot on the corre, 
Sage counsel in cumber, 
Red hand in the foray, 
How sound is thy slumber ! 
Like the dew on the mountain, 
Like the foam on the river, 
Like the bubble on the fountain, 
Thou art gone, and forever ! 
From The Lady of the Lake. 
HARP OF THE NORTH, FAREWELL! 
Harp of the North, farewell! The hills 
grow dark, 
On purple peaks a deeper shade de- 
scending ; 
In twilight copse the glow-worm lights 
her spark, 
The deer, half-seen, are to the covert 
wending. 
Resume thy wizard elm! the fountain | 
lending, 
And the wild breeze, why wilder min-. 
strelsy ; 
Thy numbers sweet with nature’s vespers 
blending, 
With distant echo from the fold and 
lea, 
And herd-boy’s evening pipe, and hum 
of housing bee. 


Yet, once again, farewell, thou Minstrel 
Harp! 
Yet, once again, forgive my feeble 
sway, 
And little reck I of the censure sharp 
May idly cavil at an idle lay. 
Much have I owed thy strains on lfe’s 
long way, 
Through secret woes the world has 
never known, 
When on the weary 
wearier day, 
And bitterer was the grief devoured 
alone.—- 
That [ o’erlive such woes, Enchantress ! 
is thine own. 


night dawned 


Hark be my lingering footsteps slow 
retire, 


SCOTT 


Some spirit of the Air has waked thy 


string ! 
Tis now a seraph bold, with touch of 
fire 
‘Tis now the brush of Fairy’s frolic 
wing. 


Receding now, the dying numbers ring 
Fainter and fainter down the rugged 
dell ; 
And now the mountain breezes scarcely 
bring 
A wandering witch-note of the distant 
spell— 
And now, ’tis silent all !—Enchantress, 
fare thee well! 


Conclusion of The Lady of the Lake. 
BRIGNALL BANKS 


During the composition of Rokeby Scott wrote 
to Morritt: ‘‘ There are two or three Songs, and 
particularly one in Praise of Brignall Banks, 
which I trust you will like—because, entre nous, 
Tlike them myself. One of them is a little dash- 
ne banditti song, called and entitled Allen-a- 

ale. 


O, BRIGNALL banks are wild and fair, 
And Greta woods are green, 

And you may gather garlands there 
Would grace a summer queen. 

And as I rode by Dalton-hall, 
Beneath the turrets high, 

A maiden on the castle wall 
Was singing merrily : 

**O, Brignall banks are fresh and fair, 
And Greta woods are green ; 

I’d rather rove with Edmund there 
Than reign our English queen.” 


‘Tf, maiden, thou wouldst wend with 


me, 

To leave both tower and town, 

Thou first must guess what life lead we 
That dwell by dale and down. 

And if thou canst that riddle read, 
As read full well you may, 

Then to the greenwood shalt thou speed, 
As blithe as Queen of May.” 

Yet sung she, ‘‘ Brignall banks are fair, 
And Greta woods are green ; 

I'd rather rove with Edmund there 
Than reign our English queen. 


“Tread you, by your bugle horn, 
And by your palfrey good, 
I read you for a ranger sworn 
To keep the king’s greenwood.” 
‘“ A ranger, lady, winds his horn, 
And ’tis at peep of light ; 
His blast is heard at merry morn, 
And mine at dead of night.” 
II 


161 


Yet sung she, ‘‘ Brignall banks are fair, 
And Greta woods are gay ; 

I would I were with Edmund there, 
To reign his Queen of May ! 


‘* With burnished brand and musketoon 
So gallantly you come, 

Tread you for a bold dragoon, 
That lists the tuck of drum.” 

‘*T list no more the tuck of drum, 
No more the trumpet hear ; 

But when the beetle sounds his hum, 
My comrades take the spear. 

And O, though Brignall banks be fair, 
And Greta woods be gay, 

Yet mickle must the maiden dare 
Would reign my Queen of May! 


**Maiden ! a nameless life I lead, 
A nameless death Pll die; 

The fiend whose lantern lights the mead 
Were better mate than I! 

And when I’m with my comrades met 
Beneath the greenwood bough, 

What once we were we all forget, 
Nor think what we are now. 

Yet Brignall banks are fresh and fair, 
And Greta woods are green, 

And you may gather garlands there 
Would grace a summer queen.” 

From Rokeby, 1813. 


ALLEN-A-DALE 


ALLEN-a-Dale has no fagot for burning, 

Allen-a-Dale has no furrow for turning, 

Allen a-Dale has no fleece for the spin- 
ning, 

Yet Allen-a-Dale has red gold for the 
winning. 

Come, read me my riddle ! come, heark- 
en my tale! 

And tell me the craft of bold Allen-a-Dale. 


The Baron of Ravensworth prances in 
pride, 

And he views his domains upon Arkin- 
dale side. 

The mere for his net and the land for 
his game, 

The chase for the wild and the park for 
the tame : 

Yet the fish of the lake and the deer of 
the vale 

Are less free to Lord Dacre than Allen- 
a-Dale ! 


Allen-a-Dale was ne’er belted a knight, 
Though his spur be as sharp and his 
blade be as bright ; 


162 


Allen-a-Dale is no baron or lord, 

Yet twenty tall yeomen will draw at his 
word ; 

And the best of our nobles his bonnet 
will vail, 

Who at Rere-cross on Stanmore meets 
Allen-a-Dale ! 


Allen-a-Dale to his wooing is come ; 

The mother, she asked of his household 
and home: 

‘Though the castle of Richmond stand 
fair on the hill, 

My hall,” quoth bold Allen, 
gallanter still ; 

’Tis the blue vault of heaven, with its 
crescent so pale 

And with all its bright spangles !” said 
Allen-a-Dale. 


** shows 


The father was steel and the mother 
was stone; 

They lifted the latch and they bade him 
be gone ; 

But loud on the morrow their wail and 
their cry: 

He had laughed on the lass with his 
bonny black eye, 

And she fled to the forest to hear a love- 
tale, 

And the youth it was told by was Allen- 
a-dale ! 


From Rokeby, 1813. 
HIE AWAY, HIE AWAY 


HIE away, hie away, 
Over bank and over brae, 
Where the copsewood is the greenest, 
Where the fountains glisten sheenest, 
Where the lady-fern grows strongest, 
Where the morning dew lies longest, 
Where the black-cock sweetest sips it, 
Where the fairy latest trips it : 
Hie to haunts right seldom seen, 
Lovely, lonesome, cool, and green, 
Over bank and over brae, 
Hie away, hie away. 


From Waverley, 1814. 
TWIST YE, TWINE YE! EVEN SO 


TWIST ye, twine ye! even so, 
Mingle shades of joy and woe, 

Hope and fear and peace and strife, 
In the thread of human life. 


While the mystic twist is spinning, 
And the infant’s life beginning, 


BRITISH POETS 





Dimly seen through twilight bending, 
Lo, what varied shapes attending ! 


Passions wild and follies vain, 
Pleasures soon exchanged for pain ; 
Doubt and jealousy and fear, 

In the magic dance appear. 


Now they wax and now they dwindle, 
Whirling with the whirling spindle, 
Twist ye, twine ye! even so 
Mingle human bliss and woe. 

From Guy Mannering, 1815. 


WASTED, WEARY, WHEREFORE 
STAY 


WASTED, weary, wherefore stay, 
Wrestling thus with earth and clay ? 
From the body pass away ;— 

Hark! the mass is singing. 


From thee doff thy mortal weed, 

Mary Mother be thy speed, 

Saints to help thee at thy need ;— 
Hark ! the knell is ringing. 


Fear not snow-drift driving fast, 
Sleet or hail or levin blast ; 
Soon the shroud shall lap thee fast, 
And the sleep be on thee cast 
That shall ne’er know waking. 


Haste thee, haste thee, to be gone, 
Earth flits fast, and time draws on,— 
Gasp thy gasp, and groan thy groan, 
Day is near the breaking. 
From Guy Mannering. 


JOCK O’ HAZELDEAN 


‘WHY weep ye by the tide. ladie ? 

Why weep ye by the tide? 

Tll wed ye to my youngest son, 
And ye sall be his bride: 

And ye sall be his bride, ladie, 
Sae comely to be seen ”’— 

But aye she loot the tears down fa’ 
For Jock o’ Hazeldean. 


‘¢ Now let this wilfu’ grief be done, 

And dry that cheek so pale ; 

Young Frank is chief of Errington 
And lord of Langley-dale ; 

His step is first in peaceful ha’, 
His sword in battle keen ”— 

But aye she loot the tears down fa’ 
For Jock o’ Hazeldean. 


SCOUT 


163 





*¢ A chain of gold ye sall not lack, 
Nor braid to bind your hair ; 
Nor mettled hound, nor managed 
hawk, ; 
Nor palfrey fresh and fair ; 
And you, the foremost o’ them a’, 
Shall ride our forest queen.” — 
But aye she loot the tears down fa’ 
For Jock o’ Hazeldean. 


The kirk was decked at morning-tide, 
The tapers glimmered fair ; 
The priest and bridegroom wait the 
bride, 
And dame and knight are there. 
ala 3 sought her baith by bower and 
ay 
The ladie was not seen ! 
She’s o’er the Border and awa’ 


Wi Jock o’ Hazeldean. 1816. 


PIBROCH OF DONALD DHU 


PIBROCH of Donuil Dhu, 
Pibroch of Donuil, 

Wake thy wild voice anew, 
Summon Clan Conuil. 

Come away, come away, 
Hark to the summons! 

Come in your war array, 
Gentles and commons. 


Come from deep glen and 
From mountain so rocky, 

The war-pipe and pennon 
Are at Inverlochy. 

Come every hill-plaid and 
True heart that wears one, 

Come every steel blade and 
Strong hand that bears one. 


Leave untended the herd, 
The flock without shelter ; 
Leave the corpse uninterred, 
The bride at the altar ; 
Leave the deer, leave the steer, 
Leave nets and barges: 
Come with your fighting gear, 
Broadswords and targes. 


Come as the winds come when 
Forests are rended ; 

Come as the waves come when 
Navies are stranded : 

Faster come, faster come, 
Faster and faster, 

Chief, vassal, page and groom, 
Tenant and master. 


Fast they come, fast they come; 
See how they gather ! 

Wide waves the eagle plume, 
Blended with heather. 

Cast your plaids, draw your blades, 
Forward each man set ! 

Pibroch of Donuil Dhu, 
Knell for the onset ! 1816. 

TIME 


‘Why sit’st thou by that ruined hall, 
Thou aged carle so stern and gray ? 
Dost thou its former pride recall, 
Or ponder how it passed away ? ” 


‘“*Know’st thou not me?” the Deep 
Voice cried : 
“So long enjoyed, so oft misused— 
Alternate, in thy fickle pride, 
Desired, neglected, and accused ! 


‘‘ Before my breath, like blazing flax, 
Man and his marvels pass away ! 

And changing empires wane and wax, 
Are founded, flourish, and decay. 


‘‘Redeem mine hours—the space is 
brief— 

While in my glass the sand-grains 
shiver, 


And measureless thy joy or grief, 
When Time and thou shalt part for- 
ever!” 
From The Antiquary, 1816. 


CAVALIER SONG 


AnD what though winter will pinch 
severe 
Through locks of gray and a cloak 
that ’s old, 
Yet keep up thy heart, bold cavalier, 
For a cup of sack shall fence the cold. 


For time will rust the brightest blade, 
And years will break the strongest 
bow ; 
Was never wight so starkly made, 
But time and years would overthrow, 


From Old Mortality, 1816. 
CLARION 


SounpD, sound the clarion, fill the fife ! 
To all the sensual world proclaim, 
One crowded hour of glorious life 
Is worth an age without a name. 


From Old Mortality, 1816. 


164 





BRITISH POETS 





THE SUN UPON THE WEIRDLAW 
HILL 


“It was while struggling with such languor, 
on one lovely evening of this autumn [1817], 
that he composed the following beautiful verses. 
They mark the very spot of their birth,—namely, 
the then naked height overhanging the northern 
side of the Cauldshields Loch, from which Mel- 
rose Abbey to the eastward, and the hills of Et- 
trick and Yarrow to the west. are now visible 
over a wide range of rich woodland,—all the 
work of the poet’s hand.” Lockhart’s Life of 
Scott, Chapter 39. 


THE sun upon the Weirdlaw Hill 
In Ettrick’s vale is sinking sweet ; 

The westland wind is hush and still, 
The lake lies sleeping at my feet. 

Yet not the landscape to mine eye 
Bears those bright hues that once it 

bore, 

Though evening with her richest dye 

Flames o’er the hills of Ettrick’s shore. 


With listless look along the plain 
I see Tweed’s silver current glide, 
And coldly mark the holy fane 
Of Melrose rise in ruined pride. 
The quiet lake, the balmy air, 
The hill, the stream, the tower, the 
tree— 
Are they still such as once they were, 
Or is the dreary change in me? 


Alas! the warped and broken board, 
How can it bear the painter’s dye ? 
The harp of strained and tuneless chord, 

How to the minstrel’s skill reply ? 
To aching eyes each landscape lowers, 
To feverish pulse each gale blows 
chill ; 
And Araby’s or Eden’s bowers 
Were barren as this moorland hill. 
1817. 


PROUD MAISIE 

PROUD Maisie is in the wood, 
Walking so early ; 

Sweet Robin sits on the bush, : 
Singing so rarely. 


“Tell me, thou bonny bird, 
When shall I marry me?” 

‘* When six braw gentlemen 
Kirkward shall carry ye.” 


** Who makes the bridal bed, 
Birdie, say truly ?” 

‘The gray-headed sexton 
That delves the grave duly. 





“The glow-worm o’er grave and stone 
Shall light thee steady. 

The owl from the steeple sing, 
‘Welcome, proud lady.’” 


From The Heart of Midlothian, 1818. 
TRUE-LOVE, AN THOU BE TRUE 


TRUE-LOVE, an thou be true, 
Thou hast ane kittle part to play, 
For fortune, fashion, fancy, and thou 
Maun strive for many a day. 


I’ve kend by mony a friend’s tale, 
Far better by this heart of mine, 

What time and change of fancy avail, 
A true love-knot to untwine. 


From The Bride of Lammermoor, 1819. 
REBECCA’ 8 HYMN 


WHEN Israel of the Lord beloved 
Out from the land of bondage came, 
Her fathers’ God before her moved, 
An awful guide in smoke and flame. 
By day, along the astonished lands 
The cloudy pillar glided slow ; 
By night, Arabia’s crimsoned. sands 
Returned the fiery column’s glow. 


There rose the choral hymn of praise, 
And trump and timbrel answered 
keen, 
And Zion’s daughters poured their lays, 
With priest’s and warrior’s voice be- 
tween. 
No portents now our foes amaze, 
Forsaken Israel wanders lone : 
Our fathers would not know Thy ways, 
And Thou hast left them to their own. 


But present still, though now unseen, 
When brightly shines the prosperous 
day, 
Be thoughts of Thee a cloudy screen 
To temper the deceitful ray ! 
And O, when stoops on Judah’s path 
In shade and storm the frequent 
night, 
Be Thou, long-suffering, slow to wrath, 
A burning and a shining light ! 


Our harps we left by Babel’s streams, 
The tyrant’s jest, the Gentile’s scorn ; 
No censer round our altar beams, 
And mute are timbrel, harp, and horn, 
But Thou hast said, The blood of goat, 
The flesh of rams I will not prize ; 


SCOTT 


A contrite heart, a humble thought, 
Are mine accepted sacrifice. 
From Ivanhoe, 1818. 


BORDER BALLAD 


Marcu, march, Ettrick and Teviotdale, 
Why the deil dinna ye march forward 
in order ? 
March, march, Eskdale and Liddesdale, 
All the Blue Bonnets are bound for 
the border, 
Many a banner spread, 
Flutters above your head, 
Many a crest that is famous in story, 
Mount and make ready then, 
Sons of the mountain glen, 
Fight for the Queen and our old Scot- 
tish glory. 


Come from the hills where your hirsels 
are grazing, 
Come from the glen of the buck and 
the roe ; 
Come to the crag where the beacon is 
blazing. 
Come with the buckler, the lance, and 
the bow. 
Trumpets are sounding, 
War-steeds are bounding, 
Stand to your arms and march in good 
order ; 
England shall many a day 
Tell of the bloody fray, 
When the Blue Bonnets came over the 
the Border. 
From The Monastery, 1820. 


LIFE 


YoutH! thou wear’st to manhood now ; 

Darker lip and darker brow, 

Statelier step, more pensive mien, 

In thy face and gait are seen: 

Thou must now _ brook 

watches, 

Take thy food and sport by snatches ! 

For the gambol and the jest 

Thou wert wont to love the best, 

Graver follies must thou follow, 

But as senseless, false, and hollow. 
From The Abbot, 1820. 


COUNTY GUY 


AH! County Guy, the hour is nigh, 
The sun has left the lea, 

The orange flower perfumes the bower, 
The breeze is on the sea, 


midnight 


165 


———_ 


The lark his lay who thrilled all day 
Sits hushed his partner nigh: 

Breeze, bird, and flower confess the hour, 
But where is County Guy? 


The village maid steals through the 
shade, 
Her shepherd’s suit to hear ; 
To beauty shy by lattice high, 
Sings high-born Cavalier. 
The star of Love, all stars above 
Now reigns o’er earth and sky ; 
And high and low the influence know— 
But where is County Guy? 
From Quentin Durward, 1828. 


BONNY DUNDEE 


To the Lords of Convention ’t was Clav- 
er’se who spoke, 

as Ere the King’s crown shall fall there 
are crowns to be broke; 

So let each Cavalier who lov es honor 


and me, 
Come follow the bonnet of Bonny Dun- 
dee, 
Come fill up my cup, come fill up 
my can, 


Come saddle your horses and call up 
your men ; 

Come open the West Port and let 
me gang free, 

And it’s room for 
Bonny Dundee!” 


the bonnets of 


Dundee he is mounted, he rides up the 
street, 

The bells are rung backward, the drums 
they are beat ; 

But the Provost, douce man, said, ‘‘ Just 
e’en let him be, 

The Gude Town is weel quit of that Deil 
of Dundee.” 

Come fill up my cup, ete. 


As he rode down the sanctified bends of 
the Bow, 

Ilk carline was flyting and shaking her 
pow 3 

But the young plants of grace they 
looked couthie and slee, 

Thinking luck to thy bonnet, thou 
Bonny Dundee! 

Come fill up my cup, etc. 


With sour-featured Whigs the Grass- 
market was crammed, 

As if half the West had set ‘tryst to be 
hanged ; 


166 


There was spite in each look, there was 
fear in each e’e, 
As they watched for the bonnets of 
Bonny Dundee. 
Come fill up my cup, etc. 


These cowls of Kilmarnock had spits 
and had spears, 

And lang-hafted gullies to kill cava- 
liers ; 

But they shrunk to close-heads and the 
causeway was free, 

At the toss of the bonnet of Bonny Dun- 
dee. 

Come fill up my cup, etc. 


He spurred to the foot of the proud 
Castle rock, 

And with the gay Gordon he gallantly 
spoke ; 

** Let Mons Meg and her marrows speak 
twa words or three, 

For the love of the bonnet of Bonny 
Dundee.” 

Come fill up my cup, etc. 


The Gordon demands of him which way 
he goes — 

‘*Where’er shall direct me the shade of 
Montrose ! 

Your Grace in short space shall hear 
tidings of me, 

Or that low lies the bonnet of Bonny 
Dundee. 

Come fill up my cup, etc. 


“There are hills beyond Pentland and 
lands beyond Forth, 

If there’s lords in the Lowlands, there’s 
chiefs in the North; 

There are wild Duniewassals three thou- 
sand times three, 

Will cry hoigh/ for the bonnet of Bonny 
Dundee. 

Come fill up my cup, etc. 


‘‘There’s brass on the target of barkened 
bull-hide ; 

There’s steel in the scabbard that dangles 
beside ; 

The brass shall be burnished, the steel 
shall flash free, 

Ata toss of the bonnet of Bonny Dun- 
dee. 

Come fill up my cup, etc. 


BRITISH -POETS 


‘‘Away to the hills, to the caves, to the 
rocks — 
Ere Lown an usurper, Ill couch with the 


fox ; 
And tremble, false Whigs, in the mids 
of your glee, 
You have not seen the last of my bonnet 
and me!” 
Come fill up my cup, etc. 


He waved his proud hand and the 
trumpets were blown, 
The kettle-drums clashed and the horse- . 
men rode on, 
Till on Ravelston’s cliffs and on Cler- 
miston’s lee 
Died away the wild war-notes of Bonny 
Dundee. 
Come fill up my cup, come fill up 
my can, 
Come saddle the horses and call up 
the men, 
Come open your gates and let me 
gae free, 
For its up with the bonnets of 
Bonny Dundee! 
December, 1825. 1830. 


HEALTH TO “KING 
CHARLES 


BRING the bowl which you boast, 
Fill it up to the brim ; 
’T is to him we love most, 
And to all who love him. 
Brave gallants, stand up, 
And avaunt ye, base carles! 
Were there death in the cup, 
Here’s a health to King Charles. 


HERE’S A 


Though he wanders through dangers, 
Unaided, unknown, . 
Dependent on strangers, 
Estranged from his own; 
Though ’t is under our breath, 
Amidst forfeits and perils, 
Here’s to honor and faith, 
And a health to King Charles! 


Let such honors abound 
As the time can afford, 
The knee on the ground, 
And the hand on the sword ; 
But the time shall come round 
When, ’mid Lords, Dukes, and Earls, 
The loud trumpet shall sound, 
Here’s a health to King Charles! 
From Woodstock, 1826. 


BYRON 


LIST OF REFERENCES 
EDITIONS 


* * Tue standard edition is that published by Murray, London, 1898— 
_ 1904, in 13 volumes: Letters and Journals, 6 volumes, edited by R. E. 

Prothero ; Poetical Works, 7 volumes, edited by E. H. Coleridge. 

Poetical Works, Riverside Edition, 5 volumes, Houghton & Mifflin. 
Poetical Works, Oxford Edition, 1 volume. * Poetical Works, Cambridge 
Edition, edited by Paul E. More (the best one-volume edition). 


BioGRAPHY 


* Moore (Thomas), The Letters and Journals of Lord Byron, with 
Notices of his Life, 1830, (the standard biography, though unreliable on 
many points). Gaur (J ohn), Lite of Lord Byron, 1830 (based in part on 
Moore’s Life). Monpvor (Armand), Histoire de la Vie et des Kcrits de Lord 
Byron, Paris, 1860. Lescurr (Adolphe), Lord Byron, Histoire un Homme, 
Paris, 1866. Eze (Karl), Lord Byron, Berlin, 1870 ; English translation, 
London, 1872. CasreLar (Emilio), Vida de Lord Byron, Madrid, 1878 ; 
English translation, London, 1875. *Nicnot (John), Byron (English 
Men of Letters Series), 1880 (the best brief biography). JEAFrFRESON 
(J. C.), The Real Lord Byron, 18838. Norn (Roden), Lord Byron (Great 
Writers Series), 1887. AckrRMANN (Richard), Lord Byron, sein Leben, 
seine Werke, Heidelberg, 1901. 


PERSONAL REMINISCENCES AND EARLY CRITICISM 


Merpwin (Thomas), Conversations of Lord Byron, 1824. Danas 
(R. C.), Recollections of Lord Byron, from 1808 to 1814, 1824. GamBa 
(Pietro), A Narrative of Lord Byron’s Last Journey to Greece, 1825. 
Hunt (Leigh), Lord Byron and some of his Contemporaries, 1828. Hunt 
(Leigh), Autobiography. Grom (Hermann), Fiinfzehn Essays: Lord 
Byron und Leigh Hunt. 

Macavtay (T. B.), Edinburgh Review, 1831: Moore’s Life of Byron. 
Also in his Essays. Disrarri (B.), Venetia (Portrait of Byron). JEerrrey 
(Lord Francis), Edinburgh Review: No. 38, Art. 10, Childe Harold; No. 
42, Art. 2, The Giaour; No. 45, Art. 9, The Corsair and Bride of Abydos : 

167 


168 BRITISH Seer s 


No. 54, Art. 1, Byron’s Poetry; No. 56, Art. 7, Manfred ; No. 58, Art. 2, 
Beppo ; No. 70, Art. 1, Marino Faliero ; No. 72, Art. 5, Byron’s Tragedies. 
Also in his Critical Essays. SourHEY (R.), Essays, 1832. Dr Quincey 
(T.), Reminiscences. TRELAWNEY (EH. J.), Recollections of Shelley and 
Byron, 1858. Gur1ccroxir (Countess), Lord Byron jugé par les Témoins de 
sa Vie, Paris, 1868; English translation by Jerningham—My Recollec- 
tions of Lord Byron and Those of Eye-Witnesses of His Life—London, 
1869. Procrer (B. W.), Autobiography. Hueo (V.), Littérature et 
Philosophie, 1834. 


LATER CRITICISM, ETC. 


* Arnotp (M.), Essays in Criticism. Barsry D’Avurevitity (Jules), 
Littérature étrangere. Buiaze pre Bury (Henri), Tableaux Romantiques 
de Littérature et @Art. Branprs (G. M. C.), Shelley und Lord Byron: 
Zwei litterarische Charakterbilder. * Branpres (G. M. C.), Die Haupt- 
str6mungen in der Litteratur des neunzehnten Jahrhunderts, Vol. IV. 
CuESTERTON (G. K.), Twelve Types: The Optimism of Byron. Darmgss- 
TETER (James), Essais de Littérature anglaise. Dowprn (Edward), The 
French Revolution and English Literature: Essay VI. Downpmn (Kd- 
ward), Studies in Literature: French Revolution and Literature. Hur- 
TON (Rh. H.), Essays in Literary Criticism. Krnesitey (Charles), Works: 
Thoughts on Shelley and Byron. Lororre—Ronpi (Andrea), Nelle Let- 
terature straniere. Mazzinr (G), Essays. * More (Paul E.), Atlantic 
Monthly, Dec., 1898: The Wholesome Revival of Byron. Noxn (R.), 
Essays on Poetry and Poets: Lord Byron and His Times. * Morty 
(John), Miscellanies, Vol. I. Ossoxrr (Margaret F.), Art, Literature and 
the Drama. Rosserrr (W. M.) Lives of Famous Poets. * Scamipt 
(Julian), Portraits aus dem neunzehnten Jahrhundert: Lord Byron. 
SWINBURNE (A. C.), Miscellanies: Wordsworth and Byron. * SwInBuRNE 
(A. C.), Essays and Studies. *Symonps (J. A.), In Ward’s English Poets, 
VolLIV. * Taine (H.), History of English Literature, Vol.IV. * TRenT 
(W. P.), Authority of Criticism: The Byron Revival. * Warrs—DunTon 
(T.), In Chambers’ New Cyclopedia of English Literature, * WoopBERRY 
(G. E.), Makers of Literature. 

Brooks (8. W.), English Poets. Caine (T. Hall), Cobwebs of Criti- 
cism. CourTHoPE (William J.), Liberal Movement in English Literature. 
Dawson (W. J.), Makers of Modern English. Drvry (J.), Modern 
English Poets. -Dixon (W. M.), English Poetry. Friswexi (J. H.), Es- 
says on English Writers. Hancock (A. E.), French Revolution and the 
English Poets. Haywarp (A.), Sketches of Eminent Statesmen and 
Writers, with other Essays. Mrnein (Urbain), L’Italie des Romantiques. 
Minto (W.), The Georgian Era. Monti (Giulio), Studi Critici. Morr 
(D. M.), Sketches of the Poetical Literature of the Past Half-Century, 
1851. Napa (E.S.), Essays at Home. Nisarp (Désiré), Portraits et 
Etudes d’Histoire littéraire. Rrzp (H.), Lectures on the British Poets. 
SAUNDERS (F.), Famous Books. ScuuyLter (Eugene), Italian Influences. 


BYRON 169 


SHArP (R. F.), Arehitects of English Literature. Srrerer (J. 8.), Book of 
Essays. Swanwick (A.), Poets the Interpreters of Their Age. TucksEr- 
MAN (Henry T’.), Notes on the Poets. 


Byron’s INFLUENCE ON THE CONTINENT 

See BranpEs, Eze, CasTeLar, Taine, Menein, Monti, Nisarp, Mon- 
pot, Lescurr, Huao, etc., above; and Lamarrine and Gautikrr, below. 

ACKERMANN (Richard), Lord Byron: sein Leben, seine Werke, sein 
Einfluss auf die Deutsche Litteratur. Crark (W.J.), Byron und die Ro- 
mantische Periode in Frankreich (Inaugural Dissertation). Dumas, 
Memoires, Vol. IX, Chap. 6, 7 and 8. * Gorrne, Conversations with 
Eckermann. Honrnnausen (E. P. A.), Rousseau, Gothe, Byron, ein 
Kritisch-literarischer Umriss aus Ethischchristlichem Standpunkt. Lam- 
ARTINE, Le dernier Chant de Childe Harold. Lorenzo y d’Ayor (Man- 
uel), Shakespere, Lord Byron, y Chateaubriand, como modelos de la Ju- 
ventud Literaria. Merncuror (Felix), Heinrich Heine’s Verhaltnis zu 
Lord Byron. Muon (Guido), La Fama del Byron, e il Byronismo in Italia. 
Musser (A. de), La Coupe et les Lévres (Dédicace), Lettre 4 Lamartine, 
Namouna, ete. Purcuor, (A.), Essai sur la Vie, le Caractére, et. le Génie de 
Lord Byron. Pons (Gaspard de), Annales romantiques, 1826: Bona- 
parte et Byron. Satnre-Bruve, Chateaubriand et son Groupe littéraire, 
Vol. I, Chap. 15. Sanp (George), Histoire de ma Vie, Vol. III. Svrrenp- 
HAL, Racine et Shakespeare. Scumrpt (G. B. O.), Rousseau und Byron: 
Ein Beitrag zur Vergleichenden Litteratur-Geschichte des Revolutions- 
zeitalters. Wrppicen (Friedrich H. O.), Lord Byron’s Einfluss auf die 
Europaischen Litteraturen der Neuzeit. 


TRIBUTES IN VERSE, ETC. 
® 
Lamartine, Méditations poétiques, 1820: L’Homme, a Lord Byron. 
SHELLEY, Julian and Maddalo, 1818; Fragment to Byron, 1818; Sonnet 
to Byron, 1821. Kears, Sonnet to Byron. Gautter, Poésies, Vol. I. 
Lana, Letters to Dead Authors. Warson (William), Epigrams: Byron 
the Voluptuary. 


BrsLtioGRAPHY 


* CoLtertpGe (EK. H.), in Vol. VIT. of his edition of the Poetical Works. 
ANDERSON (J. P.), Appendix to Noel’s Lite of Byron. 


BYRON 


LACHIN Y GAIR 


AWAY, ye gay landscapes, ye 
of roses! 
In you let the minions of luxury rove ; 
Restore me the rocks, where the snow- 
flake reposes, 
Though still they are sacred to freedom 
and love: 


gardens 


Yet, Caledonia, beloved are thy moun-— 


tains, 
Round their white summits though 
elements war ; 
Though cataracts foam ’stead of smooth- 
flowing fountains, 
I sigh for the valley of dark Loch na 
Garr. 


Ah! there my young footsteps in infancy 
wander’d ; 
My cap was the bonnet, my cloak was 
the plaid ; 
On chieftains long perish’d my memory 
ponder’d, 
As daily I strode through the pine- 
cover’d glade; . 
I sought not my home till the day’s 
dying glory 
Gave plage to the rays of the bright 
polar star ; 


For fancy was cheer’d by traditional 
story, 
Disclosed by the natives of dark Loch 
na Garr. 


‘* Shades of the dead! have I not heard 
your voices 
Rise on the night-rolling breath of the 
gale?’ 
Surely the soul of the hero rejoices, 
And rides on the wind, o’er his own 
Highland vale. 
Round Loch na Garr while the stormy 
mist gathers, 
Winter presides in his cold icy car : 
Clouds there encircle the forms of my 
fathers ; 
They dwell in the tempestsof dark 
Loch na Garr. 


‘« T1l-starr’d, though brave, did no visions 
foreboding 
Tell you that fate had forsaken your 
cause ?” 
Ah! were you destined to die at Culloden, 
Victory crown’d not your fall with 
applause : 
Still were you happy in death’s earthly 
slumber, 
You rest with your clan in the caves of 
Braemar : 
The pibroch resounds, to the piper’s loud 
number, 
Your deeds on the echoes of dark Loch 
na Garr. 


Years have roll’d on, Loch na Garr, since 
I left you, 
Years must elapse ere I tread you 
again : 
Nature of verdure and flow’rs has bereft 
you, 
Yet still are you dearer than Albion’s 
plain. 
England! thy beauties are tame and 
domestic 
To one who has roved o’er the moun- 
tains afar: . 
Oh for the crags that are wild and 
majestic ! 
The steep frowning glories of dark 
Loch na Garr. 1807.1 


MAID OF ATHENS, ERE WE PART 
Zon “ov, oa¢ ayaTto 


Marp of Athens, ere we part, 
Give, oh, give me back my heart! 
Or, since that has left my breast, 
Keep it now, and take the rest ! 
Hear my v ow before I go, 

Zon mov, oa¢ ayano., 


1The dates for Byron’s poems are made up 
chiefly from the very full accounts of their writ- 
ing and publication given in the notes to E. H. 
Coleridge’s splendid edition. 


170 


BYRON 


By those tresses unconfined, 

Woo’d by each Aigean wind ; 

By those lids whose jetty fringe 

Kiss thy soft cheeks’ blooming tinge ; 
By those wild eyes like the roe, 


Zon gov, cag ayaTro, 


By that lip I long to taste ; 

By that zone-encircled waist ; 

By all the token-flowers that tell 
What words can never speak so well ; 
By love’s alternate joy and woe, 

Zon “ov, oac ay ara, 


Maid of Athens ! Iam gone: 
Think of me, sweet! when alone. 
Though I fly to Istambol, 
Athens holds my heart and soul; 
Can I cease to love thee ? No! 


Zon “ov, oa¢ ayara, 1810. 1812. 


AND THOU ART DEAD, AS YOUNG 
AND FAIR 


““Heu, quanto minus est cum reliquis versari 
quam tui meminisse !’ 


AND thou art dead, as young and fair 
As aught of mortal birth ; 

And form so soft, and charms so rare, 
Too soon return’d to Earth! 

Though Earth received them in her bed 

And o’er the spot the crowd may tread 
In carelessness or mirth, 

There is.an eye which could not brook 

A moment on that grave to look. 


I will not ask where thou liest low, 
Nor gaze upon the spot ; 

There flowers or weeds at will may grow, 
So I behold them not : 

It is enough for me to prove 

That what I loved, and long must love, 
Like common earth can rot; 

To me there needs no stone to tell, 

*Tis Nothing that I loved so well. 


Yet did I love thee to the last 
As fervently as thou, 
Who didst not change through all the 


past, 
And canst not alter now. 
The love where Death has set his seal, 
Nor age can chill, nor rival steal, 
Nor falsehood disavow : 
And, what were worse, thou canst not 
see 
Or wrong, or change, or fault in me. 


rae 


The better days of life were ours ; 
The worst can be but mine ; 
The sun that cheers, the storm that 
lowers, 
Shall never more be thine. 
The silence of that dreamless sleep 
I envy now too much to weep ; 
Nor need I to repine, 
That all those charms have pass’d away ; 
I might have watch’d through long 
decay. 


The flower in ripen’d bloom unmateclh’d 
Must fall the earliest prey ; 

Though by no hand untimely snatch'd, 
The leaves must drop away ; 

And yet it were a greater grief 

To watch it withering leaf by leaf, 
Than see it pluck’d to-day ; 

Since earthly eye but ill can bear 

To trace the change to foul from fair. 


I know not if I could have borne 
To see thy beauties fade ; 

The night that follow’d such a morn 
Had worn a deeper shade ; 

Thy day without a cloud hath pass’d, 

And thou wert lovely to the last ; 
Extinguish’d, not decay’d ; 

As stars “that shoot along the sky 

Shine brightest as they fall from high. 


As once I wept, if I could weep, 
My tears might well be shed, 

To think I was not near to keep 
One vigil o’er thy bed ; 

To gaze, how fondly ! on thy face, 

To fold thee in a faint embrace, 
Uphold thy drooping head ; 

And show that love, however vain, 

Nor thou nor I can feel again. 


Yet how much less it were to gain, 
Though thou hast left me free, 

The loveliest things that still remain, 
Than thus remember thee ! 

The all of thine that cannot die 

Through dark and dread Eternity 
Returns again to me, 

And more thy buried love endears 

Than aught except its living years. 

February, 1812. 1812. 


WHEN WE TWO PARTED 


WHEN we two parted 
In silence and tears, 

Half broken-hearted 
To sever for years, 


ie 





Pale grew thy cheek and cold, 
Colder thy kiss ; 

Truly that hour foretold 
Sorrow to this. 


The dew of the morning 
Sunk chill on my brow— 

It felt like the warning 
Of what I feel now. 

Thy vows are all broken, 
And light is thy fame: 

I hear thy name spoken, 
And share in its shame, 


They name thee before me, 
A knell to mine ear; 

A shudder comes o’er me— 
Why wert thou so dear ? 
They know not I knew thee, 
Who knew thee too well : 
Long, long shall I rue thee, 

Too deeply to tell. 


In secret we met— 
In silence I grieve, 

That thy heart could forget, 
Thy spirit deceive. 

If Ishould meet thee 
After long years, 

How should I greet thee ?— 
With silence and tears. 

Fexvcaton LOLo: 


THE BRIDE OF ABYDOS 


A TURKISH TALE 


* Had we never loved so kindly, 
Had we never loved so blindly, 
Never met or never parted, 
We had ne’er been broken-hearted.”’—BURNS. 


CANTO THE FIRST 


KNow ye the land where the cypress and 
myrtle 
Are emblems of deeds that are done in 
their clime ? 
Where the rage of the vulture, the love 
of the turtle, 
Now melt into sorrow, now madden to 
crime ! 
Know ye the land of the cedar and vine, 
Where the flowers ever blossom, the 
beams ever shine: 
Where the light wings of Zephyr, op- 
press’d with perfume, 
Wax faint o’er the gardens of Gal in her 
bloom ; 
Where the citron and olive are fairest of 
fruit, 


BRITISH POETS 


And the voice of the nightingale never 
is mute: 

Where the tints of the earth, and the 
hues of the sky, 

In color though varied, in beauty may 
vie, 

And the purple of ocean is deepest in 
dye; 

Where the virgins are soft as the roses 
they twine, 

Andall, save the spirit of man, is divine ? 

'T is the clime of the East ; ’t is the land 
of the Sun— 

Can he smile on such deeds as his chil- 
dren have done? 

Oh! wild as the accents of lovers’ fare- 
well 

Are the hearts which they bear, and the 
tales which they tell. 


Begirt with many a gallant slave, 
Apparell’d as becomes the brave, 
Awaiting each his lord’s behest 
To guide his steps, or guard his rest, 
Old Giaffir sate in his Divan: 
Deep thought was in his aged eye ; 
And though the face of Mussulman 
Not oft betrays to standers by 
The mind within, well skill’d to hide 
All but unconquerable pride, 
His pensive cheek and pondering brow 
Did more than he was wont avow. 


‘Let the chamber be clear’d.”—The 
train disappear’d.— 
‘* Now call me the chief of the Haram 
guards 
With Giaffir is none but his only son, 
And the Nubian awaiting the Sire’s 
award. 
‘¢ Haroun—when all the crowd that wait 
Are pass’d beyond the outer gate, 
(Woe to the head whose eye beheld 
My child Zuleika’s face unveil’d !) 
Hence, lead my daughter from her 
tower ; 
Her fate is fix’d this very hour : 
Yet not to her repeat my thought ; 
By me alone be duty taught!” 





‘* Pacha! to hear is to obey.” 

No more must slave to despot say— 

Then to the tower had ta’en his way, 

But here young Selim silence brake, 
First lowly rendering reverence meet ; 

And downcast look’d and gently spake, 
Still standing at the Pacha’s feet : 

For son of Moslem must expire, 

Ere dare to sit before his sire! 


BYRON 


‘* Father ! 
chide 
My sister, or her sable guide, 
Know—for the fault, if fault there be, 
Was mine, then fall thy frowns on me— 
So lovelily the morning shone, 
That-—let the old and weary sleep— 
I eould not ; and to view alone 
The fairest scenes of land and deep, 
With none to listen and reply 
To thoughts with which my heart beat 
high 
Were irksome—for whate’er my mood, 
In sooth I love not solitude ; 
lon Zuleika’s slumber broke, 
And, as thou knowest that for me 
Soon turns the Haram’s grating key, 
Before the guardian slaves awoke 
We to the cypress groves had flown, 
And made earth, main, and heaven our 
own! 
There linger’d we, beguiled too long 
With Mejnoun’s tale, or Sadi’s song ; 
Till I, who heard the deep tambour 
Beat thy Divan’s approaching hour, 
To thee, and to my duty true, 
Warn’d by the sound, to greet thee 
flew : 
But there Zuleika wanders yet— 
Nay, Father, rage not—nor forget 
That none can pierce that secret bower 
But those who watch the woman’s 
tower.” 


for fear that thou shouldst 


** Son of a slave ’’—the Pacha said— 
‘From unbelieving mother bred, 
Vain were a father’s hope to see 
Aught that beseems a man in thee. 
Thou, when thine arm should bend the 
bow, 
And hurl the dart, and curb the steed, 
Thou, Greek in soul if not in creed, 
Must pore where babbling waters flow, 
And watch unfolding roses blow. 
Would that yon orb, whose matin glow 
Thy listless eyes so much admire, 
Would lend thee something of his fire ! 
Thou, who wouldst see this battlement 
By Christian cannon piecemeal rent ; 
Nay, tamely view old Stambol’s wall 
Before the dogs of Moscow fall, 
Nor strike one stroke for life and death 
Against the curs of Nazareth! 
Go—let thy less than woman’s hand 
Assume the distaff—not the brand. 
But, Haroun !—-to my daughter speed ! 
And hark—of thine own head take heed— 
If thus Zuleika oft takes wing— 
Thou see’st yon bow—it hath a string!” 


173 


No sound from Selim’s lip was heard, 
At least that met old Giaffir’s ear. 
But every frown and every word 
Pierced keener than a Christian’s sword. 
‘*Son of a slave !--reproach’d with 
fear ! 
Those gibes had cost another dear. 
Son of a slave !—and who my sire ?” 
Thus held his thoughts their dark 
career ; 
And glances ev’n of more than ire 
Flash forth, then faintly disappear. 
Old Giaffir gazed upon his son 
And started ; for within his eye 
He read how much his wrath had done; 
He saw rebellion there begun : 
‘Come hither, boy—what, no reply? 
I mark thee—and I know thee too ; 
But there be deeds thou dar’st not do: 
But if thy beard had manlier length, 
And if thy hand had skill and strength, 
I'd joy to see thee break a lance, 
Albeit against my own perchance.” 


As sneeringly these accents fell, 
On Selim’s eye he fiercely gazed: 

That eye return’d him glance for glance 
And proudly to his sire’s was raised, 

Till Giaffir’s quai’d and shrunk as- 

kance— 
And why—he felt, but durst not tell. 
‘*Much I misdoubt this wayward boy 
Will one day work me more annoy : 
I never loved him from his birth, 
And—but his arm is little worth, 
And scarcely in the chase could cope 
With timid fawn or antelope, 
Far less would venture into strife 
Where man contends for fame and life— 
I would not trust that look or tone: 
No—nor the blood so near my own. 
That blood--he hath not heard—no 
more— 
I'll watch him closer than before. 
He is an Arab to my sight, 
Or Christian crouching in the fight— 
But hark !—I hear Zuleika’s voice ; 

Like Houris’ hymn it meets mine ear ; 
She is the offspring of my choice ; 

Oh! more than ev’n her mother dear, 
With all to hope, and nought to fear— 
My Peri! ever welcome here! 

Sweet, as the desert fountain’s wave 
To lips just cool’d in time to save— 

Such to my longing sight art thou ; 
Nor can they waft to Mecca’s shrine 
More thanks for life, than I for thine, 

Who blest thy birth and bless thee 

now.” 


174 


Fair, as the first that fell of womankind, 
When on that dread yet lovely serpent 
smiling, 
Whose image then was stamp’d upon 
her mind— 
But once beguil’d—and ever more be- 
guiling ; 
Dazzling, as that, oh! too transcendent 
vision 
To Sorrow’s phantom-peopled slumber 
given, 
When heart meets heart again in dreams 
Elysian, 
And paints the lost on Earth revived 
in Heaven ; 
Soft, as the memory of buried love ; 
Pure, as the prayer which Childhood 
wafts above 
Was she--the daughter of that rude old 


Chief, 

Who met the maid with tears—but not 
of grief. 

Who hath not proved how feebly words 
essay 

To fix one spark of Beauty’s heavenly 
ray ? 

Who doth not feel, until his failing 
sight 

Faints into dimness with its own de- 
light, 

His changing cheek, his sinking heart 
confess 


The might, the majesty of Loveliness ? 


Such was Zuleika, such around her 
shone 

The nameless charms unmark’d by her 
alone— 


The light of love, the purity of grace, 

The mind, the Music breathing from 
her face, 

The heart whose softness harmonized 
the whole, 

And oh! that eye was in itself a Soul! 


Her graceful arms in meekness bending 
Across her gently budding breast ; 

At one kind word those arms extending 
To clasp the neck of him who blest 
His child caressing and carest, 

Zuleika came—and Giaffir felt 

His purpose half within him melt: 

Not that against her fancied weal 

His heart though stern could ever feel ; 

Affection chain’d her to that heart ; 

Ambition tore the links apart. 


**Zuleika! child of gentleness! 
How dear this very day must tell, 


BRITISH POETS 


When I forget my own distress, 
In losing what I love so well, 
To bid thee with another dwell: 
Another ! and a braver man 
Was never seen in battle’s van. 
We Moslem reck not much of blood ; 
But yet the line of Carasman 
Unchanged, unchangeable hath stood 
First of the bold Timariot bands 
That won and well can keep their lands. 
Enough that he who comes to woo 
Is kinsman of the Bey Oglou: 
His years need scarce a thought employ ; 
I would not have thee wed a boy. 
And thou shalt have a noble dower: 
And his and my united power 
Will laugh to scorn the death-firman, 
Which others tremble but to scan, 
And teach the messenger what fate 
The bearer of such boon may wait. 
And now thou know’st thy father’s will : 
All that thy sex hath need to know : 
*T was mine to teach obedience still— 
The way to love, thy lord may show.” 
In silence bow’d the virgin’s head ; 
And if her eye was fill’d with tears 
That stifled feeling dare not shed, 
And changed her cheek from pale to 
red, 
And red to pale, as through her ears 
Those winged words like arrows sped, 
What could such be but maiden fears ? 
So bright the tear in Beauty’s eye, 
Love half regrets to kiss it dry ; 
So sweet the blush of Bashfulness, 
Even Pity scarce can wish it less ! 
Whate’er it was the sire forgot; 
Or if remember’d, mark’d it not; 
Thrice clapp’d his hands, and call’d his 
steed, 
Resign’d his gem-adorn’d chibouque, 
And mounting featly for the mead, 
With Maugrabee and Mamaluke, 
His way amid his Delis took, 
To witness many an active deed 
With sabre keen, or blunt jerreed. 
The Kislar only and his Moors 
Watch well the Haram’s massy doors. 


His head was leant upon his hand, 
His eye look’d o’er the dark blue 
water 
That swiftly glides and gently swells 
Between the winding Dardanelles ; 
But yet he saw nor sea nor strand, 
Nor even his Pacha’s turban’d band 
Mix in the game of mimic slaughter, 
Careering cleave the folded felt, 


BYRON 


With sabre stroke right sharply dealt ; 
Nor mark’d the javelin-darting crowd 
Nor heard their Ollahs wild and loud— 
He thought but of old Giaffir’s 
daughter ! 


No word from Selim’s bosom broke ; 
One sigh Zuleika’s thought bespoke : 
Still gazed he through the lattice grate, 
Pale, mute, and mournfully sedate. 
To him Zuleika’s eye was turn’d, 
But little from his aspect learn’d : 
Equal her grief, yet not the same ; 
Her heart confess’d a gentler flame : 
But yet that heart, alarm’d or weak, 
She knew not why, forbade to speak. 
Yet speak she must—but when essay ? 
‘‘How strange he thus should turn 
away ! 
Not thus we e’er before have met; 
Nor thus shall be our parting yet.” 
Thrice paced she slowly through the 
room, 
And watch’d his eye—it still was fix’d : 
She snatch’d the urn wherein was 
mix’d 
The Persian Atar-gul’s perfume, 
And sprinkled all its odors o’er 
The pictured roof and marble floor : 
The drops, that through his glittering 
vest 
The playful girl’s appeal address’d, 
Unheeded o’er his bosom flew, 
As if that breast were marble too. 
‘* What, sullen yet ? it mustnot be— 
Oh! gentle Selim, this from thee!” 
She saw in curious order set 
The fairest flowers of eastern land— 
‘“*He loved them once: may touch them 


ret, 
If offer'd by Zuleika’s hand.” 

The childish thought was hardly brea- 
thed 

Before the rose was pluck’d and wrea- 
thed ; 

The next fond moment saw her seat 

Her fairy form at Selim’s feet : 

‘“‘This rose to calm my brother’s cares 

A message from the Bulbul bears ; 

It says to-night he will prolong 

For Selim’s ear his sweetest song ; 

And though his note is somewhat sad, 

He’ll try for once a strain more glad, 

With some faint hope his alter’d lay 

May sing these gloomy thoughts away. 


‘“* What ! not receive my foolish flower ? 
Nay then I am indeed unblest : 
On me can thus thy forehead lower? 


ners 


And know’'st thou not who loves thee 
best ? 
Oh, Selim dear! oh, more than dearest ! 
Say, is it me thou hat’st or fearest ? 
Come, lay thy head upon my breast, 
And I will kiss thee into rest, 
Since words of mine, and songs must 
fail, 
Ev’n from my fabled nightingale. 
I knew our sire at times was stern, 
But this from thee had yet to learn : 
Too well I know he loves thee not ; 
But is Zuleika’s love forgot ? 
Ah! deem I right? the Pacha’s plan— 
This kinsman Bey of Carasman 
Perhaps may prove some foe of thine. 
If so, I swear by Mecca’s shrine,— 
If shrines that ne’er approach allow 
To woman’s step, admit her vow,— 
Without thy free consent. command, 
The Sultan should not have my hand! 
Think’st thou that I could bear to part 
With thee, and learn to halve my heart ? 
Ah! were I sever’d from thy side, 
Where were thy friend—and who my 
guide? 
Years have not seen, Time shall not see, 
The hour that tears my soul from thee: 
EKv’n Azrael, from his deadly quiver 
When flies that shaft, and fly it must, 
That parts all else, shall doom for ever 
Our hearts to undivided dust!” 


He lived, he breathed, he moved, he felt; 
He raised the maid from where she 
knelt ; 
His trance was gone, his keen eye shone 
With thoughts that long in darkness 
dwelt : 
With thoughts that burn—in rays that 
melt. 
As the stream late conceal’d 
By the fringe of its willows, 
When it rushes reveal’d 
In the light of its billows ; 
As the bolt bursts on high 
From the black cloud that bound it, 
Flash’d the soul of that eye 
Through the long lashes round it. 
A war-horse at the trumpet'’s sound, 
A lion roused by heedless hound, 
A tyrant waked to sudden strife 
By graze of ill-directed knife, 
Starts not to more convulsive life 
Than he, who heard that vow, display’d, 
And all, before repress’d, betray‘d : 
‘** Now thou art mine, for ever mine, 
With life to keep, and scarce with lfe 
resign ; 


176 


Now thou art mine, that sacred oath, 

Though sworn by one, hath bound us 
both. 

Yes, fondly, wisely hast thou done; 

That vow hath saved more heads than 
one: 

But blench not thou—thy simplest tress 

Claims more from me than tenderness ; 

I would not wrong the slenderest hair 

That clusters round thy forehead fair, 

For all the treasures buried far 

Within the caves of Istakar. 

This morning clouds upon me lower’d, 

Reproaches on my head were shower’d, 

And Giaffir almost call’d me coward! 

Now I have motive to be brave ; 

The son of his neglected slave, 

Nay, start not, ’twas the term he gave, 

May show, though little apt to vaunt, 

A heart his words nor deeds can daunt. 

His son, indeed !—yet, thanks to thee, 

Perchance I am, at least shall be ; 

But let our plighted secret vow 

Be only known to us as now. 

I know the wretch who dares demand 

From Giaffir thy reluctant hand ; 

More ill-got wealth, a meaner soul 

Holds not a Musselim’s control : 

Was he not bred in Egripo? 

A viler race let Israel show ! 

But let that pass—to none be told 

Our oath; the rest shall time unfold. 

To me and mine leave Osman Bey ; 

I’ve partisans for peril’s day : 

Think not [am what I appear ; 

I’ve arms, and friends, and vengeance 
near.” 


*¢ Think not thou art what thouappearst ! 
My Selim, thou art sadly changed : 
This morn I saw thee gentlest, dearest ; 

But now thouwrt from thyself es- 
tranged. 
My love thou surely knew’st before, 
It ne’er was less, nor can be more. 
To see thee, hear thee, near thee stay, 
And hate the night [ know not why, 
Save that we meet not but by day ; 
With thee to live, with thee to die, 
I dare not to my hope deny : 
Thy cheek, thine eyes, thy lips to kiss, 
Like this—and this—no more than this ; 
For, Allah! sure thy lips are flame : 
What fever in thy veins is flushing? 
My own have nearly caught the same, 
At least I feel my cheek, too, blushing. 
To soothe thy sickness, watch thy health, 
Partake, but never waste thy wealth, 
Or stand with smiles unmurmuring by, 


BRITISH 4POETS 





And lighten half thy poverty ; 

Do all but close thy dying eye, 

For that I could not live to try ; 

To these alone my thoughts aspire : 

More can I do? or thou require ? 

But, Selim, thou must answer why 

We need so much of mystery ? 

The cause I cannot dream nor tell, 

But be it, since thousay’st ’tis well ; 

Yet what thou mean’st by ‘ arms’ and 

‘friends,’ 

Beyond my weaker sense extends. 

I meant that Giaffir should have heard 
The very vow I plighted thee ; 

His wrath would not revoke my word: 
But surely he would leave me free. 
Can this fond wish seem strange in 

me, 

To be what I have ever been? 

What other hath Zuleika seen . 

From simple childhood’s earliest hour ? 
What other can she seek to see 

Than thee, companion of her bower, 
The partner of her infancy ? 

These cherish’d thoughts with life begun, 
Say, why must I no more avow ? 

What change is wrought to make me 

shun 
The truth; my pride, and thine till 
now ? 

To meet the gaze of stranger’s eyes 

Our law, our creed, our God denies ; 

Nor shall one wandering thought of mine 

At such, our Prophet’s will, repine: 

No! happier made by that decree, 

He left me all in leaving thee. 

Deep were my anguish, thus compell’d 

To wed with one I ne’er beheld: 

This wherefore should I not reveal ? 

Why wilt thou urge me to conceal ? 

I know the Pacha’s haughty mood 

To thee hath never boded good ; 

And he so often storms at nought, 

Allah ! forbid that e’er he ought! 

And why I know not, but within 

My heart concealment weighs like sin. 

If then such secrecy be crime, 

And such it feels while lurking here ; 

Oh, Selim! tell me yet in time, 

Nor leave me thus to thoughts of fear. 

Ah ! yonder see the Tchocadar, 

My father leaves the mimic war ; 

I tremble now to meet his eye— 

Say, Selim, canst thou tell me why ?” 


‘** Zuleika—to thy tower’s retreat 
Betake thee—Giaffir I can greet! 
And now with him I fain must prate 
Of firmans, imposts, levies, state. 


BYRON 


There’s fearful news from Danube’s 
banks, 
Our Vizier nobly thins his ranks, 
For which the Giaour may give him 
thanks ! 
Our Sultan hath a shorter way 
Such costly triumph to repay. 
_ But, mark me, when the twilight drum 
Hath warn’d the troops to food and 
sleep, 
Unto thy cell will Selim come: 
Then softly from the Haram creep 
Where we may wander by the deep: 
Our garden battlements are steep ; 
Nor these will rash intruder climb 
To list our words, or stint our time ; 
And if he doth, I want not steel 
pee ce have felt, and more may 
eel, 
Then shalt thou learn of Selim more 
‘Than thou hast heard or thought before : 
Trust me, Zuleika—fear not me ! 
‘Thou know’st I hold a Haram key.” 
‘*Fear thee, my Selim! ne’er till now 
Did word like this——” 


** Delay not thou : 
I keep the key—and Haroun’s guard 
Have some, and hope of more reward. 
To-night, Zuleika, thou shalt hear 
My tale, my purpose, and my fear : 
lam not, love! what I appear.” 


CANTO THE SECOND 


THE winds are high on Helle’s wave, 
As on that night of stormy water 

When Love, who sent, forgot to save 

The young, the beautiful, the brave, 
The lonely hope of Sestos’ daughter. 

Oh! when alone along the sky 

Her turret-torch was blazing high, 

Though rising gale, and breaking foam, 

And shrieking sea-birds warn’d him 

home ; 

And clouds aloft and tides below, 

With signs and sounds, forbade to go, 

He could not see, he would not hear, 

Or sound or sign foreboding fear ; 

His eye but saw that light of love, 

The only star it hail’d above ; 

His ear but rang with Hero’s song, 

‘* Ye waves, divide not lovers long !”— 

That tale is old, but love anew 

May nerve young hearts to prove as 

true. 


The winds are high, and Helle’s tide 
Rolls darkly heaving to the main ; 
12 


177 


And Night’s descending shadows hide 
That field with blood bedew'd in 


vain, 
The desert of old Priam’s pride ; 
The tombs, sole relics of his reign, 
All—save immortal dreams that could 
beguile 
The blind old man of Scio’s rocky isle ! 


Oh! yet—for there my steps have been ; 
These feet have press’d the sacred 
shore, 
These limbs that buoyant wave hath 
borne— 
Minstrel! with thee to muse, to mourn, 
To trace again those fields of yore, 
Believing every Iffllock green 
Contains no fabled hero’s ashes, 
And that around the undoubted scene 
Thine own ‘‘ broad Hellespont” still 
dashes, 
Be long my lot ! and cold were he 
Who there could gaze denying thee! 


The night hath closed on Helle’s stream, 
Nor yet hath risen on Ida's hill 
That moon, which shone on his high 
theme : 
No warrior chides her peaceful beam 
But conscious shepherds bless it still. 
Their flocks are grazing on the mound 
Of him who felt the Dardan’s arrow : 
That mighty heap of gather’d ground 
Which Ammon’s son ran proudly round, 
By nations raised, by monarchs crown’d, 
Is now a lone and nameless barrow ! 
Within—thy dwelling-place how nar- 
row ! 
Without—can only strangers breathe 
The name of him that was beneath : 
Dust long outlasts the storied stone ; 
But Thou—thy very dust is gone ! 


Late, late to-night will Dian cheer 
The swain, and chase the boatman’s 
fear ; 

Till then—no beacon on the cliff 

May shape the course of struggling skiff ; 

The scatter’d lights that skirt the bay, 

All, one by one, have died away ; 

The only lamp of this lone hour 

Is glimmering in Zuleika’s tower, 

Yes! there is light in that lone chamber, 
And o’er her silken ottoman 

Are thrown the fragrant beads of amber, 
O’er which her fairy fingers ran ; 

Near these, with emerald rays beset, 

(How could she thus that gem forget ? ) 

Her mother’s sainted amulet, 


178 


Whereon engraved the Koorsee text, 
Could smooth this life, and win the 
next ; 
And by her comboloio les 
A Koran of illumined dyes ; 
And many a bright emblazon’d rhyme 
By Persian scribes redeem’d from time ; 
And o’er those scrolls, not oft so mute, 
Reclines her now neglected lute ; 
And round her lamp of fretted gold 
Bloom flowers in urns of China’s mould ; 
The richest work of Iran’s loom, 
And Sheeraz, tribute of perfume ; 
All that can eye or sense delight 
Are gather’d in that gorgeous room : 
But yet it hath an aw of gloom 
She, of this Peri cell the sprite, 
What doth she hence, and on so rudea 
night ? 


Wrapt in the darkest sable vest, 
Which none save noblest Moslem wear, 
To guard from winds of heaven the 
breast 
As heaven itself to Selim dear, 
With cautious steps the thicket thread- 
ing, 

And starting oft, as through the glade 
The gust its hollow moanings made, 
Till on the smoother pathway treading, 

More free her timid bosom beat, 
The maid pursued her silent guide ; 
And though her terror urged retreat, 
How could she quit her Selim’s side ? 
How teach her tender lips to chide ? 


They reach’d at length a grotto, hewn 
By nature, but enlarged by art, 
Where oft her lute she wont to tune, 
And oft her Koran conn’d apart ; 
And oft in youthful reverie 
She dream’d what Paradise might be: 
Where woman’s parted soul shall go 
Her Prophet had disdain’d to show ; 
But Selim’s mansion was secure, 
Nor deem’d she, could he long endure 
His bower in other worlds of bliss 
Without her, most beloved in this! 
Oh! who so dear with him could dwell ? 
What Houri soothe him half so well? 


Since last she visited the spot 

Some change seem’d wrought within the 
grot: 

It might be only that the night 

Disguised things seen by better light : 

That brazen lamp but dimly threw 

A ray of no celestial hue ; 

But in a nook within the cell © 


BRITISH ORTS 


Her eye on stranger objects fell. 

There arms were piled, not such as wield 
The turban’d Delis in the field ; 

But brands of foreign blade and hilt, 
And one was red—perchance with guilt ! 
Ah! how without can blood be spilt ? 

A cup too on the board was set 

That did not seem to hold sherbet. 
What may this mean? she turn’d to see 
Her Selim—‘‘ Oh! can this be he ?” 


His robe of pride was thrown aside, 
His brow no high-crown’d turban bore, 
But in its stead a shawl of red, 
Wreathed lightly round, his temples 
wore: 
That dagger, on whose hilt the gem 
Were worthy of a diadem, 
No longer glitter’d at his waist, 
Where pistols unadorn’d were braced ; 
And from his belt a sabre swung, 
And from his shoulder loosely hung 
The cloak of white, the thin capote 
That decks the wandering Candiote ; 
Beneath—his golden plated vest 
Clung like a cuirass to his breast ; 
The greaves below his knee that wound 
With silvery scales were sheathed and 
bound. 
But were it not that high command 
Spake in his eye, and tone, and hand, 
All that a careless eye could see 
In him was some young Galiongée.} 


‘“*T said I was not what I seem’d ; 

And now thou see’st my words were 

true: . 

T have a tale thou hast not dream’d, 

If sooth—its truth must others rue. 
My story now ’t were vain to hide, 
I must not see thee Osman’s bride : 
But had not thine own lips declared 
How much of that young heart I shared, 
I could not, must not, yet have shown 
The darker secret of my own. 
In this I speak not now of love; 
That, let time, truth, and peril prove: 
But first—Oh ! never wed another— 
Zuleika! Iam not thy brother ! ” 


‘Oh! not my brother !--yet unsay— 
God! am I left alone on earth 

To mourn—TI dare not curse—the day 
That saw my solitary birth ? 

Oh! thou wilt love me now no more! 
My sinking heart foreboded ill ; 

But know me all I was before, 


1A Turkish sailor. 


BYRON 


E79 





_ Thy sister—friend—Zuleika still. 
Thou led’st me here perchance to kill ; 

If thou hast cause for vengeance, see ! 
My breast is offer’d—take thy filk! 

Far better with the dead to be 

Than live thus nothing now to thee ! 
Perhaps far worse, for now I know 
Why Giaffir alway seem’d thy foe ; 
And I, alas! am Giaffir’s child, 
For whom thou wert contemn’d, reviled. 
If not thy sister—wouldst thou save 
My life, oh! bid me be thy slave!” 


‘* My slave, Zuleika !—nay, I’m thine: 
But, gentle love, this transport calm, 

Thy lot shall yet be link’d with mine ; 

I swear it by our Prophet’s shrine, 
And be that thought thy sorrow’s 

balm. 

So may the Koran verse display’d 

Upon its steel direct my blade, 

In danger’s hour to guard us both, 

As I preserve that awful oath! 

The name in which thy heart hath prided 
Must change ; but, my Zuleika, know, 

That tie is widen’d, not divided, 
Although thy Sire’s my deadliest foe. 

My father was to Giaffir all 
That Selim late was deem’d to thee: 

That brother wrought a brother’s fall, 
But spared, at least, my infancy ; 

And lull’d me with a vain deceit 

That yet a like return may meet. 

He rear’d me, not with tender help, 
But like the nephew of a Cain ; 

He watched me like a lion’s whelp, ' 
That gnaws and yet may break his 

chain. 

My father’s blood in every vein 

Is boiling ; but for thy dear sake 

No present vengeance will I take ; 
Though here I must no more remain. 

But first, beloved Zuleika ! hear 

How Giaffir wrought this deed of fear. 


‘* How first their strife to rancor grew, 
If love or envy made them foes, 

It matters little if I knew ; 

In fiery spirits, slights, though few 
And thoughtless, will disturb repose. 

In war Abdallah’s arm was strong, 

Remember’d yet in Bosniac song, 

And Paswan’s rebel hordes attest 

How little love they bore such guest: 

His death is all I need relate, 

The stern effect of Giaffir’s hate ; 

And how my birth disclosed to me, 

Whate’er beside it makes, hath made me 

free. 


‘*When Paswan, after years of strife, 
At last for power, but first for life, 
In Widdin’s walls too proudly sate, 
Our Pachas rallied round the state ; 
Nor last nor least in high command, 
Kach brother led a separate band ; 
They gave their horse-tails 1 to the wind, 
And mustering in Sophia’s plain 
Their tents were pitch’d, their post as- 
sign’d ; 
To one, alas ! assign’d in vain ! 
What need of words ! the deadly bow], 
By Giaffir’s order drugged and given, 
With venom subtle as his soul, 
Dismiss’d Abdallah’s hence to heaven. 
Reclined and feverish in the bath, 
He, when the hunter’s sport was up, 
But little deem’d a brother’s wrath 
To quench his thirst had such a cup: 
The bowl a bribed attendant bore ; 
He drank one draught, nor needed more ! 
If thou my tale, Zuleika, doubt, 
Call Haroun—he can tell it out. 


‘<The deed once done, and Paswan’s feud 
In part suppress’d, though ne’er subdued, 
Abdallah’s Pachalick was gain’d :— 

Thou know’st not what in our Divan 

Can wealth procure for worse than man— 
Abdallah’s honors were obtain’d 

By him a brother’s murder stain’d ; 

’T is true, the purchase nearly drain’d 

His ill got treasure, soon replaced. 

Wouldst question whence? Survey the 

waste, 

And ask the squalid peasant how 

His gains repay his broiling brow !— 

Why me the stern usurper spared, 

Why thus with me his palace shared, 

I know not. Shame, regret, remorse, 

And little fear from infant’s force ; 

Besides, adoption as a son 

By him whom Heaven accorded none, 

Or some unknown cabal, caprice, 

Preserved me thus ;—but not in peace: 

He cannot curb his haughty mood, 

Nor I forgive a father’s blood. 


‘¢ Within thy father’s house are foes ; 
Not all who break his bread are true ; 
To these should I my birth disclose, 
His days, his very hours were few ; 
They only want a heart to lead, 
A hand to point them to the deed. 
But Haroun only knows, or knew, 
This tale, whose close is almost nigh : 


1° Horse-tail,’”? the standard of a pacha. 
(Byron.) 


180 


He in Abdallah’s palace grew, 
And held that post in his Serai 
Which holds he here—he saw him die ; 
But what could single slavery do ? 
Avenge his lord? alas! too late ; 
Or save his son from sucha fate? 
He chose the last, and when elate 
With foes subdued, or friends betray’d, 
Proud Giaffir in high triumph sate, 
He led me helpless to his gate, 
And not in vain it seems essay’d 
To save the life for which he pray’d. 
The knowledge of my birth secured 
From all and each, but most from me ; 
Thus Giaffir’s safety was insured. 
Removed he too from Roumelie 
To this our Asiatic side, 

Far from our seats by Danube’s tide, 
With none but Haroun, who retains 
Such knowledge—and that Nubian feels 

A tyrant’s secrets are but chains, 
From which the captive gladly steals, 
And this and more to me reveals : 
Such still to guilt just Alla sends— 
Slaves, tools, accomplices—no friends ! 


** All this, Zuleika, harshly sounds ; 
But harsher still my tale must be : 
Howe’er my tongue thy softness wounds, 
Yet I must prove all truth to thee. 
I saw thee start this garb to see, 
Yet is it one I oft have worn, 
And long must wear: this Galiongée, 
To whom thy plighted vow is sworn, 
Is leader of those pirate hordes, 
Whose laws and lives are on their 
swords ; 
To hear whose desolating tale 
Would make thy waning cheek more 
pale: 
Those arms thou see’st my band have 
brought. 
The hands that wield are not remote ; 
This cup too for the rugged knaves 
Is filUd—once quaff’d, they ne’er repine: 
Our prophet might forgive the slaves ; 
They’re only infidels in wine. 


*““ What could I be? Proscribed at home, 
And taunted to a wish to roam ; 

And listless left-—-for Giaffir’s fear 
Denied the courser and the spear—— 
Though oft-—-Oh, Mahomet ! how oft— 
In full Divan the despot scoff’d, 

As if my weak unwilling hand 

Refused the bridle or the brand: 

He ever went to war alone, 

And pent me here untried—unknown ; 
To Haroun’s care with women left, 





BRITISH POETS 


By hope unblest, of fame bereft, 

While thou—whose softness long en- 
dear’d, 

Though it unmann’d me, 
cheer’d— 

To Brusa’s walls for safety sent, 

Awaited’st there the field’s event. 

Haroun, who saw my spirit pining 

Beneath inaction’s sluggish yoke, 

His captive, though with dread resign- 

ing, 
My thraldom for a season broke, 

On promise to return before 

The day when Giaffir’s charge was o’er. 

°T is vain—my tongue cannot impart 

My almost drunkenness of heart, 

When first this liberated eye 

Survey’d Earth, Ocean, Sun, and Sky, 

Asif my spirit pierced them through, 

And all their inmost wonders knew ! 

One word alone can paint to thee 

That more than feeling—I was Free! 

K’en for thy presence ceased to pine ; 

The World—nay, Heaven itself was 
mine ! 


still had 


‘¢ The shallop of a trusty Moor 

Convey’d me from this idle shore ; 

I long’d to see the isles that gem 

Old Ocean’s purple diadem : 

I sought by turns, and saw them all; 
But when and where I join’d the 

crew, 

With whom I’m pledged to rise or fall, 
When all that we design to do 

Is done, ’t will then be time more meet 

To tell thee, when the tale’s complete. 


“°T is true, they are a lawless brood, 
But rough in form, nor mild in mood ; 
And every creed, and every race, 
With them hath found—may find a 
place ; 
But open speech, and ready hand, 
Obedience to their chief’s command ; 
A soul for every enterprise, 
That never sees with terror’s eyes ; 
Friendship for each, and faith to all, 
And vengeance vow’d for those who fall, 
Have made them fitting instruments 
For more than ev’n my own intents. 
And some—and I have studied all 
Distinguish’d from the vulgar rank, 
But chiefly to my council call 
The wisdom of the cautious Frank— 
And some to higher thoughts aspire, 
The last of Lambro’s patriots there 
Anticipated freedom share ; 
And oft around the cavern fire 


BYRON 


On visionary schemes debate, 
To snatch the Rayahs from their fate. 
So let them ease their hearts with prate 
Of equal rights, which man ne’er knew ; 
I have a love for freedom too, 
Ay! let me like the ocean-Patriarch roam 
Or only know on land the Tartar’s home ! 
My tent on shore, my galley on the sea, 
Are more than cities and Serais tome : 
Borne by my steed, or wafted by my sail, 
Across the desert, or before the gale, 
Bound where thou wilt, my barb! or 
glide, my prow! 
But be the star that guides the wanderer, 


Thou! 

Thou, my Zuleika, share and bless my 
bark ; 

The Dove of peace and promise to mine 
ark ! 

Or, since that hope denied in worlds of 
strife, 

Be thou the rainbow tothe storms of 
life! 

The evening beam that smiles the clouds 


away, 

And tints to-morrow with prophetic ray ! 

Blest—as the Muezzin’s strain from Mec- 
ca’s wall 

To pilgrims pure and prostrate at his 
call”; 

Soft—as the melody of youthful days, 

That steals the trembling tear of speech- 
less praise ; 

Dear—as his native song to Exile’s ears, 

Shall sound each tone thy long-loved 
voice endears. 

For thee in those bright isles is built a 
bower 

Blooming as Aden in its earliest hour. 

A thousand swords, with Selim’s heart 
and hand, 

Wait—wave—defend—destroy—at 
command ! 

Girt by my band, Zuleika at my side, 

The spoil of nations shall bedeck my 
bride. 

The Haram’s languid years of listless ease 

Are well resign’d for cares—for joys like 
these : 

Not blind to fate, Isee, where’er I rove, 

Unnumber’d perils—but one only love! 

Yet well my toils shall that fond breast 


thy 


repay , 

Though fortune frown, or falser friends 
betray. 

How dear the dream in darkest hours 
of ill, 


Should all be changed, to find thee faitii- 
ful still ! 





I8t 


Be but thy soul, like Selim’s, firmly 
shown ; 

To thee be Selim’s tender as thine own ; 

To soothe each sorrow: share in each de- 
light, 

Blend every thought, do all—but dis- 
unite ! 

Once free, *tis mine our horde again to 
guide ; 

Friends to each other, foes to aught be- 
side : 

Yet there we follow but the bent assign’d 

By fatal Nature to man’s warring kind : 

Mark! where his carnage and his con- 
quests cease ! 

He makes a solitude, and calls it—peace ! 

I, like the rest, must use my skill or 


strength, 

But ask no land beyond my _ sabre’s 
length : 

Power sways but by division—her re- 


source 

The blest alternative of fraud or force! 

Ours be the last; in time deceit may 
come 

When cities cage us ina social home: 

There ev’n thy soul might err—how oft 
the heart 

Corruption shakes which peril could not 
part ! 

And woman, more than 
death or woe, 

Or even Disgrace, would lay her lover 
low, 

Sunk in the lap of Luxury will shame— 

Away suspicion !—not Zuleika’s name ! 

But life is hazard at the best ; and here 

No more remains to win, and much to 
fear : 

Yes, fear! the doubt, the dread of los- 
ing thee, 

By Osman’s power, and Giaffir’s stern 
decree. 

That dread shall vanish with the favour- 
ing gale, 

Which Love to-night hath promised to 
my sail : 

No danger daunts the pair his smile hath 
blest, 

Their steps still roving, but their hearts 
at rest. 

With thee all toils are sweet, each clime 
hath charms ; 

Earth—sea alike—our world within our 
arms ! 

Ay—let the loud winds whistle o’er the 
deck, 

So that those arms cling closer round 
my neck ; 


man, when 





182 


BRITISH POETS 





The deepest murmur of this lip shall be, 
No sigh for safety, but a prayer for thee ! 
The war of elements no fears impart 

To Love, whose deadliest bane is human 


Art: 

There lie the only rocks our course can 
check ; 

Here moments menace—there are years 
of wreck ! 

But hence ye thoughts that rise in Hor- 
ror’s shape ! ° 


This hour bestows, or ever bars, escape. 

Few words remain of mine my tale to 
close ; 

Of thine but one to waft us from our 
foes ; 

Yea—foes—to me will Giaffit’s hate de- 
cline? 

And is not Osman, who would part us, 
thine ? 


“His head and faith from doubt and 
death 

Return’d in time my guard to save ; 

Few heard, none told, that o’er the wave 

From isle to isle I roved the while ; 

And since, though parted from my band, 

Too seldom now I leave the land, 

No deed they’ve done, nor deed shall do, 

Ere I have heard and doom’d it too : 

I form the plan, decree the spoil, 

’ Tis fit 1 oftener share the toil. 

But now too long I’ve held thine ear ; 

Time presses, floats my bark, and here 

We leave behind but hate and fear. 

To-morrow Osman with his train 

Arrives—to-night must break thy chain: 

And wouldst thou save that haughty 


Bey ,— 
Perchance his life who gave thee 
thine,— 


With me this hour away—away ! 
But yet, though thou art plighted 
mine, 
Wouldst thou recall thy willing vow, 
Appall’d by truths imparted now, 
Here rest I— not to see thee wed: 
But be that peril on my head!” 


Zuleika, mute and motionless, 
Stood like that statue of distress, 
When, her last hope for ever gone, 
The mother harden’d into stone : 
All in the maid that eye could see 
Was but a younger Niobe. 

But ere her lip, or even her eye, 
Kssay’d to speak, or look reply, 
Beneath the garden’s wicket porch 
Far flash’d on high a blazing torch ! 


Another—and another—and another— 
‘Oh! fly—no more—yet now my more 
than brother !” 

Far, wide, through every thicket spread 
The fearful lights are gleaming red ; 
Nor these alone—for each right hand 
Is ready with a sheathless brand. 

They part, pursue, return, and wheel 
With searching flambeau, shining steel ; 
And last of all, his sabre waving, 

Stern Giaffir in his fury raving: 

And now almost they touch the cave— 
Oh! must that grot be Selim’s grave? 


Dauntless he stood—‘‘’Tis come—soon 
past— 
One kiss, Zuleika—’tis my last : 
But yet my band not far from shore 
May hear this signal, see the flash ; 
Yet now too few—the attempt were 
rash : 
No matter—yet one effort more.” 
Forth to the cavern mouth he stept ; 
His pistol’s echo rang on high, 
Zuleika started not, nor wept, 
Despair benumb’d her breast and 
eye !— 
‘‘They hear me not, or if they ply 
Their oars ’tis but to see me die; 
That sound hath drawn my foes more 
nigh, 
Then forth my father’s scimitar, 
Thou ne’er hast seen less equal war! 
Farewell, Zuleika !—sweet ! retire : 
Yet stay within—here linger safe, 
At thee his rage will only chafe. 
Stir not—lest even to thee perchance 
Some erring blade or ball should glance. 
Fear’st thou for him ?—may I expire 
If in this strife I seek thy sire ! 
No—though by him that poison pour’d ; 
No—though again he call me coward ! 
But tamely shall I meet their steel ? 
No-—-as each crest save his may feel!” 


One bound he made, and gain’d the 
sand : 

Already at his feet hath sunk 
The foremost of the prying band, 

A gasping head, a quivering trunk : 
Another falis—but round him close 
A swarming circle of his foes ; 

From right to left his path he cleft, 

And almost met the meeting wave: 
His boat appears—not five oars’ length— 
His comrades strain with desperate 

strength—- 

Oh! are they yet in time to save? 

His feet the foremost breakers lave ; 





BYRON 


His band are plunging in the bay, 
Their sabres glitter through the spray ; 
Wet—wild—unwearied to the strand 
They struggle—now they touch the land ! 
They come—’tis but to add to slaughter— 
His heart’s best blood is on the water. 


Escaped from shot, unharm’d by steel, 

Or scarcely grazed its force to feel, 

Had Selim won, betray’d, beset, 

To where the strand and billows met ; 

There as his last step left the land— 

And the last death-blow dealt his hand— 

Ah! wherefore did he turn to look 

For.her his eye but sought in vain ? 

That pause, that fatal gaze he took, 

Hath doom’d his death, or fix’d his 
chain. 

Sad proof, in peril and in pain, 

- How late will Lover’s hope remain ! 

His back was to the dashing spray : 
. Behind, but close, his comrades lay, 
When, at the instant, hiss’d the ball— 
**So may the foes of Giaffir fall!” 
Whose voice is heard? whose carbine 
rang? 

Whose bullet through the night-air sang, 

Too nearly, deadly aim’d to err? 

*Tis thine—A bdallah’s Murderer ! 

The father slowly rued thy hate, 

The son hath found a quicker fate: 

Fast from his breast the blood is bub- 
bling, 

The whiteness of the sea-foam troub- 
ling— 

If aught his lips essay’d to groan, 

The rushing billows choked the tone! 


Morn slowly rolls the clouds away ; 
Few trophies of the fight are there : 
The shouts that shook the midnight-bay 

Are silent; but some signs of fray 
That strand of strife may bear, 
And fragments of each shiver’d brand 
Steps stamp’d ; and dash’d into the sand 
The print of many a struggling hand 
May there be mark’d ; nor far remote 
A broken torch, an oarless boat ; 
And tangled on the weeds that heap 
The beach where shelving to the deep 
There lies a white capote! 
*T is rent in twain—-one dark-red stain 
The wave yet ripples o'er in vain ; 
But where is he who wore? 
Ye! who would o’er his relics weep, 
Go, seek them where the surges sweep 
Their burthen round Sigzeum’s steep 
And cast on Lemnos’ shore : 
The sea-birds shriek above the prey, 


183 


O’er which their hungry beaks delay, 
As shaken on his restless pillow, 
His head heaves with the heaving 
billow ; 
That hand, whose motion is not life, 
Yet feebly seems to menace strife, 
Flung by the tossing tide on high, 
Then levell’d with the wave— 
What recks it, though that corse shall 
lie 
Within a living grave? 
The bird that tears that prostrate form 
Hath only robb’d the meaner worm ; 
The only heart, the only eye 
Had bled or wept to see him die, 

Had seen those scatter’d limbs composed, 
And mourn’d above his turban-stone, 
That heart hath burs 

closed— 
Yea—closed before his own ! 





By Helle’s stream there is a voice of wail ! 
And woman’s eye is wet—man’s cheek 
is pale: 
Zuleika! last of Giaffir’s race, 
Thy destined lord is come too late : 
He sees not—ne’er shall see thy face ! 
Can he not hear 
The loud Wul-wulleh warn his distant 
ear? 
Thy handmaids weeping at the gate, 
The Koran-chanters of the hymn of fate, 
The silent slaves with folded arms that 
walt, 
Sighs in the hall, and shrieks upon the 
gale, 
Tell him thy tale! 
Thou didst not view thy Selim fall! 
That fearful moment when he left the 
cave 
Thy heart grew chill: 
He was thy hope—thy joy—thy love— 
thine all, 
And that last thought on him 
couldst not save 
Sufficed to kill ; 
Burst forth in one wild cry—and all was 
still. 
Peace to thy broken heart, and virgin 
grave ! 
Ah! happy ! but of life to lose the worst ! 
That grief—though deep—though fatal— 
was thy firs st! 


thou 


Thrice happy ne’er to feel nor fear the 
force 
Of absence, shame, pride, hate, revenge, 


remorse ! 
And, oh! that pang where more than 
madness Lies ! 


184 


The worm that will not sleep—and never 


dies ; 
Thought of the gloomy day and ghastly 
night, 
That dreads the darkness, and yet loathes 
the light, 
That winds around, and tears the quiver- 
ing heart ! 
wherefore not consume it—and 
depart ! 
Woe to thee, rash and unrelenting chief ! 
Vainly thou heap’st the dust upon thy 
head, 
Vainly the sackcloth o’er thy limbs 
dost spread : 
By that same hand Abdallah—Selim : 
bled. 
Now let it tear thy beard in idle grief. 
Thy pride of heart, thy bride for Osman’s 


Ah! 


ed, 
She, whom thy sultan had but seen to 
wed, 
Thy Daughter’s dead ! 
Hope of thine age, thy twilight’s lonely 
beam, 
The Star hath set that shone on Helle’s 
stream. 
What quench’d its ray ?—the blood that 
thou hast shed ! 
Hark! tothe hurried question of Despair : 
‘Where is my child ?”—an Echo an- 
swers—‘‘ Where ?”’ 


Within the place of thousand tombs 
That shine beneath, while dark above 

The sad but living cypress glooms 
And withers not, though branch and 

leaf 

Are stamp’d with an eternal grief, 

Like early unrequited Love, 

One spot exists, which ever blooms, 
Ev’n in that deadly grove— 

A single rose is shedding there 
Its lonely lustre, meek and pale: 

It looks as planted by Despair— 

So white—so faint—the slightest gale 
Might whirl the leaves on high : 

And yet, though storms and blight 

assail, 

And hands more rude than wintry sky 
May wring it from the stem—in vain— 
To-morrow sees it bloom again : 

The stalk some spirit gently rears, 

And waters with celestial tears, 

For well may maids of Helle deem 
That this can be no earthly flower, 
Which mocks the tempest’s withering 

hour, 

And buds unshelter’d by a bower ; 


BRITISH POETS 


Nor droops though Spring refuse her 
shower, 
Nor woos the summer beam: 
To it the livelong night there sings 
A bird unseen—but not remote : 
Invisible his airy wings, 
But soft as harp that Houri strings 
His long entrancing note! 
It were the Bulbul ; but his throat, 
Though mournful, pours not such a 
strain : 
For they who listen cannot leave 
The spot, but linger there and grieve, 
As if they loved in vain! 
And yet so sweet the tears they shed, 
*Tis sorrow so unmix’d with dread, 
They scarce can bear the morn to break 
That melancholy spell, 
And longer yet would weep and wake, 
He sings so wild and well! 
But when the day-blush bursts from high 
Expires that magic melody. 
And some have been who could believe, 
(So fondly youthful dreams deceive, 
Yet harsh be they that blame, ) 
That note so piercing and profound 
Will shape and syllable its sound 
Into Zuleika’s name. 
’Tis from her cypress summit heard, 
That melts in air the liquid word: 
’T is from her lowly virgin earth 
That white rose takes its tender birth. 
There late was laid a marble stone ; 
Eve saw it placed—the Morrow gone! 
It was no mortal arm that bore 
That deep-fix’d pillar to the shore; 
For there, as Helle’s legends tell, 
Next morn’ twas found where Selim fell ; 
Lash’d by the tumbling tide, whose wave 
Denied his bones a holier grave ; 
And there by night, reclined, ’ t is said, 
Is seen a ghastly turban’d head : 
And hence extended by the billow, 
’ Tis named the ‘‘ Pirate-phantom’s pil- 
low !” 
Where first it lay that mourning flower 
Hath flourish’d ; flourisheth this hour, 
Alone and dewy, coldly pure and pale ; 
As weeping Beauty’s cheek at Sorrow’s 
tale ! 
November, 1818, November 29, 1818. 


ODE TO NAPOLEON BUONAPARTE 


‘“Expende Annibalem :—quot libras in duce 
summo 
Invenies ? ’°—Juvenal, Sat. x. 


’'T 18 done—but yesterday a King! 
And arm’d with Kings to strive— 


BYRON 


185 





And now thou art a nameless thing : 
So abject—yet alive! 
Is this the man of thousand thrones, 
Who strew’d our earth with hostile 
bones, 
And can he thus survive? 
Since he, miscalled the Morning Star, 
Nor man nor fiend hath fallen so far. 


Ill-minded man! why scourge thy kind 
Who bow’d so low the knee? 

By gazing on thyself grown blind, 
Thou taught’st the rest to see. 

With might unquestion’d,—power to 


save ,— 

Thine only gift hath been the grave, 
To those that worshipp’d thee ; 
Nor till thy fall could mortals guess 

Ambition’s less than littleness ! 


Thanks for that lesson—It will teach 
To after-warriors more, 

Than high Philosophy can preach, 
And vainly preach’d before. 

That spell upon the minds of men 

Breaks never to unite again, 
That led them to adore 

Those Pagod things of sabre sway 

With fronts of brass, and feet of clay. 


The triumph and the vanity, 
The rapture of the strife— 
The earthquake voice of Victory, 
To thee the breath of life ; 
The sword, the sceptre, and that sway 
Which man seem’d made but to obey, 
Wherewith renown was rife— 
All quell’d !—Dark Spirit! what must be 
The madness of thy memory ! 


The Desolator desolate ! 
The Victor overthrown! 

The Arbiter of others’ fate 
A Supplant for his own! 

Is it some yet imperial hope 

That with such change can calmly cope ? 
Or dread of death alone ? 

To die a prince—or live a slave— 

Thy choice is most ignobly brave! 


He who of old would rend the oak, 
Dream’d not of the rebound : 

Chain’d by the trunk he vainly broke— 
Alone—how look’d he round ? 

Thou, in the sternness of thy strength, 

An equal deed hast done at length, 
And darker fate hast found : 

He fell, the forest prowlers’ prey ; 

But thou must eat thy heart away ! 


The Roman, when his burning heart 
Was slaked with blood of Rome, 

Threw down the dagger—dared depart, 
In savage grandeur, home— 

He dared depart in utter scorn 

Of men that such a yoke had borne, 
Yet left him such a doom ! 

His only glory was that hour 

Of self-upheld abandon’d power. 


The Spaniard,! when the lust of sway 
Had lost its quickening spell, 

Cast crowns for rosaries away, 
An empire for a cell ; 

A strict accountant of his beads, 

A subtle disputant on creeds, 
His dotage trifled well : 

Yet better had he neither known 

A bigot’s shrine, nor despot’s throne. 


But thou—from thy reluctant hand 
The thunderbolt is wrung— 
Too late thou leav’st the high command 
To which thy weakness clung ; 
All Evil Spirit as thou art, 
It is enough to grieve the heart 
To see thine own unstrung ; 
To think that God’s fair world hath been 
The footstool of a thing so mean ; 


And Earth hath spilt her blood for him, 
Who thus can hoard his own! 

And Monarchs bow’d the trembling 

limb, 

And thank’d him for a throne! 

Fair Freedom ! we may hold thee dear, 

When thus thy mightiest foes their fear 
In humblest guise have shown. 

Oh! ne’er may tyrant leave behind 

A brighter name to lure mankind! 


Thine evil deeds are writ in gore, 
Nor written thus in vain— 

Thy triumphs tell of fame no more, 
Or deepen every stain : 

If thou hadst died as honor dies, 

Some new Napoleon might arise, 
To shame the world again— 

But who would soar the solar height, 

To set in such a starless night ? 


Weigh’d in the balance, hero dust 
Is vile as vulgar clay ; 

Thy scales, Mortality ! are just 
To all that pass away: . 

But yet methought the living great 

Some higher sparks should animate, 
To dazzle and dismay : 


1 The Emperor Charles V. 


186 


Nor deem’d Contempt could thus make 
mirth 
Of these, the Conquerors of the earth. 


And she, proud Austria’s mournful 
flower, 
Thy still imperial bride ; 
How bears her breast the tor turing 
hour? 
Still clings she to thy side? 
Must she too bend, must she too share 
Thy late repentance, long despair, 
Thou throneless Homicide? 
If still she loves thee, hoard that gem,— 
’T is worth thy vanish’d diadem ! 


Then haste thee to thy sullen Isle, 
And gaze upon the sea ; 

That element may meet thy smile— 
It ne’er was ruled by thee! 

Or trace with thine all idle hand 

In loitering mood upon the sand 
That Earth is now as free! 

That Corinth’s pedagogue ? hath now 

Transferr’d his by-word to thy brow. 


Thou Timour! in his captive’s cage 
What thoughts will there be thine, 

While brooding in thy prison’d rage? 
But one—‘‘ The world was mine!” 

Unless, like he of Babylon, 

All sense is with thy sceptre gone, 
Life will not long confine 

That spirit pour’d so widely forth— 

So long obey’d—so little worth ! 


Or, like the thief of fire from heaven, 
Wilt thou withstand the shock ? 

And share with him, the unforgiven, 
His vulture and his rock ! 

Foredoom’d by God—by man accurst, 

And that last act, though not thy worst, 
The very Fiend’s arch mock ; 

He in his fall preserved his pride 

And, if a mortal, had as proudly died ! 


There was a day—there was an hour, 
While earth was Gaul’s—Gaul thine— 

When that immeasurable power 
Unsated to resign 

Had been an act of purer fame 

Than gathers round Marengo’s name, 
And gilded thy decline, 

Through the long twilight of all time, 

Despite some passing clouds of crime. 


1 Dionysius the younger, tyrant of Syracuse, 
who after his second banishment earned his 
living by teaching, in Corinth, 


BRITISH ORT S 


But thou forsooth must be a king, 
And don the purple vest, 

As if that foolish robe could wring 
Remembrance from thy breast. 

Where is that faded garment? where 

The gewgaws thou wert fond to wear, 
The star, the string, the crest ? 

Vain froward child of empire! say, 

Are all thy playthings snatched away ? 


Where may the wearied eye repose 

When gazing on the Great ; 

Where neither guilty glory glows, 

Nor despicable state ? 

Yes—one—the first—the last—the best— 
The Cincinnatus of the West, 

Whom envy dared not hate, 
Bequeath’d the name of Washington, 
To make man blush there was but one! 

April 9-10, 1814. April 16, 1814. 


SHE WALKS IN BEAUTY 


SHE walks in beauty, like the night 
Of cloudless climes and starry skies ; 
And all that’s best of dark and bright 
Meet in her aspect and her eyes :. 
Thus mellow’d to that tender hight | 
Which heaven to gaudy day denies. 


One shade the more, one ray the less, 
Had half impair’d the nameless grace 
Which waves in every raven tress, 
Or softly lightens o’er her face ; 
Where thoughts serenely sweet express 
How pure, how dear their dwelling- 
place. 


And on that cheek, and o’er that brow, 
So soft, so calm, yet eloquent, 

The smiles that win, the tints that 

glow, 

But tell of days in goodness spent, 

A mind at peace with all below, 
A heart whose love is innocent ! 

June 12, 1814. 1815. 


OH! SNATCH’D AWAY IN 
BEAUTY’S BLOOM 


OH! snatch’d away in beauty’s bloom, 
On thee shall press no ponderous tomb ; 
But on thy turf shall roses rear 
Their leaves, the earliest of the year ; 
And the wild cypress wave in tender 
gloom : 


And oft by yon blue gushing stream 
Shall Sorrow lean her drooping head, 


BYRON 


187 





And feed deep thought with many a 
dream, 
And lingering pause and 
tread ; 
Fond wretch! as if her step disturb’d 
the dead ! 


lightly 


Away ! we know that tears are vain, 

That death nor heeds nor hears dis- 

tress : 
Will this unteach us to complain ? 

Or make one mourner weep the less ? 
And thou—who tell’st me to forget, 
Thy looks are wan, thine eyes are wet. 
1814 or 1815. April 23, 1815. 


THE DESTRUCTION OF 
SENN ACHERIB 


THE Assyrian came down like the wolf 
on the fold, 

And his cohorts were gleaming in pur- 
ple and gold; 

And the sheen of their spears was like 
stars on the sea, 

When the blue wave rolls nightly on 
deep Galilee. 


Like the leaves of the forest when Sum- 
mer is green, 

That host with their banners at sunset 
were seen : 

Like the leaves of the forest when Au- 
tumn hath blown, 

That host on the morrow lay wither’d 
and strown. 


For the Angel of Death spread his wings 
on the blast, 

And breathed in the face of the foe as 
he pass’d ; 

And the eyes of the sleepers wax’d 
deadly and chill, 

And their hearts but once heaved, and 
for ever grew still! 


And there lay the steed with his nostril 
all wide, 

But through it there roll’d not the breath 
of his pride ; 

And the foam of his gasping lay white 
on the turf, 

And cold as the spray of the rock-beat- 
ing surf. 


And there lay the rider distorted and 


pale, 
With the dew on his brow, and the rust 
on his mail: 


And the tents were allsilent, the ban- 
ners alone, 

The lances unlifted, the trumpet .un- 
blown, 


And the widows of Ashur are loud in 
their wail, 

And the idols are broke in the temple of 
Baal ; 

And the might of the Gentile, unsmote 
by the sword, 

Hath melted like snow in the glance of 
the Lord! 

February 17, 1815. 1815. 


SONG OF SAUL BEFORE HIS LAST 
BATTLE 


WARRIORS and chiefs! should the shaft 
or the sword 

Pierce me in leading the host of the 
Lord, 

Heed not the corse, though a king’s, in 
your path : 

Bury your steel in the bosoms of Gath! 


Thou who art bearing my buckler and 
bow, 

Should the soldiers of Saul look away 
from the foe, 

Stretch me that moment in blood at thy 
feet ! 

Mine be the doom which they dared not 
to meet. 


Farewell to others, but never we part, 
Heir to my royalty, son of my heart! 
Bright is the diadem, boundless the 


sway, 
Or kingly the death, which awaits us to- 
day ! 1815, 1819. 


STANZAS FOR MUSIC 


‘“O Lachrymarum fons, tenero sacros 
Ducentium ortus ex animo: quater 
Felix ! in imo qui scatentem 
Pectore te, pia Nympha, sensit.”’ 

GRAyY’s Poemata. 


THERE’S not a joy the world can give like 
that it takes away, 

When the glow of early thought declines 
in feeling’s dull decay ; 

°Tis not on youth’s smooth cheek the 
blush alone, which fades so fast, 

But the tender bloom of heart is gone, ere 
youth itself be past. 


Then the few whose spirits float above the 
wreck of happiness 


188 


Are driven o’er the shoals of guilt or 
ocean of excess: 

The magnet of their course is gone, or 
only points in vain 

The shore towhich their shiver’d sail shall 
never stretch again. 


Then the mortal coldness of the soul like 
death itself comes down ; 

It cannot feel for others’ woes, it dare not 
dream its own; 

That heavy chill has frozen o’er the foun- 
tain of our tears, 

And though the eye may sparkle still, ’t is 
where the ice appears. 


Though wit may flash from fluent lips, 
and mirth distract the breast, 

Through midnight hours that yield no 
more their former hope of rest ; 

‘Tis but as ivy-leaves around the ruin‘d 
turret wreath, 

All green and wildly fresh without, but 
worn and gray beneath. 


Oh could I feelas I have felt,—or be what 
I have been, 

Or weep as I could once have wept o’er 
many a vanish’d scene ; 

As springs in deserts found seem sweet, 
all brackish though they be, 

So, midst the wither’d waste of life, those 
tears would flow to me. 

March, 1815. 1816. 


FARE THEE WELL 


** Alas ! they had been friends in youth; 
But whispering tongues can poison truth 
And constancy lives in realms above ; 
And life is thorny ; and youth is vain ; 
And to be wroth with one we love, 

Doth work like madness in the brain ; 


But never either found another 

To free the hollow heart from paining— 

They stood aloof, the scars remaining, 

Like cliffs which had been rent asunder ; 

A dreary sea now flows between, 

But neither heat, not frost, nor thunder, 

Shall wholly do away, I ween, 

The marks of that which once hath been.’’ 
COLERIDGE’S Christabel. 


FARE thee well! and if for ever, 
Still for ever, fare thee well: 

Even though unforgiving, never 
’Gainst thee shall my heart rebel. 


Would that breast were bared before thee 
Where thy head so oft hath lain, 

While that placid sleep came o’er thee 
Which thou ne’er canst know again: 


BRITISH on is 





Would that breast, by thee glanced over, 
Every inmost thought could show ! 
Then thou wouldst at last discover 
‘T was not well to spurn it so. 


Though the world for this commend , 
thee— 
Though it smile upon the blow, 
Even its praises must offend thee, 
Founded on another’s woe: 


Though my many faults defaced me, 
Could no other arm be found, 

Than the one which once embraced me, 
To inflict a cureless wound ? 


Yet, oh yet, thyself deceive not ; 
Love may sink by slow decay, 
But by sudden wrench, believe not 
Hearts can thus be torn away : 


Still thine own its life retaineth, 
Still must mine, though bleeding, beat: 
And the undying thought which paineth 
Is—that we no more may meet. 


These are words of deeper sorrow 
Than the wail above the dead ; 
Both shall live, but every morrow 
Wake us from a widow’d bed. 


And when thou wouldst solace gather, 
When our child's first accents flow, 
Wilt thou teach her to say ‘‘ Father !” 
Though his care she must forego ? 


When her little hands shall press thee, 
When her lip to thine is press’d, 
Think of him whose prayer shall bless 
thee, 
Think of him thy love had bless’d! 


Should her lineaments resemble 
Those thou never more may’st see, 

Then thy heart will softly tremble 
With a pulse yet true to me. 


All my faults perchance thou knowest, 
All my madness none can know ; 

All my hopes, where’er thou goest, 
Wither, yet with thee they go. 


Every feeling hath been shaken ; 
Pride, which not a world could bow, 
Bows to thee—by thee forsaken, 
Even my soul forsakes me now : 


But ’t is done—all words are idle— 
Words from me are vainer still ; 

But the thoughts we cannot bridle 
Force their way without the will. 


BYRON 





Fare thee well! thus disunited, 
Torn from every nearer tie, 
Sear’d in heart, and lone, and blighted, 
More than this I scarce can die. 
March 18, 1816. April 4, 1816. 


STANZAS FOR MUSIC 


THERE be none of Beauty’s daughters 
With a magic lke thee ; 
And like music on the waters 
Is thy sweet voice to me: 
When, as if its sound were causing 
The charmed ocean’s pausing, 
The waves lie still and gleaming, 
And the lull’d winds seem dreaming : 


And the midnight moon is weaving 
Her bright chain o’er the deep ; 

Whose breast is gently heaving, 
As an infant’s asleep : 

So the spirit bows before thee, 

To listen and adore thee ; 

With a full but soft emotion, 

Like the swell of Summer’s ocean. 


March 28, 1816. 1816. 


CHILDE HAROLD’S PILGRIMAGE 
CANTO THE THIRD 


‘““Afin que cette application vous foreat de 
penser dautre chose ; iln’yaen vérité de reméde 
que celui-la et le temps.’ Lettre du Roi de 
Prusse ad D’ Alembert, Sept. 7, 1776. 


Is thy face like thy mother’s, my fair 
child! 

ADA! sole daughter of my house and 
heart ? 

When last I saw thy young blue eyes 
they smiled, 

And then we parted,—not as now we 
part, 

But with a hope.— 

Awaking with a start, 

The waters heave around me; and on 
high 

The winds lift up their voices: I depart, 

Whither I know not; but the hour’s 
gone by, 

When Albion’s lessening shores could 
grieve or glad mine eye. 


Once more upon the waters! yet once 
more ! 

And the waves bound beneath me asa 
steed 

That knows his rider. 
roar ! 


Welcome to their 


189 


Swift be their guidance, wheresoe’er it 
lead ! 

Though the strain’d mast should quiver 
as a reed, 

And the rent canvas fluttering strew the 
gale, 

Still must I on; for 1am as a weed, 

Flung from the rock, on Ocean’s foam to 
sail 

Where’er the surge may sweep, the tem- 
pest’s breath prevail. 


In my youth’s summer I did sing of One, 

The wandering outlaw of his own dark 
mind ; 

Again I seize the theme, then but begun, 

And bear it with me, as the rushing 
wind 

Bears the cloud onwards: in that Tale I 
find 

The furrows of long thought, and dried- 
up tears, 

Which, ebbing, leave a sterile track be- 
hind, 

O’er which all heavily the journeying 
years 

Plod the last sands of life,—where not a 
flower appears. 


Since my young days of passion—joy, or 
pain, 

Perchance my heart and harp have lost 
a string, 

And both may jar: it may be, that in vain 

I would essay as I have sung to sing. 

Yet, though a dreary strain, to this I 
cling ; 

So that it wean me from the weary dream 

Of selfish grief or gladness—-so it fling 

Forgetfulness around me—-it shall seem 

To me, though to none else, a not un- 
grateful theme. 


He, who grown aged in this world of 
woe, 

In deeds, not years, piercing the depths 
of life, 

So that no wonder waits him; nor below 


Can love or sorrow, fame, ambition, 
strife, 

Cut to his heart again with the keen 
knife 


Of silent, sharp endurance: he can tell 

Why thought seeks refuge in lone caves, 
yet rife 

With airy images, and shapes which 
dwell 

Still unimpair’d, though old, in the soul's 
haunted cell. 


Igo 





'T is to create, and in creating live 

A being more intense that we endow 

With form our fancy, gaining as we give 

The life we image, even as I do now. 

What am I? Nothing: but not so art 
thou, 

Soul of my thought ! with whom I tra- 
verse earth, 

Invisible but gazing, as I glow 

Mix’d with thy spirit, blended with thy 
birth, 

And feeling still with thee in my crush’d 
feelings’ dearth. 


Yet’ must I think less wildly ;—I have 
thought 

Too long and darkly, till my brain be- 
came, 

In its own eddy boiling and o’erwrought, 

A whirling gulf of phantasy and flame : 

And thus, untaught in youth my heart 
to tame, 

My springs of life were poison’d. 
too late! 

Yet am I changed ; though still enough 
the same 

In strength to bear what time cannot 
abate, 

And feed on bitter fruits without ac- 
cusing Fate. 


°T is 


Something too much of this :—but now 
*t is past, 

And the spell closes with its silent seal. 

Long absent HAROLD re-appears at last ; 

He of the breast which fain no more 
would feel, 

Wrung with the wounds which kill not 
but ne’er heal ; 

Yet Time, who changes all, had alter’d 
him 

In soul and aspect as in age: years steal 

Fire from the mind as vigor from the 
limb ; 

And life’s enchanted cup but sparkles 
near the brim. 


His had been quaff’d too quickly, and he 

found 

dregs were wormwood,—but he 

fill’d again, 

And froma purer fount, on holier ground 

And deem’d its spring perpetual; but in 
vain! 

Still round him clung invisibly a chain 

Which gall’d for ever, fettering though 
unseen, 

And heavy though it clank’d not ; worn 
with pain, | 


The 


BRITISH POETS 


Which pined although it spoke not, and 
grew keen, 

Entering with every step he took through 
many a scene. 


Secure in guarded coldness, he had mix’d 

Again in fancied safety with his kind, 

And deem’d his spirit now so firmly fix’d 

And sheath’d with an invulnerable mind, 

That, if no joy, no sorrow lurk’d behind ; 

And he, as one, might ’midst the many 
stand 

Unheeded, searching through the crowd 
to find 

Fit speculation ; such as in strange land 

He found in wonder-works of God and 
Nature’s hand. ‘ 


But who can view the ripen’d rose, nor 
seek | 

To wear it ? who can curiously behold 

The smoothness and the sheen of beauty’s 
cheek, 

Nor feel the heart can never all grow 
old ? 

Who can contemplate Fame through 
clouds unfold 

The star which rises o’er her steep, nor 
climb ? . 

Harold, once more within the vortex, 
roll’d 

On with the giddy circle, chasing Time, 

Yet witha nobler aim than in his youth’s 
fond prime. 


But soon he knew himself the most unfit 

Of men to herd with Man; with whom he 
held 

Little in common; untaught to submit 

His thoughts to others, though his soul 
was quell’d 

In youth by his own thoughts; still un- 
compell’d, 

He would not yield dominion of his 
mind 

To spirits against whom his own rebell’d ; 

Proud though in desolation; which 
could find 

A life within itself, to breathe without 
mankind. 


Where rose the mountains, there to him | 
were friends ; 

Where roll’d the ocean, thereon was his 
home ; 

Where a blue sky, and glowing clime, 
extends, 

He had the passion and the power to 
roam ; 


BYRON 


The desert, forest, cavern, breaker’s foam, 
Were unto him companionship; they 
' spake 

A mutual language, 
tome 

Of his land’s tongue, which he would oft 
forsake 

For Nature’s pages glass’d by sunbeams 
on the lake. 


clearer than the 


Like the Chaldean, he could watch the 


stars, 

Till he had peopled them with beings 
bright 

As their own beams ; 
earthborn jars, 

And human frailties, 
quite : 

Could he have kept his spirit to that flight 

He had been happy ; but this clay will 
sink 

Itsspark immortal, envying it the light 

To which it mounts, as if to break the 
link 

That keeps us from yon heaven which 
woos us to its brink. 


and earth, and 


were forgotten 


But in Man’s dwellings he became a 
thing 

Restless and worn, and stern and weari- 
some, 

Droop’d as a wild-born falcon with clipt 
wing, 

To whom the boundless air alone were 
home : 

Then came his fit again, which to o’er- 
come, 

_ As eagerly the barr’d-up bird will beat 

His ein and beak against his wiry 


om 

Till the Bidod tinge his plumage, so the 
heat 

Of his impeded soul would through his 
bosom eat. 


Self-exiled Harold wanders forth again, 

With nought of hope left, but with less 
of gloom 3 

The very knowledge that he lived in vain, 

That all was over on this side the tomb, 

Had made Despair asmilingness assume, 

Which, though ’t were wild,—as on the 
plunder” d wreck 

When peers would madly meet their 


With draughts intemperate on the sink- 
ing deck, — 

Did yet inspire a cheer, which he forbore 
to check. 


Ig! 


Stop !—for thy tread is on an Empire’s 
dust ! 

An Earthquake’s spoil 
below ! 

Is the spot mark’d with no colossal bust ? 

Nor column trophied for triumphalshow ? 

None ; but the moral’s truth tells simpler 


is sepulchred 


SO, 

As the ground was before, thus let it 
be ;— 

How that red rain hath made the harvest 
grow ! 

And is this all the world has gain’d by 
thee, 

Thou first and last of fields ! king-making 
Victory ? 

And Harold stands upon this place of 
skulls, 

The grave of France, the deadly Water- 
loo! 

How in an hour the power which gave 
annuls 

Its gifts, transferring fame as fleeting 
too ; 

In *‘ pride of place ” here last the eagle 
flew, 

Then tore with bloody talon the rent 
plain, 

Pierced by the shaft of banded nations 
through ; 


Ambition’s life and labors all were vain ; 
He wears the shatter’d links of the 
world’s broken chain. 


Fit retribution! Gaul may champ the 
bit 

And foam in fetters ;—but is Earth more 
free? 

Did nations combat to make One sub- 
mit ; 

Or league to teach all kings true sov- 
ereignty ? 

What! shall reviving Thraldom again 


be 

The patch’d-up idol of enlighten’d days? 

Shall we, who struck the Lion down, 
shall we 

Pay the Wolf homage? proffering lowly 
gaze 

And servile knees to thrones? No; 
prove before ye praise ! 


If not, o’er one fallen despot boast no 
more ! 

In vain fair cheeks were furrow’d with 
hot tears 

For Europe’s flowers 
before 


long rooted up 


192 

The trampler of her vineyards; in vain 
years 

Of death, depopulation, bondage, fears, 

Have all been bor ne, and broken by the 


accord 

Of roused-up millions; all that most 
endears 

Glory, is when the myrtle wreathes a 
sword 

Such as Harmodius drew on Athens’ 


tyrant lord. 


There was a sound of revelry by night 

And Belgium’s capital had gather’d 
then 

Her Beauty and her Chivalry, and bright 

The lamps shone o’er fair women and 
brave men ; 

A thousand hearts beat happily ; and 
when 

Music arose with its voluptuous swell, 

Soft eyes look’d love to eyes which 
spake again, 

And all went,merry as a marriage bell ; 

But hush! hark! a deep sound strikes 
like a rising knell! 


Did ye not hear it ?—No; "twas but the 


wind, 

Or the car rattling o’er the stony 
street ; 

On with the dance! let joy be uncon- 
fined ; 


No sleep till morn, when Youth and 
Pleasure meet 

To chase the glowing Hours with flying 
feet— 

But hark !—that heavy sound breaks in 
once more, 

As if the clouds. its echo would repeat ; 

And nearer, clearer, deadlier than be- 
fore ! 

Arm! Arm! it is—it is—the cannon’s 
opening roar ! 


Within a window’d niche of that high 
hall 

Sate Brunswick’s fated chieftain ; he 
did hear 

That sound the first amidst the fes- 
tival, 

And caught its tone with Death’s pro- 
phetic ear ; 

And when they smiled because he 
deem’d it near, 

His heart more truly knew that peal 
too well 

Which stretch’d his father on a bloody 
bier, 


BRITISH) BOETS 


And roused the vengeance blood alone 
could quell ; 

He rush’d into the field, and, foremost 
fighting, fell. 


Ah! then and there was hurrying to 
and fro, 

And gathering tears, and tremblings 
of distress, 

And cheeks all pale, which but an 
hour ago 

Blush’d at the praise of their own love- 
liness ; 

And there were sudden partings, such 
as press 

The life from out young hearts, and 
choking sighs 

Which ne’er might be repeated; who 
could guess 

If ever more should meet those mutual 
eyes, 

Since upon night so sweet such awful 
morn could rise! | 


And there was mounting in hot haste: 
the steed, 

The mustering squadron, and the clat- 
tering car, 

Went pouring forward with impetuous 
speed, 

And swiftly forming in the ranks of 
war ; 

And the deep thunder peal on peal afar ; 

And near, the beat of the alarming 
drum 

Roused up the soldier ere the morning 
star ; 

While throng’d the citizens with ter- 
ror dumb, 

Or whispering, with white lips—‘‘ The 
foe, they come! they come! ” 


And wild and high the ‘‘ Cameron’s 


gathering ” rose! 
The war-note of Lochiel, which Albyn’s 
hills 


Have heard, and heard, too, have her 
Saxon foes :— 

How in the noon of night that pibroch 
thrills, 
Savage and shrill! 

which fills 
Their mountain-pipe, so fill the moun- 


But with the breath 


taineers 

With the fierce native daring which 
instils 

The SHEDS memory of a thousand 
ye 


And vat an °s, Donald’s fame rings in each 
clansman’ sears ! 


BYRON 





And Ardennes waves above them her 
green leaves, 

Dewy with nature’s tear- -drops as they 
pass, 

Grieving, if aught inanimate e’er grieves, 

Over the unreturning brave,—alas ! 

Ere evening to be trodden like the grass 

Which now beneath them, but above 
shall grow 

In its next verdure, when this fiery mass 

_Of living valor, rolling on the foe 

And burning with high hope 
moulder cold and low. 


shall 


Last noon beheld them full of lusty life, 

Last eve in Beauty’s circle proudly gay, 

‘The midnight brought the signal-sound 
of strife. 

The morn the marshalling in arms,— 
the day 

Battle’s magnificently stern array ! 

The thunder-clouds close o’er it, which 
when rent 

The earth is cover'd thick with other 
clay, 

Which her own clay shall cover, heap’d 
and pent, 

Rider and horse,—friend, foe,—in one 
red burial blent ! 


Their praise is hymn’d by loftier harps 
than mine: 

Yet one [ would select from that proud 
throng, 

Partly because they blend me with his 
line, 

And partly that I did his sire some wrong, 

And partly that bright names will hallow 


song ; 

And his was of the bravest, and when 
shower’d 

The death-bolts deadliest the thinn’d 
files along, 

Even where the thickest of war’s tem- 
pest lower'd. 

They reach’d no nobler breast than thine, 
young gallant Howard! 


There have been tears and breaking 
hearts for thee, 
And mine were nothing had I such to 


give; 

But when I stood beneath the fresh 

green tree, 

Which living waves where thou didst 

cease to live, 

And saw around me the wide field revive 

With fruits and fertile promise, and the 
Spring 


13 


AOS 


Came forth her work of gladness to 
contrive, 

With all her reckless birds upon the 
wing, 

I turn’d from all she brought to those 
she could not bring. 


I turn’d to thee, to thousands, of whom 
each 

And one as alla ghastly gap did make 

In his own kind and kindred, whom to 
teach 

Forgetfulness were mercy for their sake ; 

The Archangel’s trump, not Glory’s, 
must awake 

Those whom they thirst for ; 
sound of Fame 

May for a moment soothe, 
slake 

The fever of vain longing, and the name 

So honor’d but assumes a_ stronger, 
bitterer claim. 


though the 


it cannot 


They mourn, but smile at length; and, 
smiling, mourn : 

The tree will wither long before it fall ; 

The hull drives on, though mast and 
sail be torn ; 

The roof-tree sinks, but moulders on 
the hall 

In massy hoariness ; the ruin’d wall 

Stands when its wind-worn battlements 
are gone ; 

The bars survive the captive they en- 
thral ; 

The day drags through, 
keep out the sun; 

And thus the heart will break, yet bro- 
kenly live on : 


though storms 


Evenas a broken mirror, which the glass 

In every fragment multiplies ; and makes 

A thousand images of one that was, 

The same, and still the more, the more 
it breaks ; 

And thus the heart will do which not 
forsakes, 

Living in shatter’d guise; and still, and 
cold, 

And bloodless, with its sleepless sorrow 
aches, 

Yet withers on till all without is old, 

Showing no visible sign, for such things 
are untold. 


There is a very life in our despair, 

Vitality of poison,—a quick root 

Which feeds these deadly branches ; for 
it were 


194 


As nothing did we die ; but Life will suit 

Itself to Sorrow’s most detested fr uit, 

Like to the apples on the Dead Sea’s 
shore, 

All ashes to the taste: Did man compute 

Existence by enjoyment, and count o’er 

Such hours ’gainst years of life,—say, 
would he name threescore ? 


The Psalmist number’d out the years of 
man : 

They are enough ; 
true, 

Thou, who didst grudge him even that 
fleeting span, 

More than enough, thou fatal Waterloo ! 


and if thy tale be 


Millions of tongues record thee, and 
anew 

Their children’s lips shall echo them, 
and say— 

‘* Here, where the sword united nations 
drew, 

Our countrymen were warring on that 
day t= 


And this is much, and all which will not 
pass away. 


There sunk the greatest, nor the worst 
of men, 

Whose spirit, antithetically mixt, 

One moment of the mightiest, and again 

On little objects with like firmness fixt ; 

Extreme in all things ! hadst thou been 
betwixt, 

Thy throne had still been thine, or never 
been ; 

For daring made thy rise as fall: 
seek’st 

Even now to re-assume the imperial 
mien, 

And shake again the world, the Thun- 
derer of the scene ! 


thou 


Conqueror and captive of the earth art 
thou! 

She trembles at thee still, and thy wild 
name 

Was ne’er more bruited in men’s minds 
than now 

That thou art nothing,‘save the jest of 
Fame, 

Who woo’d thee once, thy vassal, 
became 

The flatterer of thy fierceness, till thou 
wert 

A god unto thyself ; nor less the same 

To the astounded kingdoms all inert, 

Who deem’d thee for a time whate’er 
thou didst assert. 


and 


BRITISH POETS 


Oh, more or less than man—in high or 
low, 

Battling with nations, flying from the 
field ; ~ 

Now making monarchs’ necks thy foot- 
stool, now 

More than thy meanest soldier taught 
o yield ; 

An empire thou couldst crush, command, 
rebuild, 

But govern not thy pettiest passion, nor, 

However deeply in men’s spirits skill’d, 

Look through thine own, nor curb the 
lust of war, 

Nor learn that tempted Fate will leave 
the loftiest star. 


Yet well thy soul hath brook’d the turn- 
ing tide 

With that untaught innate philosophy, 

Which, be it wisdom, coldness, or deep 
pride, 

Is gall and wormwood to an enemy. 

When the whole host of hatred stood 
hard by, 

To watch and mock thee shrinking, thou 
hast smiled 

With a sedate and all-enduring eye ;— 

When Fortune fled her spoil’d and 
favorite child, 

He stood unbow’d beneath the ills upon 
him piled. 


Sager than in thy fortunes; for in them 

Ambition steel’d thee on too far to show 

That just habitual scorn, which could 
contemn 

Men and their thoughts ;’ twas wise to 
feel, not so 

To wear it ever on thy lip and brow, 

And spurn the instruments thou wert to 
use 

Till they were turn’d unto thine over- 
throw : 

’Tis but a worthless world to win or lose ; 

So hath it proved to thee, and all such 

lot who choose. 


If, like a tower upon a headland rock, 

Thou hadst been made to stand or fall 
alone, 

Such scorn of man had help’d to brave 
the shock ; 

But men’s thoughts were the steps which 
paved thy throne, 

Their admiration thy best weapon shone ; 

The part of Philip’s son was thine, not 
then 

(Unless aside thy purple 
thrown) 


had been 


BYRON 


Like stern Diogenes to mock at men ; 
For sceptred cynics earth were far too 
wide a den. 


But quiet to quick bosoms is a hell, 
And at hath been thy bane ; there is a 
re 

And motion of the soul which will not 
dwell 

In its own narrow being, but aspire 

Beyond the fitting medium of desire ; 

And, but once kindled, quenchless ever- 
more, 

Preys upon high adventure, nor can tire 

Of aught but rest ; a fever at the core, 

Fatal to him who bears, to all who ever 
bore. 


This makes the madmen who have made 


men mad 

By their contagion ; Conquerors and 
Kings, 

mean crs OF sects and systems, to whom 
a 

Sophists, Bards, Statesmen, all unquiet 
things 

Which stir too strongly the soul’s secret 
springs, 

And are themselves the fools to those 
they fool ; 


Envied, yet how unenviable! what stings 

Are theirs! One breast laid open were a 
school 

Which would unteach mankind the lust 
to shine or rule: 


Their breath is agitation, and their life 

A storm whereon they ride, to sink at 
last, 

And yet so nursed and bigoted to strife, 

That should their days, surviving perils 
past, 

Melt to calm twilight, they feel overcast 

With sorrow and supineness, and so die ; 

Even as a flame unfed, which runs to 
waste 


With its own flickering, or a sword laid | 


by, 
Which eats into itself, and rusts inglori- 
ously. 


He who ascends to mountain-tops, shall 
find 

The loftiest peaks most wrapt in clouds 
and snow ; 

He who surpasses or subdues mankind 

Must look down on the hate of those 
below. 

Though high above the sun of glory glow, 


nos 


And far beneath the earth and ocean 
spread, 

Round him are icy rocks, and loudly blow 

Contending tempests on his naked head, 

And thus reward the toils which to those 


summits led. 


Away with these! true Wisdom’s world 
will be 

Within its own creation, or in thine, 

Maternal Nature! for who teems like 
thee, 

Thus on the banks of thy majestic Rhine ? 

There Harold gazes on a work divine, 

A blending of all beauties; streams and 
dells, 

Fruit, foliage, crag, wood, cornfield, 
mountain, vine, 

And chiefless castles breathing stern 
farewells 

From gray but leafy walls, where Ruin 
greenly dwells. 


And there they stand, as stands a lofty 
mind, 

Worn, but unstooping to the baser crowd, 

All tenantless, save to the crannying 
wind, 

Or holding dark communion with the 
cloud. 

There wasa day when they were young 
and proud ; 

Banners on high, and battles pass’d 


below ; 
But they who fought are in a_ bloody 
shroud, 


And those which waved are shredless 
dust ere now, 
And the bleak battlements shall bear no 


future blow. 


Beneath those battlements, within those 
walls, 

Power dwelt amidst her passions; in 
proud state 

Each robber chief upheld his armed halls, 

Doing his evil will, nor less elate 

Than mightier heroes of a longer date. 

What want these outlaws conquerors 
should have 

But history’s purchased page to call them 
great ? 

A wider space, an ornamented grave ? 

Their hopes were not less warm, their 
souls were full as brave. 


In their baronial feuds and single fields, 

W hat deeds of prowess unrecorded died! 

And Love, which lent a blazon to their 
shields, 


196 


With emblems well devised by amorous 
pride, 

Through all the mail of iron hearts 
would glide ; 

But still their flame was fierceness, and 
drew on 

Keen contest and destruction near allied, 

And many a tower for some fair mis- 
chief won, 

Saw the discolor’d Rhine beneath its 
ruin run. 


But Thou, exulting and abounding 
river ! 

Making thy waves a blessing as they 
flow 


Through banks whose beauty would 
endure for ever 

Could man but leave thy bright crea- 
tion so, 

Nor its fair promise from the surface 
mow 

With the sharp scythe of conflict,— 
then to see 

Thy valley of sweet waters, were to 
know 

Earth paved like Heaven ; and to seem 
such to me, 

Even now what wants thy stream ?— 
that it should Lethe be. 


A thousand battles have assail’d thy 
banks, 

But these and half their fame have 
pass’d away, 

And Slaughter heap’d on high his welter- 
ing ranks ; 

Their very graves are gone, and what 
are they ? 

Thy tide wash’d down the blood of 
yesterday, 

And all was stainless, and on thy clear 
stream 
Glass’d, with its 

sunny ray ; 
But o’er the blacken’d memory’s 
ing dream 
Thy waves would vainly roll, all sweep- 
ing as they seem. 


dancing light, the 


blight- 


Thus Harold inly said, and pass’d along, 

Yet not insensible to all which here 

Awoke the jocund birds to early song 

In glens which might have made even 
exile dear: 

Though on his brow were graven lines 
austere, 

And tranquil sternness, which had ta’en 
the place 


BRITISH POETS 


Of feelings fierier far but less severe, 

Joy was not always absent from his face, 

But o’er it in such scenes would steal 
with transient trace. 


Nor was all love shut from him, though 
his days 

Of passion had consumed themselves to 
dust. 

It is in vain that we would coldly gaze 

On such as smile upon us; the heart 
must 

Leap kindly back to kindness, though 
disgust 

Hath wean’d it from all worldlings : thus 
he felt, 

For there was soft remembrance, and 
sweet trust 

In one fond breast, to which his own 
would melt, 

And in its tenderer hour on that his 
bosom dwelt. 


And he had learn’d to love,—I know not 
why, 

For this in such as him seems strange of 
mood,— 

The helpless looks of blooming infancy, 

Even in its earliest nurture ; what sub- 


— dued, 
To change like this, a mind so far im- 
bued 
With scorn of man, it little boots to 
know ; 


But thus it was: and though in solitude 

Small power the nipp’d affections have 
to grow, 

In him this glow’d when all beside had 
ceased to glow. 


And there was one soft breast, as hath 
been said, 

Which unto his was bound by stronger 
ties 

Than the church links withal; 
though unwed, 


and, 


‘That love was pure, and, far above dis- 


guise, 
Had stood the test of mortal enmities 
Still undivided, and cemented more 
By peril, dreaded most in female eyes ; 
But this was firm, and from a foreign 
shore 
Well to that heart might his these ab- 
sent greetings pour ! 


The castled crag of Drachenfels 
Frowns o’er the wide and winding 
Rhine, 


BYRON 


Whose breast of waters broadly swells 

Between the banks which bear the 
vine, 

And hills all rich with blossom’d trees, 

And fields which promise corn and 
wine, 

And scatter’d cities crowning these, 

Whose far white walls along them 
shine, 

Have strew’d a scene, which I should 
see 

With double joy wert thow with me. 


And peasant girls, with 
eyes, 

And hands which offer early flowers, 

Walk smiling o’er this paradise ; 

Above, the frequent feudal towers 

Through green leaves lift their walls 
of gray ; 

And many a rock which steeply 
lowers, 

And noble arch in proud decay, 

Look o’er this vale of vintage-bowers ; 

But one thing want these banks of 
Rhine,— 

Thy gentle hand to clasp in mine! 


deep blue 


I send the lilies given to me ; 

Though long before thy hand they 
touch, 

I know that they must wither’d be, 

But yet reject them not as such ; 

For I have cherish’d them as dear, 

Because they yet may meet thine eye, 

And guide thy soul to mine even here, 

When thou behold’st them drooping 
nigh, 

And know’st them gather’d by the 
Rhine, 

And offer’d from my heart to thine! 


The river nobly foams and flows, 

The charm of this enchanted ground, 

And all its thousand turns disclose 

Some fresher beauty varying round : 

The haughtiest breast its wish might 
bound 

Through life to dwell delighted here ; 

Nor could on earth a spot be found 

To nature and to me so dear, 

Could thy dear eyes in following mine 

Still sweeten more these banks of 
Rhine ! 


By Coblentz, on a rise of gentle ground, 

There is a small and simple pyramid, 

Crowning the summit of the verdant 
mound ; 


soit 





Beneath its base are heroes’ ashes hid, 

Our enemy’s—but let not that forbid 

Honor to Marceau! o’er whose early 
tomb 

Tears, big tears, gush’d from the rough 
soldier’s lid, 

Lamenting and yet envying 
doom, 

Falling for France, whose rights he 
battled to resume. 


such a 


Brief, brave, and glorious was his young 
career ,—— 

His mourners were two hosts, his friends 

- and foes; 

And fitly may the stranger lingering 
here 

Pray for his gallant spirit’s bright repose ; 

For he was Freedom’s champion, one of 

those. 

few in number, 

o’erstept 

The charter to chastise which she be- 
stows 

On such as wield her weapons; he had 
kept 

The whiteness of his soul, and thus men 
o’er him wept. 


The who had not 


Here Ehrenbreitstein, with her shatter’d 
wall 

Black with the miner’s blast, upon her 
height 

Yet shows of what she was, when shell 
and ball 

Rebounding idly on her strength did 


light : 

A tower of victory! from whence the 
flight 

Of baffled foes was watch’d along the 
plain : 


But Peace destroy’d what War could 
never blight, 

And laid those proud roofs bare to Sum- 
mer’s rain— 

On which the iron shower for years had 
pour’d in vain. 


Adieu to thee, fair Rhine ! How long 
delighted 

The stranger fain would linger on his 
way ! 

Thine is a scene alike where souls united 

Or lonely Contemplation thus might 


stray ; 

And could the ceaseless vultures cease 
to prey 

On self-condemning bosoms, it were 
here, 


198 


BRITISH POETS 





Where Nature, nor too sombre nor too 


gay, 
Wild but not rude, awful yet not austere, 
Is to the mellow Earth as Autumn to 
the year. 


Adieu to thee again ! avain adieu! 
There can be no farewell to scene like 
thine ; : 
The mind is color’d by thy every hue: 
And if reluctantly the eyes resign 
Their cherish’d gaze upon thee, lovely 


Rhine! 
’'T is with the thankful heart of parting 
praise ; 


More mighty spots may rise, more glar- 
ing shine, 

But none unite in one attaching maze 

The brilliant, fair, and soft,—the glories 
of old days, 


The negligently grand, the fruitful 
bloom 

Of coming ripeness, the white city’s 

sheen, 

rolling 

gloom, 

The forest’s growth, and Gothic walls 
between, 

The wild rocks shaped as they had 
turrets been, 

In mockery of man’s art; and these 
withal ; 

A race of faces happy as the scene, 

Whose fertile bounties here extend to all, 

Still springing o’er thy banks, though 
Empires near them fall. 


The stream, the precipice’s 


But these recede. Above me are the 
Alps, 

The palaces of Nature, whose vast walls 

Have pinnacled in clouds their snowy 
scalps, 

And throned Eternity in icy halls 

Of cold sublimity, where forms and falls 

The avalanche — the thunderbolt of 
snow ! 

Allthat expands the spirit, yet appalls, 

Gather around these summits, as to 
show 

How Earth may pierce to Heaven, yet 
leave vain man below. 


But ere these matchless heights I dare 
to scan, 

There is a spot should not be pass’d in 
vain ,— 

Morat! the proud, the patriot field! 
where man 


May gaze on ghastly trophies of the slain, 

Nor blush for those who conquer’d on 
that plain ; 

Here Burgundy bequeath’d his tomb- 
less host, 

A bony heap, through ages to remain, 

Themselves their monument ; — the 
Stygian coast 

Unsepulchred they roam’d, and shriek’d 
each wandering ghost. 


While Waterloo with Canne’s carnage 
vies, 

Morat and Marathon twin names shall 
stand ; 

They were true Glory’s stainless. vic- 
tories, 

Won by the unambitious heart and 
hand 

Of a proud, brotherly, and civic band, 

All unbought champions in no princely 


cause 

Of vice-entail’d Corruption; they no 
land 

Doom’d to bewail the blasphemy of 
laws 


Making kings’ rights divine, by some 
Draconic clause. 


By a lone wall a lonelier column rears 
A gray and grief-worn aspect of old 


days ; 

*T is the last remnant of the wreck of 
years, 

And looks as with the wild-bewilder’d 
gaze 


Of one to stone converted by amaze, 

Yet still with consciousness ; and there 
it stands 

Making a marvel that it not decays, 

When the coeval pride of human hands, 

Levell’d Adventicum,! hath strew’d her 
subject lands. 


And there—oh! sweet and sacred be 
the name !— 

Julia—the daughter, the devoted—gave 

Her youth to Heaven; her heart, be- 
neath a claim 

Nearest to Heaven’s, broke o’er a father’s 
grave. 

Justice is sworn ’gainst tears, and hers 
would crave 

The life she lived in; but the judge was 
just, 

And then she died on him she could 
not save. 


1The Roman capital of Helvetia; now Aven- 
ches, 


Bae 


BYRON 


Their tomb was simple, and without 
a bust, 

And held within their urn one mind, 
one heart, one dust. 


But these are deeds which should not 
pass away, 

And names that must 
though the earth 

Forgets her empires with a just decay, 

The enslavers and the enslaved, their 
death and birth ; 

The high, the mountain-majesty of worth 

Should be, and shall, survivor of its woe, 

And from its immortality look forth 

In the sun’s face, like yonder Alpine 
snow, 

Imperishably pure beyond all things 
below. 


not wither, 


Lake Leman woos me with its crystal 
face, 

The mirror where the stars and moun- 
tains view ~ 

The stillness of their aspect in each trace 

Its clear depth yields. of their far 
height and hue ; 

There is too much of man here, to look 
through 

With a fit mind the might which I 
behold ; 

But soon in me shall Loneliness renew 

Thoughts hid, but not less cherish’d 
than of old, 

Ere mingling with the herd had penn’d 
me in their fold. 


To fly from, need not be to hate, man- 
kind : 

All are not fit with them to stir and toil, 

Nor is it discontent to keep the mind 

Deep in its fountain, lest it overboil 

In the hot throng, where we become 
the spoil 

Of our infection, till too late and long 

We may deplore and struggle with the 
coil, 

In wretched interchange of wrong for 
wrong 

Midst a contentious world, 
where none are strong. 


striving 


There, ina moment we may plunge our 
years 

In fatal. penitence, and in the blight 

Of our own soul turn all our blood to 
tears, 

And color things to come with hues 
of Night ; 


499 


The race of life becomes a_ hopeless 
flight 
To those who walk in darkness: on the 


sea 

The boldest steer but where their ports 
invite ; 

But there are wanderers o’er Eternity 

Whose bark drives on and on, and 
anchor’d ne’er shall be. 


Is it not better, then, to be alone, 

And love Earth only for its earthly sake ? 

By the blue rushing of the arrowy Rhone, 

Or the pure bosom of its nursing lake, 

Which feeds it as a mother who doth 
make 

A fair but froward infant her own care, 

Kissing its cries away as these awake ;— 

Is it not better thus our lives to wear, 

Than join the crushing crowd, doom’d 
to inflict or bear ? 


I live not in myself, but I become 

Portion of that around me; and to me 

High mountains are a feeling, but the 
hum 

Of human cities torture : I can see 

Nothing to loathe in nature, save to be 

A link reluctant in a fleshly chain, 

Class’d among creatures, when the soul 
can flee, 

And with the sky, the peak, the heaving 
plain 

Of ocean, or the stars, mingle, and not 
in vain. 


And thus I am absorb’d, and this is life : 

I look upon the peopled desert past, 

As on a place of agony and strife, 

Where, for some sin, to sorrow I was 
cast, 

To act and suffer, but remount at last 

With a fresh pinion; which I feel to 
spring, 

Though young, yet waxing vigorous as 
the blast 

Which it would cope 
lighted wing, 

Spurning the clay-cold bonds which 
round our being cling. 


with, on de- 


And when, at length, the mind shall be 


all free 
From what it hates in this degraded 
form, 


Reft of its carnal life, save what shall be 
Existent happier in the fly and worm—— 
When elements to elements conform, 
And dust is as it should be, shall I not 


200 





Feel all I see, less dazzling, but more 
warm? 

The bodiless thought? the Spirit of each 
spot ? 

Of which, even now, I share at times 
the immortal lot? 


Are not the mountains, waves, and skies, 
a part 

Of me and of my soul, as I of them ? 

Is not the love of these deep in my heart 

With a pure passion? should I not con- 
temn 

All objects, if compared with these? and 
stem 

A tide of suffering, rather than forego 

Such feelings for the hard and worldly 
phlegm 

Of those whose eyes are only turn’d 
below, 

Gazing upon the ground, with thoughts 
which dare not glow? 


But this is not my theme; and I return 

To that which is immediate, and require 

Those who find contemplation in the urn, 

To look on One, whose dust was once all 
fire, 

A native of the land where I respire 

The clear air for a while—a passing guest 

Where he became a being,—whose desire 

Was to be glorious; ’t was a foolish 
quest, 

The which to gain and keep, he sacrificed 
all rest. 


Here the self-torturing sophist, wild 
Rousseau, 

The apostle of affliction, he who threw 

Enchantment over passion, and from woe 

Wrung overwhelming eloquence, first 
drew 

The breath which made him wretched ; 
yet he knew 

How to make madness beautiful and cast 

O’er erring deeds and thoughts a heav- 
enly hue 

Of words, like sunbeams, dazzling as 
they past 

The eyes, which o’er them shed tears feel- 
ingly and fast. 


His love was passion’s essence :—as a tree 

On fire by ightning, with ethereal flame 

Kindled he was, and blasted ; for to be 

Thus, and enamor’d, were in him the 
same. 

But his was not the love of living dame, 

Nor of the dead who rise upon our 
dreams, 


BRITISH) POETS 


But of ideal beauty, which became 

In him existence, and o’erflowing teems 

Along his burning page, distemper’d 
though it seems. . 


This breathed itself to life in Julie, this 

Invested her with all that’s wild and 
sweet ; 

This hallow’d, too, the memorable kiss 

Which every morn his fever’d lip would 
greet, 

From hers, who but with friendship his 
would meet ; 

But to that gentle touch through brain 
and breast 

Flash’d the thrill’d spirit’s love-devour- 
ing heat; 

In that absorbing sigh perchance more 
blest 

Than vulgar minds may be with all they 
seek possest. 


His life was one long war with self- 
sought foes, 

Or friends by him self-banish’d ; for his 
mind 

Had grown Suspicion’s sanctuary, and 
chose, 

For its own cruel sacrifice, the kind, 

’Gainst whom he raged with fury strange 
and blind. 

But he was phrensied,—wherefore, who 
may know ? 

Since cause might be which skill could 

_ never find ; 

But he was phrensied by disease or woe, 

To that worst pitch of all, which wears 
a reasoning show. 


For then he was inspired, ana from him 
came, 

As from the Pythian’s mystic cave of 
yore, 

Those oracles which set the world in 
flame, 

Nor ceased to burn till kingdoms were 

- no more: 

Did he not this for France ? which lay 
before 

Bow’d to the inborn tyranny of years ? 

Broken and trembling to the yoke she 
bore, 

Till by the voice of him and his compeers 

Roused up to too much wrath, which fol- 
lows o’ergrown fears ? 


They made themselves a fearful monu- 
ment! 

The wreck of old opinions — things 

which grew, 





BYRON 


Breathed from the birth of time: the 
veil they rent, 

And what behind it lay, allearth shall 
view. 

But good with ill they also overthrew, 

Leaving but ruins, wherewith to rebuild 

Upon the same foundation, and renew 

Dungeons and thrones, which the same 
hour refill’d, 

As heretofore, because ambition was self- 
will'd. 


» But this will not endure, nor be endured ! 

Mankind have felt their strength, and 
made it felt. 

They might have used it better, but, 
allured 

By their new vigor, 
dealt 

On one another; pity ceased to melt 


sternly have they 


With her once natural charities. But 
they, 

Who in oppression’s darkness caved had 
dwelt, 

They were not eagles, nourish’d with 
the day ; 


What marvel then, at times, if they 
mistook their prey ? 


What deep wounds ever closed with- 
out a scar? 

The heart’s bleed longest, and but heal 
to wear 

That which disfigures it ;and they who 
war 

With their own hopes, and have been 
vanquish’d, bear 

Silence, but not submission: in his 


lair 

Fix’d Passion holds his breath, until 
the hour 

Which shall atone for years; none need 
despair : 

It came, it cometh, and will come,— 


the power 
To punish or forgive—in one we shall be 
slower. 


Clear, placid Leman! thy contrasted 


lake, 

‘With the wild world I dwelt in, is a 
thing 

Which warns me, with its stillness, to 
forsake . 

Earth’s troubled waters for a purer 


spring. 

This quiet sail is as a noiseless wing 

To waft me from distraction ; once I 
loved 


201 


Torn ocean’s roar, 
muring 
Sounds sweet as if a Sister’s 

proved, 
That I with stern delights should e’er 
have been so moved. 


but thy soft mur- 


voice re- 


It is the hush of night, and all between 
Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, 
yet clear, 


| Mellow’d and mingling, yet distinctly 


seen, 

Save darken’d Jura, whose capt heights 
appear 

Precipitously steep; and drawing near, 

There breathes a living fragrance from 
the shore, 

Of flowers yet fresh with childhood ; on 
the ear 

Drops the light drip of the suspended 
oar, 

Or chirps the grasshopper one good- 
night carol more ; 


He is an evening reveller, who makes 
His life an infancy, and sings his fill; 
At intervals, some bird from out the 


brakes 

Starts into voice a moment, then is 
still. 

There seems a floating whisper on the 
hill, 


But that is fancy, for the starlight dews 

All silently their tears of love instil, 

Weeping themselves away, till they 
infuse 

Deep into nature’s breast the spirit of 
her hues. 

Ye stars! which are the 
heaven ! 

If in your bright leaves we would read 
the fate 

Of men and empires,—’tis to be for- 
given, 

That in our aspirations to be great, 

Our destinies o’erleap their mortal state, 

And claim a kindred with you; for ye 
are 

A beauty and a mystery, and create 

In us such love and reverence from 
arar, 

That fortune, fame, power, life, have 
named themselves a star. 


poetry of 


All heaven and earth are still—though 
not in sleep, 
But breathless, as we grow when feeling 
most ; 


202 


And silent, as we stand in thoughts too 
deep :— 

Allheaven and earth are still: From the 
high host 

Of stars, to the lull’d lake and moun- 
tain coast, 

All is concenter’d in a life intense, 

Where nota beam, nor air, nor leaf is lost, 

But hath a part of being, and a sense 

Of that which is of all Creator and de- 
fence. 


Then stirs the feeling infinite, so felt 

In solitude, where we are least alone ; 

A truth, which through our being then 
doth melt, 

And purifies from self: it isa tone, 

The soul and source of music, which 
makes known 

Eternal harmony, and sheds a charm 

Like to the fabled Cytherea’s zone, 

Binding all things with beauty :— 
*’t would disarm 

The spectre Death, had he substantial 
power to harm. 


Not vainly did the early Persian make 

His altar the high places, and the peak 

Of earth-o’ergazing mountains, and 
thus take 

A fit and unwall’d temple, there to seek 

The Spirit, in whose honor shrines are 
weak, 

Uprear’d of human hands. Come, and 
compare 

Columns and idol-dwellings, Goth or 
Greek, 

With Nature’s realms of worship, earth 
and air, 

Nor fix on fond abodes to circumscribe 

thy prayer! 


The sky is changed !—and such achange! 
Oh night, 

And storm, and darkness, ye are won- 
drous strong, 

Yet lovely in your strength, as is the 
light 

Of a dark eye in woman! Far along, 

From peak to peak, the rattling crags 
among 

Leaps the live thunder ! 
lone cloud, 

But every mountain now hath found 
a tongue, 

And Jura answers, through her misty 
shroud, 

Back to the joyous Alps, who call to her 
aloud! 


Not from one 


BRITISH POETS 


And this is in the night :—Most glorious | 
night ! 

Thou wert not sent for slumber! let 
me be 

A sharer in thy fierce and far delight,— 

A portion of the tempest and of thee ! 

How the lit lake shines, a phosphoric 


sea, 

And the big rain comes dancing to the 
earth ! 

And now again ’tis black,—and now, the 


glee 
Of the loud hilly shakes with its moun- 
tain-mirth, ; 
As if they did rejoice o’er a young earth- 
quake’s birth. 


Now, where the swift Rhone cleaves 
his way between 

Heights which appear as lovers who 
have parted 

In hate, whose mining depths so inter- 
vene, 

That they can meet no more, though 
broken-hearted ; 

Though in their souls, which thus each 

; other thwarted, 

Love was the very root of the fond rage 

Which blighted their life’s bloom, and 
then departed : 

Itself expired, but leaving them anage 

Of years all winters,—war within them- 
selves to wage : 


Now, where the quick Rhone thus hath 
cleft his way, 

The mightiest of the storms hath ta’en 
his stand : 

For here, not one, but many, make 
their play, 

And fling their thunder-bolts from hand 
to hand, 

Flashing and cast around ; 
band, 

The brightest through these parted hills 
hath fork’d 

His lightnings,—as if he did understand, 

That in such gaps as desolation work’d, 

There the hot shaft should blast what- 
ever therein lurk’d. 


of all the 


mountains, river, winds, lake, 
lightnings ! ye! 

With night, and clouds, and thunder, 
and a soul 

To make these felt and feeling, well 
may be 

Things that have made me watchful ; 


the far roll 


Sky, 


BYRON 


Of your departing voices, is the knoll 

Of what in me is sleepless,—if I rest. 

But where of ye, O tempests! is the 
goal ? 

Are ye like those within the human 

_ breast ? 

Or do ye find, at length, like eagles, 

some high nest ? 


Could I embody and unbosom now 

That which is most within me,—could 
I wreak 

My thoughts upon expression, and thus 
throw 

Soul, heart, mind, 
strong or weak, 

All that I would have sought, and all I 
seek, ; 

Bear, know, feel, and yet breathe— 
into one word, 

And that one word were Lightning, I 
would speak ; 

But as it is, I live and die unheard, 

With a most voiceless thought, sheath- 
ing it as a sword, 


passions, feelings, 


The morn is up again, the dewy morn, 

With breath all incense, and with 
cheek all bloom, 

Laughing the clouds away with playful 
scorn, 

And living as if earth contain’d no 
tomb,— 

And glowing into day : we may resume 

The march of our existence: and thus I, 

Still on thy shores, fair Leman! may 
find room 

And food for meditation, nor pass by 

Much, that may give us pause, if pon- 
der’d fittingly. 


Clarens! sweet Clarens, birthplace of 
deep Love ! 

Thine air is the young breath of pas- 
sionate thought ; 

Thy trees take root in Love; the snows 
above 

The very Glaciers 
caught, 

And sunset into rose-hues sees them 
wrought 

By rays which sleep there lovingly ; the 
rocks, 

The permanent crags, tell here of Love, 
who sought 

In them a refuge from the worldly 
shocks, 

Which stir and sting the soul with hope 
that woos, then mocks. 


have his’ colors 


203 


Clarens ye heavenly feet thy paths are 
trod,— 

Undying Love’s, who here ascends a 
throne 

To which the steps are mountains ; 
where the god 

Is a pervading life and light,—so shown 

Not on those summits solely, nor alone 

In the still cave and forest ; o’er the 
flower 

His eye is sparkling, and his breath hath 
blown, 

His soft and summer 
tender power 

Passes the strength of storms in their 
most desolate hour. 


breath, whose 


All things are here of him; from the 
black pines, 

Which are his shade on high, and the 
loud roar 

Of torrents, where he listeneth, to the 
vines 

Which slope his green path downward 
to the shore, 

Where the bow’d waters meet him, and 


adore, 

Kissing his feet with murmurs ; and the 
wood, 

The covert of old trees, with trunks all 
hoar, 


But light leaves, young as joy, stands 
where it stood, 

Offering to him, and his, a populous 
solitude ; 


A populous solitude of bees and birds, 

And fairy-form’d and many color’d 
things, 

Who worship him with notes more sweet 
than words, 

And innocently open their glad wings, 

Fearless and full of life: the gush of 
springs, 

And fall of lofty fountains, and the bend 

Of stirring branches, and the bud which 
brings 

The swiftest thought of beauty, here 
extend, 

Mingling, and made by Love, unto one 
mighty end. 


He who hath loved not, here would learn 
that lore, 

And make his heart a spirit ; he who 
knows 

That tender mystery, willlove the more ; 

For this is Love’s recess, where vain men’s 
woes, 


204 


And the world’s waste, have driven him 
far from those, 
For ’t is his nature to advance or die ; 
He stands not still, but or decays, or 
grows 
Into a boundless blessing, which may vie 
With the immortal lights, in its eternity ! 


’T was not for fiction chose Rousseau 
this spot, 

Peopling it with affections ; but he found 

It was the scene which Passion must allot 

To the mind’s purified beings ; *t was the 
ground 

Where early Love his Psyche’s zone 
unbound, 

And hallow’d it with loveliness ; ’t is lone, 

And wonderful, and deep, and hath a 
sound, 

And sense, and sight of sweetness ; here 
the Rhone 

Hath spread himself a couch, the Alps 
have rear’d a throne. 


Lausanne! and Ferney! ye have been 
the abodes 

Of names which unto you bequeath’d 
a name ; 

Mortals, who sought and found, by 
dangerous roads, 

A path to perpetuity of fame : 

They were gigantic minds, and their 
steep aim 

Was, Titan-like, on daring doubts to pile 

Thoughts which should call down 
thunder, and the flame 

Of Heaven again assail’d, if Heaven the 
while . 

On man and man’s research could deign 
do more than smile. 


The one! was fire and fickleness, a child 

Most mutable in wishes, but in mind 

A wit as various,—gay, grave, sage, or 
wild,— 

Historian, bard, philosopher, combined ; 

He multiplied himself among mankind, 

The Proteus of their talents : But his own 

Breathed most in ridicule,—which, as 
the wind, 

Blew where it listed, laying all things 
prone,— 

Now to o’erthrow a fool, and now to 
shake a throne. 


The other,? deep and slow, exhausting 
thought, 


1Voltaire. 2 Gibbon. 


BRITISH POETS 


And hiving wisdom with each studious 
year, 

In meditation dwelt, with learning 
wrought, 

And shaped his weapon with an edge 
severe, 

Sapping a solemn creed with solemn 
sneer ; 

The lord of irony,—that master-spell, 

Which stung his foes to wrath, which 
grew from fear, 

And doom’d him to the zealot’s ready 
Hell, 

Which answers to all doubts so elo- 
quently well. 


Yet, peace be with their ashes,—for by 
them, ° 

If merited, the penalty is paid ; 

It is not ours to judge,—far less con- 
demn ; 

The hour must come when such things 
shall be made 

Known unto all, or hope and dread 
allay’d 

By slumber, on one pillow, in the dust, 

Which, thus much we are sure, must 
lie decay’d ; 

And when it shall revive, as is our 
trust, 

’T will be to be forgiven, or suffer what 
is just. 


But let me quit man’s works, again to 
read 

His Maker’s, spread around me, and 
suspend 

This page, which from my reveries I feed, 

Until it seems prolonging without end. 

The clouds above me to the white Alps 
tend, 

And I must pierce them, and survey 
whate’er 

May be permitted, as my steps I bend 

Totheir most great and growing region, 
where 

The earth to her embrace compels the 
powers of air. 


Italia! too, Italia ! looking on thee, 

Full flashes on the soul the light of ages, 

Since the fierce Carthaginian almost 
won thee, 

To the last halo of the chiefs and sages 

Who glorify thy consecrated pages ; 

Thou wert the throne and grave of 
empires ; still, 

The fount at which the panting mind 
assuages 





BYRON 205 





Her thirst of knowledge, quafting there 
her fill, 

Flows from the eternal source of Rome’s 
imperial hill. 


_ Thus far have I proceeded in a theme 


Renew’d with no kind auspices: to feel 

Weare not what we have been, and to 
deem 

We are not what we should be, and to 
steel 

The heart against itself ; and to conceal, 

What a proud caution, love, or hate, or 


aught,— 

Passion or feeling, purpose, grief or 
zeal ,— 

Which is the tyrant spirit of our 
thought, 


Is a stern task of soul :—No matter,—it 
is taught. 


And for these words, thus woven into 


song, 

It may be that they are a harmless 
wile,— 

The coloring of the scenes which fleet 
along, 

Which I would seize, in passing, to be- 
guile 

My breast, or that of others, for a while. 

Fame is the thirst of youth, but I am 


not 
So young as to regard men’s frown or 
smile, 


As loss or guerdon of a glorious lot : 
I stood and stand alone,—remember’d or 
forgot. 


Thave not loved the world, nor the world 


me; 

I have not flatter’d its rank breath, nor 
bow’d 

To its idolatries a patient knee, 

Nor coin’d my cheek to smiles, nor cried 
aloud 

In worship of an echo; in the crowd 

They could not deem me one of such ; I 
stood 

Among them, but not of them; in a 
shroud 

Of thoughts which were not their 
thoughts, aud still could, 

Had I not filed my mind, which thus 
itself subdued. 


Thave not loved the world, nor the world 
me,— 

But let us part fair foes; I do believe, 

Though I have found them not, that 
there may be 








Words which are things, hopes which 
will not deceive, 

And virtues which are merciful, nor 
weave 

Snares for the failing; I would also 
deem 

O’er others’ griefs that some sincerely 
grieve ; 

That two, or one, are almost what they 
seem, 

That goodness is no name, and hap- 
piness no dream 


My daughter! with thy name this song 
begun; 

My daughter! with thy name thus much 
shall end ; 

I see thee not, I hear thee not, but none 

Can be so wrapt in thee; thou art the 
friend 

To whom the shadows of far years ex- 
tend ; 

Albeit my brow thou never shouldst 
behold, 

My voice shall with thy future visions 
blend, 

And reach into thy heart, when mine is 
cold, 

A token and a tone, even from thy 
father’s mould. 


Toaid thy mind’s development, to watch 

Thy dawn of little joys, to sit and see 

Almost thy very growth, to view thee 
catch 

Knowledge of objects,—wonders yet to 
thee ! 

To hold thee lightly on a gentle knee, 

And print on thy soft cheek a parent’s 
kiss,— 

This, it should seem, was not reserved 
for me ; 

Yet this was in my nature: as it is, 

I know not what is there, yet something 
like to this. 


Yet, though dull Hate as duty should 
be taught, 

I know that thou wilt love me ; though 
my name 

Should be shut from thee, as a spell still 
fraught 

With desolation, and a broken claim ; 

Though the grave closed between us,— 
*t were the same, 

I know that thou wilt love me; though 
to drain 

My blood from out thy being were an 
aim, 


206 


BRITISH "POETS 





And an attainment,—all would be in 
vain ,— 

Still thou wouldst love me, still that 
more than life retain. 


The child of love, though born in bit- 
terness, 

And nurtured inconvulsion., Of thy sire 

ems ors the elements, and thine no 
ess 

As yet such are around thee, but thy fire 

Shall be more temper’d, and thy hope 
far higher. 


Sweet be thy cradled slumbers! O’er 
the sea 

And from the mountains where I now 
respire, 

Fain would I waft such blessing upon 
thee, 


As with a sigh, I deem thou might’st 
have been to me. 
May-June, 1816. November 18, 1816. 


SONNET ON CHILLON. 


ETERNAL Spirit of the chainless Mind! 

Brightest in dungeons, Liberty ! thouart, 

For there thy habitation is the heart— 

The heart which love of thee alone can 
bind ; 

And when thy sons to fetters are con- 
sign’d— 

To fetters, and the damp vault’s dayless 
gloom, 

Their country conquers with their mar- 
tyrdom, 

And Freedom’s fame finds wings on 
every wind. 

Chillon ! thy prison is a holy place, 

And thy sad floor an altar—for ’t was 
trod, 

Until his very steps have left a trace 

Worn, as if thy cold pavement werea sod, 

By Bonnivard! May none those marks 


efface ! 
eon they appeal from tyranny to God. 
June, 1816. December 5, 1816. 


THE PRISONER OF CHILLON 


My hair is gray, but not with years, 
Nor grew it white 
In asingle night, 
As men’s have grown from sudden fears ; 
My limbs are bow’d, though not with 
toil, 
But rusted with a vile repose, 
For they have been a dungeon’s spoil, 
And mine has been the fate of those 





To whom the goodly earth and air 
Are bann’d, and barr’d—forbidden fare ; 
But this was for my father’s faith 
I suffer’d chains and courted death ; 
That father perish’d at the stake 
For tenets he would not forsake ; 
And for the same his lineal race 
In darkness found a dwelling-place ; 
We were seven—who now are one, 
Six in youth, and one in age, 
Finish’d as they had begun, 
Proud of Persecution’s rage ; 
One in fire, and two in field 
Their belief with blood have seal’d, 
Dying as their father died, 
For the God their foes denied ; 
Three were in a dungeon cast, 
Of whom this wreck is left the last. 


There are seven pillars of Gothic mould, 
In Chillon’s dungeons deep and old, 
There are seven columns, massy and 


Dim with a dull imprison’d ray, 

A sunbeam which hath lost its way 
And through the crevice and the cleft 
Of the thick wall is fallen and left ; 
Creeping o’er the floor so damp, 

Like a marsh’s meteor lamp: 

And in each pillar there is a ring, 

And in each ring there is a chain ; 
That iron is a cankering thing, 

For in these limbs its teeth remain, 
With marks that will not wear away, 
Till I have done with this new day, 
Which now is painful to these eyes, : 
Which have not seen the sun s0 rise 
For years—I cannot count them o’er, 

I lost their long and heavy score, 
When my last brother droop’d and died, 
And I lay living by his side. 


They chain’d us each to a column stone, 
And we were three—yet, each alone, 
We could not move a single pace, 

We could not see each other’s face, 
But with that pale and livid light 
That made us strangers in our sight : 
And thus together—yet apart, 
Fetter’d in hand, but join’d in heart, 
’T was still some solace, in the dearth 
Of the pure elements of earth, 

To hearken to each other’s speech, 
And each turn comforter to each 
With some new hope, or legend old, 
Or song heroically bold ; 

But even these at length ¢ grew cold. 
Our voices took a dreary tone, 

An echo of the dungeon stone, 


BYRON 


A grating sound, not full and free, 

As they of yore were wont to be; 

It might be fancy, but to me 
They never sounded like our own. 


I was the eldest of the three, 

And to uphold and cheer the rest 

I ought to do—and did my best— 
And each did well in his degree. 

The youngest, whom my father loved, 
Because our mother’s brow was given 
To him, with eyes as blue as heaven— 

For him my soul was sorely moved ; 
And truly might it be distress’d 
To see such bird in such a nest ; 

For he was beautiful as day— 

(When day was beautiful to me 

As to young eagles, being free) — 

A polar day, which will not see 
A sunset till its summer’s gone, 

Its sleepless summer of long light, 
The snow-clad offspring of the sun: 

And thus he was as pure and bright, 
And in his natural spirit gay, 

With tears for nought but others’ ills, 
And then they flow’d like mountain rills, 
Unless he could assuage the woe 

Which he abhorr’d to view below. 


The other was as pure of mind, 
But form’d to combat with his kind ; 
Strong in his frame, and of a mood 
Which ’gainst the world in war had 
stood, 
And perish’d in the foremost rank 
With joy :—but not in chains to pine: 
His spirit wither’d with their clank, 
I saw it silently decline— 
And so perchance in sooth did mine: 
But yet I forced it on to cheer 
Those relics of a home so dear. 
He was a hunter of the hills, 
Had follow’d there the deer and wolf ; 
To him his dungeon was a gulf, 
And fetter’d feet the worst of ills. 


Lake Leman lies by Chillon’s walls : 
A thousand feet in depth below 
Its massy waters meet and flow ; 
Thus much the fathom-line was sent 
From Chillon’s snow-white battlement, 
Which round about the wave inthrals : 
A double dungeon wall and wave 
Have made—and like a living grave 
Below the surface of the lake 
The dark vault lies wherein we lay, 
We heard it ripple night and day ; 
Sounding o’er our heads it knock’d ; 
And I have felt the winter’s spray 


207 


Wash though the bars when winds were 
high 
And wanton in the happy sky ; 
And then the very rock hath rock’d, 
And I have felt it shake, unshock’d 
Because I could have smiled to see 
The death that would have set me free. 


I said my nearer brother pined, 

I said his mighty heart declined, 

He loathed and put away his food ; 

It was not that ’twas coarse and rude, 
For we were used to hunter’s fare, 

And for the like had little care: 

The milk drawn. from the mountain goat 
Was changed for water from the moat, 
Our bread was such as captives’ tears 
Have moisten’d many a thousand years, 
Since man first pent his fellow men 
Like brutes within an iron den; 

But what were these to us or him ? 
These wasted not his heart or limb ; 

My brother’s soul was of that mould 
Which in a palace had grown cold, 

Had his free breathing been denied 

The range of the steep mountain’s side ; 
But why delay the truth ?—he died. 

IT saw, and could not hold his head, 

Nor reach his dying hand—nor dead,— 
Though hard I strove, but strove in vain 
To rend and gnash my bonds in twain. 
He died, and they unlock’d his chain, 
And scoop’d for him a shallow grave 
Even from the cold earth of our cave, 

I begg’d them as a boon to lay 

His corse in dust whereon the day 
Might shine—it was a foolish thought, 
But then within my brain it wrought, 
That even in death his freeborn breast 
In such a dungeon could not rest. 

I might have spared my idle prayer— 
They coldly laugh’d, and laid him there : 
The flat and turfless earth above 

The being we so much did love ; 

His empty chain above it leant, 

Such murder’s fitting monument! 


But he, the favorite and the flower, 
Most cherish’d since his natal hour, 
His mother’s image in fair face, 

The infant love of all his race, 

His martyr’d father’s dearest thought 
My latest care, for whom I sought 

To hoard my life, that his might be 
Less wretched now, and one day free ; 
He, too, who yet had held untired 

A spirit natural or inspired— 

He, too, was struck, and ‘day by day 
Was wither’d on the stalk away. 


208 


Oh, God! it is a fearful thing 
To see the human soul take wing 
In any shape, in any mood : 
I’ve seen it rushing forth in blood, 
I’ve seen it on the ‘breaking ocean 
Strive with a swoln convulsive motion, 
I’ve seen the sick and ghastly bed 
Of Sin delirious with its dread ; 
But these were horrors—this was woe 
Unmix’d with such—but sure and slow : 
He faded, and so calm and meek, 
So softly worn, so sweetly weak, 
So tearless, yet so tender, kind, 
And grieved for those he left behind ; 
With all the while a cheek whose bloom 
Was as a mockery of the tomb, 
Whose tints as gently sunk away 
As a departing rainbow’s ray ; 
An eye of most transparent light, 
That almost made the dungeon bright, 
And not a wor d of murmur, not 
A groan o’er his untimely lot, — 
A little talk of better days, 
A little hope my own to raise, 
For I was sunk in silence—lost 
In this last loss, of all the most,; 
And then the sighs he would suppress 
Of fainting nature’s feebleness, 
More slowly drawn, grew less and less: 
I listen’d, but I could not hear ; 
I call’d, for I was wild with fear; 
I knew ’t was hopeless, but my dread 
Would not be thus admonished ; 
IT call’d, and thought I heard a sound— 
I burst my chain withone strong bound, 
And rush’d to him :—I found him not, 
ZT only stirr’d in this black spot, 
T only lived, I only drew 
The accursed breath of dungeon-dew ; 
The last, the sole, the dearest link 
Between me andthe eternal brink, 
Which bound me to my failing race, 
Was broken in this fatal place. 
One on the earth, and one beneath— 
My brothers—both had ceased to breathe : 
I took that hand which lay so still, 
Alas! my own was full as chill ; 
I had not strength to stir, or strive, 
But felt that I was still alive— 
A frantic feeling, when we know 
That what we love shall ne’er be so. 

I know not why 

IT could not die, 
IT had no earthly hope but faith, 
And that forbade a selfish death. 


What next befell me then and there 
I know not well—I never knew— 
First came the loss of light, and air, 


BRITISH ROETS 


And then of darkness too: 
I had no thought, no feeling—none— 
Among the stones I stood a stone, 
And was, scarce conscious what I wist, 
As shrubless crags within the mist ; 
For all was blank, and bleak, and gray ; 
It was not night, it was not day ; 
It was not even the dungeon-light, 
So hateful to my heavy sight, 
But vacancy absorbing space, 
And fixedness without a place ; 
There were no stars, no earth, no time, 
No check, no change, no good, no crime, 
But silence, and a stirless breath 
Which neither was of life nor death ; 
A sea of stagnant idleness, 
Blind, boundless, mute, and motionless! 


A light broke in upon my brain,— 

It was the carol of a bird: 

It ceased, and then it came again, 

The sweetest song ear ever heard, 
And mine was thankful till my eyes 
Ran over with the glad surprise, 

And they that moment could not see 

I was the mate of misery ; 

But then by dull degrees came back - 

My senses to their wonted track ; 

I saw the dungeon walls and floor 

Close slowly round me as before, 

I saw the glimmer of the sun 

Creeping as it before had done, 

But through the crevice where it came 

That bird was perch’d. as fond and tame, 
And tamer than upon the tree ; 

A lovely bird, with azure wings, 

And song that said a thousand things, 

And seem’d to say them all for me! 

I never saw its like before, 

I ne’er shall see its likeness more : 

It seem’d like me to want a mate, 

But was not half so desolate, 

And it was come to love me when 

None lived to love me so again, 

And cheering from my dungeon’s brink, 
Had brought me back to feel and think. 
I know not if it late were free, 

Or broke its cage to perch on mine, 
But knowing well captivity, 

Sweet bird ! I could not wish for thine ! 
Or if it were, in winged guise, 

A visitant from Paradise ; 

For—Heaven forgive that thought! the 
while 

Which made me both to weep and 
smile—-- 

IT sometimes deem’d that it might be 

My brother’s soul come down to me ; 

But then at last away it flew, 


BYRON 


And then ’twas mortal well I knew, 
For he would never thus have flown, 
And left me twice so doubly lone, 
Lone as the corse within its shroud, 
Lone as a solitary cloud,— — 

A single cloud on a sunny day, 
While all the rest of heaven is clear, 
A frown upon the atmosphere, 
That hath no business to appear 

When skies are blue, and earth is gay. 


A kind of change came in my fate, 

My keepers grew compassionate ; 

I know not what had made them so, 

They were inured to sights of woe, 

But so it was:—my broken chain 

With links unfasten’d did remain, 

And it was liberty to stride 

Along my cell from side to side, 

And up and down, and then athwart, 

And tread it over every part ; 

And round the pillars one by one, 

Returning where my walk begun, 

Avoiding only, as I trod, 

My brothers’ graves without a sod ; 

For if I thought with heedless tread 

My step profaned their lowly bed, 

My breath came gaspingly and thick, 

And my crush’d heart fell blind and 
sick. 


I made a footing in the wall, 

It was not therefrom to escape, 
For I had buried one and all 

Who loved me in a human shape ; 
And the whole earth would henceforth 

be . 

A wider prison unto me: 
No child, no sire, no kin had I, 
No partner in my misery ; 
I thought of this, and I was glad, 
For thought of them had made me mad ; 
But I was curious to ascend 
To my barr’d windows, and to bend 
Once more, upon the mountains high, 
The quiet of a loving eye. 


I saw them, and they were the same, 
They were not changed like mein frame ; 
I saw their thousand years of snow 
On high—their wide long lake below, 
And the blue Rhone in fullest flow ; 
I heard the torrents leap and gush 
O’er channell’d rock and broken bush ; 
I saw the white-wall’d distant town, 
And whiter sails go skimming down ; 
And then there was a little isle, 
Which in my very face did smile, 

The only one in view ; 


14 


209 


A small green isle, it seem’d no more, 
Scarce broader than my dungeon floor, 
But in it there were three tall trees, 
And o’er it blew the mountain breeze, 
And by it there were waters flowing, 
And on it there were young flowers 
growing, 

Of gentle breath and hue. 
The fish swam by the castle wall, 
And they seem’d joyous each and all ; 
The eagle rode the rising blast, 
Methought he never flew so fast 
As then to me he seem’d to fly ; 
And then new tears came in my eye, 
And I felt troubled—and would fain 
I had not left my recent chain ; 
And when I did descend again, 
The darkness of my dim abode 
Fell on me as a heavy load ; 
It was as is a new-dug grave, 
Closing o’er one we sought to save,— 
And yet my glance, too much opprest, 
Had almost need of such a rest. 


It might be months, or years, or days, 

I kept no count, I took no note, 

I had no hope my eyes to raise, 

And clear them of their dreary mote ; 
At last men came to set me free; 

I ask’d not why, and reck’d not where ; 
It was at length the same to me, 
Fetter’d or fetterless to be, 

I learn’d to love despair. 
And thus when they appear’d at last, 
And all my bonds aside were cast, 
These heavy walis to me had grown 
A hermitage—and all my own! 
And half I felt as they were come 
To tear me from a second home : 
With spiders I had friendship made, 
And watch’d them in their sullen trade, 
Had seen the mice by moonlight play, 
And why should I feel less than they ? 
We were all inmates of one place, 
And I, the monarch of each race, 
Had power to kill—yet, strange to tell! 
In quiet we had learn’d to dwell ; 
My very chains and I grew friends, 
So much along communion tends 
To make us what we are :—even I 
Regain’d my freedom with a sigh. 

June 27-29-July 10, 1816. December 5, 

1816. 


STANZAS TO AUGUSTA 


THOUGH the day of my destiny’s over, 
And the star of my fate hath declined, 
Thy soft heart refused to discover 
The faults which so many could find. 


ale) 


Though thy soul with my grief was ac- 
quainted, 
It shrunk not to share it with me, 
And the love which my spirit hath 
painted 
It never hath found but in thee. 


Then when nature around me is smiling, 
The last smile which answers to mine, 
I do not believe it beguiling, 
Because it reminds me of thine; 
And when winds are at war with the 
ocean, 
As the breasts I believed in with me, 
If their billows excite an emotion, 
It is that they bear me from thee. 


Though the rock of my last hope is 
shiver’d, 
And its fragments are sunk in the 
wave, 
Though I feel that my soul is deliver’d 
To pain—it shall not be its slave. 
There is many a pang to pursue me: 
They may crush, but they shall not 
contemn ; 
They may torture, but shall not subdue 


me; 
Tis of thee that I think—not of them. 


Though human, thou didst not deceive 
me, 
Though woman, thou didst not forsake, 
Though loved, thou forborest to grieve 
me, 
Though slander’d, thou never couldst 
shake ; 
Though trusted, thou didst not disclaim 
me, 
Though parted, it was not to fly, 
Though watchful, ’twas not to defame 
me, 
Nor, mute, that the world might belie. 


Yet I blame not the world, nor despise it, 
Nor the war of the many with one ; 

If my soul was not fitted to prize it, 
*Twas folly not sooner to shun : 

And if dearly that error hath cost me, 
And more than I once could foresee, 

Tt have found that, whatever it lost me, 
It could not deprive me of thee. 


From the wreck of the past, which hath 
perish’d, 
Thus much [ at least may recall, 
{t hath taught me that what I most 
cherish’d 
Deserved to be dearest of all: 


BRITISH POETS 


In the desert a fountain is springing, 
In the wide waste there still is a tree, 
And a bird in the solitude singing, 
Which speaks to my spirit of thee. 
July 24, 1816. December 5, 1816. 


EPISTLE TO AUGUSTA 


My sister ! my sweet sister! if a name 

Dearer and purer were, it should be 
thine ; 

Mountains and seas divide us, but I claim 

No tears, but tenderness to answer mine: 

Go where I will, to me thou art the 
same— 

A loved regret which I would not resign. 

There yet are two things in my des- 
tiny,— 

A world to roam through, and a home 
with thee. 


The first were nothing—had I still the 
last, 4 

It were the haven of my happiness ; 

But other claims and other ties thou hast, 

And mine is not the wish to make them 
less. 

A strange doom is thy father’s son’s, and 
past 

Recalling, as it lies beyond redress ; 

Reversed for him our grandsire’s fate of 

yore,— 
He Had no rest at sea, nor I on shore. 


If my inheritance of storms hath been 

In other elements, and on the rocks 

Of perils, overlook’d or unforeseen, 

Ihave sustain’d my share of worldly 
shocks, 

The fault was mine ; nor dol seek to 
screen 

My errors with defensive paradox ; 

I have been cunning in mine overthrow, 

The careful pilot of my proper woe. 


Mine were my faults, and mine be their 


reward. 

My whole life was a contest, since the 
day 

That gave me being, gave me that which 
marr’d 

The gift,—a fate, or will, that walk’d 
astray ; 

And T at times have found the struggle 
hard, 

And thought of shaking off my bonds of 
clay : 


But now I fain would for a time survive, 
If but to see what next can well arrive. 


BYRON 211 


Kingdoms and empires in my little day 

I have outlived, and yet I am not old; 

And when f look on this, the petty spray 

Of my own years of trouble, which have 
roll’d 

Like a wild bay of breakers, melts away: 

Something—I know not what—does still 
uphold 

A spirit of slight patience ;—not in vain, 

Even for its own sake, do we purchase 
pain. 


Perhaps the workings of defiance stir 

Within me—or perhaps a cold despair, 

Brought on when ills habitually recur,— 

Perhaps a kinder clime, or purer air, 

(For even to this may change of soul 
refer, 

And with light armor we may learn to 
bear, ) 

Have taught me a strange quiet, which 
was not 

The chief companion of a calmer lot. 


I feel almost at times as I have felt 

In happy childhood ; trees, and flowers, 
and brooks, 

Which do remember me of where I dwelt 

Ere my young mind was sacrificed to 
books, 

Come as of yore upon me, and can melt 

My heart with recognition of their looks; 

And even at moments I could think I 
see 

Some living thing to love—but none like 
thee. 


Here are the Alpine landscapes which 
create 

A fund for contemplation ;—to admire 

Is a brief feeling of a trivial date ; 

But something worthier do such scenes 
inspire ; 

Here to be lonely is not desolate, 

For much I view which I could most de- 
sire, 

And, above all, alake I can behold 

Lovelier, not dearer, than our own of old. 


Oh that thou wert but with me !—but I 
grow 

The fool of my own wishes, and forget 

The solitude which I have vaunted so 

Has lost its praise in this but one regret; 

There may be others which I less may 
show !— 

Tam not of the plaintive mood, and yet 

I feel an ebb in my philosophy, 

And the tide rising in my alter’d eye. 


1 did remind thee of our own dear Lake 

By the old Hall which may be mine no 
more. 

Leman’s is fair ; but think not I forsake 

The sweet remembrance of a dearer 


shore : 

Sad havoc Time must with my memory 
make, 

Ere that or thou can fade these eyes 
before ; 


Though, like all things which I have 
loved, they are 
Resign’d for ever, or divided far. 


The world is all before me; I but ask 

Of Nature that with which she will 
comply— . 

It is but in- her summer’s sun to bask, 

To mingle with the quiet of her sky, 

To see her gentle face without a mask, 

And never gaze on it with apathy. 

She was my early friend, and now shall 
b 


e 
My sister—till I look again on thee. 


I can reduce all feelings but this one ; 

And that 1 would not ;—for at length 
I see 

Such scenes as those wherein my life 
begun. 

The earliest—even the only paths for 
me— 

Had I but sooner learnt the crowd to 
shun, 

I had been better than I now can be; 

The passions which have torn me would 
have slept ; 

I had not suffer’d and thou hadst not 
wept. 


With false Ambition what had I to do? 

Little with Love, and least of all with 
Fame ; 

And yet they came unsought, and with 
me grew, 

And made me all which they can make 
—a name. 

Yet this was not the end I did pursue ; 

Surely I once beheld a nobler aim. 

But all is over—I am one the more 

To baffled millions Which have gone 
before. 


And for the future, this world’s future 
may 

From me demand but little of my care ; 

IT have outlived myself by many a day ; 

Having survived so many things that 
were ; 


212 


My years have been no slumber, but the 
prey 

Of ceaseless vigils ; for I had the share 

Of life which might have fill’da century, 

Before its fourth in time had pass’d 
me by. 


And for the remnant which may be to 
come 

Iam content; and for the past I feel 

Not thankless,—for within the crowded 
sum 

Of struggles, happiness at times would 
steal, 

And for the present, I would not benumb 

My feelings further.—-Nor shall I conceal 

That with all this I stillcan look around, 

And worship Nature with a thought 
profound. 


For thee, my own sweet sister, in thy 
heart 

I know myself secure, as thou in mine ; 

We were and are—I am, even as thou 
art— 

Beings who ne’er each other can resign : 

It is the same, together or apart, 

From life’s commencement to its slow 
decline 

We are entwined—let death come slow 
or fast, 

The tie which bound the first endures 
the last ! July, 1816. 1830. 


STANZAS FOR MUSIC 


THEY say that Hope is happiness ; 
But genuine Love must prize the past, 
And Memory wakes the thoughts that 
bless : 
They rose the first—they set the last ; 


And all that Memory loves the most 
Was once our only Hope to be, 

And all that Hope adored and lost 
Hath melted into Memory. 


Alas! it is delusion all ; 
The future cheats us from afar, 
Nor can we be what we recall, 
Nor dare we think on what we are. 
PeAS 29. 
DARKNESS 
I HAD a dream, which was not all a 
dream. 
The bright sun was extinguish’d, and 
the stars 


BRITISED POETS 





Did wander darkling in the eternal 
space, 

Rayless, and pathless, and the icy earth 

Swung blind and blackening in the 
moonless air; 

Morn came and went—and came, and 
brought no day, 

And men forgot their passions in the 
dread 

Of this their desolation : and all hearts 

Were chill’d into a selfish prayer for 
light ; 

And they did live by watchfires—and 
the thrones, 

The palaces of crowned kings—the huts, 

The habitations of all things which 
dwell, 

Were burnt for beacons; cities were 
consumed, 

And men were gather’d round their 
blazing homes 

To look once more into each other’s 
face ; 

Happy were those who dwelt within the 


Of iecenlene and their Oa 
torch ; 

A fearful hope was all the world con- 
tain’d ; 

Forests were set on fire—but hour by 
hour 

They fell and faded—and the crackling 
trunks 

Extinguish’d with a crash—and all was 
black. 

The brows of men by the despairing light 

Wore an unearthly aspect, as by fits 


The flashes fell upon them ; some lay 
down 

And hid their eyes and wept ; and some 
did rest 


Their chins upon their clenched hands, 
_and smiled ; 

And others hurried to and fro, and fed 

Their funeral piles with fuel, and look’d 


up 

With mad disquietude on the dull sky, 

The pall of a past world ; and then again 

With curses cast them down upon the 
dust, 

And gnash’d their teeth and howl’d: the 
wild birds shriek’d 

And, terrified, did flutter on the ground, 

And flap their useless wings ; the wild- 
est brutes 

Came tame and tremulous; and vipers 
crawl’d 

And twined themselves among the mul- 
titude, 





\ 


? 
f 
, 
} 


DP FRI a 


alll ae 
—- 


BYRON 213 





Hissing, but stingless—they were slain 


for food ! 

And War, which for a moment was no 
more, 

Did glut himself again:—a meal was 
bought 


With blood, and each sate sullenly apart 

pores himself in gloom: no love was 
eft ; 

All earth was but one thought—and that 
was death 

Immediate and inglorious ; and the pang 

Of famine fed upon all entrails—men 

Died, and their bones were tombless as 
their flesh ; 

The meagre by the meagre were de- 
vour’d, 

Even dogs assail’d their masters, all save 


one, 

And he was faithful to a corse, and 
kept 

The birds and beasts and famish’d men 


at bay, 

Till hunger clung them, or the dropping 
dead 

Lured their lank jaws; himself sought 
out no food, 

But with a piteous and perpetual moan, 

And a quick desolate cry, licking the 


hand 

Which answer’d not with a caress—he 
died. 

The crowd was famish'd by degrees ; but 
two 


Of an enormous city did survive, 

And they were enemies: they met beside 

The dying embers of an altar-place 

Where had been heap’d a mass of holy 
things 

For an unholy usage; they raked up, 

And shivering scraped with their cold 
skeleton hands 

The feeble ashes, and their feeble breath 

Blew for a little life, and made a flame 

Which was a mockery ; then they lifted 


up 
Their eyes as it grew lighter, and beheld 
Each other’s aspects—saw, and shriek’d, 


and died— 

Even of their mutual hideousness they 
died, 

Unknowing who he was upon whose 
brow 


Famine had written Fiend. The world 
was void, 

The populous and the powerful was a 
lump, 

Seasonless, herbless, treeless, manless, 
lifeless, 


A lump of death—a chaos of hard clay. 

The rivers, lakes, and ocean all stood 
still, 

And nothing stirr’d within their silent 
depths ; 

Ships sailorless lay rotting on the sea, 

And their masts fell down piecemeal : 
as they dropp’d 

They slept on the abyss without a 
surge— 

The waves were dead; the tides were in 
their grave, 

The moon, their mistress, had expired 
before ; 

The winds were wither’d in the stagnant 


air, 
And the clouds perish’d ; Darkness had 
no need 
Of aid from them—She was the Uni- 
' verse. 
July, 1816. December 5, 1816. 


PROMETHEUS 


TITAN ! to whose immortal eyes 

The sufferings of mortality, 

Seen in their sad reality, 

Were not as things that gods despise ; 
What was thy pity’s recompense ? 

A silent suffering, and intense ; 

The rock, the vulture, and the chain, 
All that the proud can feel of pain, 
The agony they do not show, 

The suffocating sense of woe, 

Which speaks but in its loneliness, 
And then is jealous lest the sky 
Should have a listener, nor will sigh 

Until its voice is echoless. 


Titan ! to thee the strife was given 
Between the suffering and the will, 
Which torture where they cannot 

kill ; 

And the inexorable Heaven, 

And the deaf tyranny of Fate, 

The ruling principle of Hate, 

Which for its pleasure doth create 

The things it may annihilate, 

Refused thee even the boon to die; 

The wretched gift eternity 

Was thine-—-and thou hast borne it well. 

All that the Thunderer wrung from 

thee 
Was but the menace which flung back 
On him the torments of thy rack ; 
The fate thou didst so well foresee, 
But would not to appease him tell ; 
And in thy Silence was his Sentence, 
And in his Soul a vain repentance, 


214 


And evil dread so ill dissembled, 
That in his hand the lightnings 
trembled. 


Thy Godlike crime was to be kind, 

To render with thy precepts less 

The sum of human wretchedness, 
And strengthen Man with his own mind ; 
But baffled as thou wert from high, 
Still in thy patient energy, 
In the endurance, and repulse 

Of thine impenetrable Spirit, 
Which Earth and Heaven could not 

convulse, 

A mighty lesson we inherit: 
Thou art a symbol and a sign 

To Mortals of their fate and force ; 
Like thee, Man is in part divine, 

A troubled stream from a pure source ; 
And Man in portions can foresee 
His own funereal destiny ; 
His wretchedness, and his resistance, 
And his sad unallied existence : 
To which his Spirit may oppose 
Itself—and equal to all woes, 

And a firm will, and a deep sense, 
Which even in torture can descry 

Its own concenter’d recompense, 
Triumphant where it dare defy, 
And making Death a Victory. 

July, 1816. December, 1816. 


SONNET TO LAKE LEMAN 


RoussEAU—Voltaire—our Gibbon—and 
De Staél— 
Leman ! these names are worthy of thy 
shore, 
Thy shore of names like these! wert 
thou no more 
Their memory thy remembrance would 
recall : 
To them thy banks were lovely as to 
all, 
But they have made them lovelier, for 
the lore 
Of mighty minds doth hallow in the 
core 
Of human hearts the ruin of a wall 
Where dwelt the wise and wondrous ; 
but by thee 
How much more, Lake of Beauty! do 
we feel, 
In sweetly gliding o’er thy crystal sea, 
The wild glow of that not ungentle zeal, 
Which of the heirs of immortality 
Is proud, and makes the breath of glory 
real ! 


July, 1816. December 5, 1816. 


BRITISH’ POETS 


MANFRED 


A DRAMATIC POEM 





“There are more things in heaven and earth, 
Horatio, 
Than are dreamt of in your philosophy.”’ 





DRAMATIS PERSONA 


MANFRED 

CHAMOIS HUNTER 
ABBOT OF ST. MAURICE 
MANUEL 

HERMAN 

WITCH OF THE ALPS 
ARIMANES 

NEMESIS 

THE DESTINIES 
SPIRITS, &c. 

The Scene of the Drama is amongst the 
Higher Alps—partly in the Castle of 
Manfred, and partly in the Moun- 
tains. 





ACTS 


SCENE JI.—MANFRED alone.—Scene, a 
Gothic Gallery.—Time, Midnight. 
Man. The lamp must be replenish’d, but 

even then 

It will not burn so long as Imust watch : 

My slumbers—if I slumber—are not sleep, 

But a continuance of enduring thought, 

Which then I can resist not : in my heart 

There is a vigil, and these eyes but close 

To look within; and yet I live, and bear 

The aspect and the form of breathing men. 

But grief should be the instructor of the 
wise } 

Sorrow is knowledge : they who know the 
most 

Must mourn the deepest o’er the fatal 
truth, 

The Tree of Knowledge is not that of 
Life. 

Philosophy and science, and the springs 

Of wonder, and the wisdom of the world, 

I have essay’d, and in my mind there is 

A power to make these subject to itself— 

But they avail not : I have done men good, 

And I have met with good even among 
men— 

But this avail’d not: I have had my foes, 

And none have baffled, many fallen be- 
fore me— 


BYRON 


But this avail’d not :—Good, or evil, life, 
Powers, passions, all I see in other beings, 
Have been to me as rain unto the sands, 
Since that all-nameless hour. J have no 
dread, 
And feel the curse to have no natural fear, 
Nor fluttering throb, that beats with 
hopes or wishes, . 
Or lurking love of something on the earth. 
Now to my task.— 
Mysterious agency ! 
Ye spirits of the unbounded Universe ! 
Whom I have sought in darkness and in 
liight— 
Ye, who do compass earth about, and 
dwell 
In subtler essence—ye, to whom the tops 
Of mountains inaccessible are haunts, 
And earth’s and ocean’s caves familiar 
things— 
I call upon ye by the written charm 
Which gives me power upon you—Rise ! 


Appear ! [A pause. 
They come not yet.—Now by the voice 
of him 


Who is the first among you—by this sign, 
Which makes you tremble—by the claims 


of him 
Who is undying,—Rise! Appear !—— 
Appear ! [A pause. 


If it be so—Spirits of earth and air, 

Ye shall not thus elude me: by a power, 

Deeper than all yet urged, a tyrant-spell, 

Which had its birthplace in a star con- 
demn’d, 

The burning wreck of a demolish’d 
world, 

A wandering hell in the eternal space ; 

By the strong curse which is upon my 
soul, 

The thought which is within me and 
around me, 

I do compel ye to my will—Appear ! 
[ A star is seen at the darker end 

of the gallery: it is stationary; and a 

voice is heard singing. 


FIRST SPIRIT 


Mortal ! to thy bidding bow’d, 

From my mansion in the cloud, 
Which the breath of twilight builds, 
And the summer’s sunset gilds 

With the azure and vermilion, 
Which is mix’d for my pavilion ; 
Though thy quest may be forbidden, 
On a star-beam I have ridden : 

To thine adjuration bow’d, 
Mortal—be thy wish avow’d ! 





215 


SECOND SPIRIT 


Mont Blane is the monarch of moun- 
tains ; 

They crown’d him long ago 

On a throne of rocks, in arobe of clouds, 
With a diadem of snow. 

Around his waist are forests braced, 
The Avalanche in his hand ; 

But ere it fall, that thundering ball 
Must pause for my command. 

The Glacier’s cold and restless mass 
Moves onward day by day ; 

But I am he who bids it pass, 
Or with its ice delay. 

I am the spirit of the place, 
Could make the mountain bow 

And quiver to his cavern’d base— 
And what with me wouldst Thou ? 


THIRD SPIRIT 


In the blue depth of the waters, 
Where the wave hath no strife, 
Where the wind is a stranger, 
And the sea-snake hath life, 
Where the Mermaid is decking 
Her green hair with shells, 
Like the storm on the surface 
Came the sound of thy spells ; 
O’er my calm Hall of Coral 
The deep echo ro]l’d— 
To the Spirit of Ocean 
Thy wishes unfold ! 


FOURTH SPIRIT 


Where the slumbering earthquake 
Lies pillow’d on fire, 

And the lakes of bitumen 
Rise boilingly higher ; 

Where the roots of the Andes 
Strike deep in the earth, 

As their summits to heaven 
Shoot soaringly forth ; 

I have quitted my birthplace, 
Thy bidding to bide— 

Thy spell hath subdued me, 
Thy will be my guide! 


FIFTH SPIRIT 


I am the Rider of the wind, 
The stirrer of the storm ; 

The hurricane I left behind 
Is yet with lightning warm ; 

To speed to thee, o’er shore and sea 
I swept upon the blast : 

The fleet I met sail’d well, and yet 
’ Twill sink ere night be past, 


BRITISH “POETS 





SIXTH SPIRIT 


My dwelling is the shadow of the night, 
Why doth “thy magic torture me with 
light ? 


SEVENTH SPIRIT 


The star which rules thy destiny 

Was ruled, ere earth began, by me: 

It was a world as fresh and fair 

As e’er revolved round sun in air ; 

Its course was free and regular, 

Space bosom’d not a lovelier star. 

The hour arrived—and it became 

A wandering mass of shapeless flame, 

A pathless comet, and a curse, 

The menace of the universe ; 

Still rolling on with innate force, 

Without a sphere, without a course, 

A bright deformity on high, 

The monster of the upper sky ! 

And thou! beneath its influence born— 

Thou worm! whom I obey and scorn— 

Forced by a power (which is not thine, 

And lent thee but to make thee mine) 

For this brief moment to descend, 

Where these weak spirits round thee bend 

And parley with a thing like thee— 

What wouldst thou, Child of Clay ! with 
me ? 


The SEVEN SPIRITS 


Earth, ocean, air, night, 
winds, thy star, 
Are at thy beck and bidding, Child of 
Clay ! 
Before thee at thy quest their spirits 
are— 
What wouldst thou with us, son of 
mortals—say ? 


mountains, 


Man. Forgetfulness—— 

First Spirit. Of what—of whom—and 
why? 

Man. Of that which is within me ; 


read it there — 
Ye know it, and I cannot utter it. 
Spirit. We can but give thee that 
which we possess : 
Ask of us subjects, sovereignty, 
power 
O’er earth—the whole, or portion—or a 
sig n 
Which shall control the elements, where- 
of 
We are the dominators,—each and all,’ 
These shall be thine. 
Man. Oblivion, self-oblivion ! 


the 





Can ye not wring from out the hidden 
realms 
Ye offer so profusely what I ask? 
Spirit. It is not in our essence, in our 
skill ; 
But—thou may’st die. 
Man. Will death bestow it on me? 
Spirit. Weare immortal, and do not 
forget ; 
We are eternal; and to us the past 
Is, as the future, present. Art thou 
answer’d ? 
Man. Ye mock me—but the power 
which brought ye here 
Hath made you mine. Slaves, scoff not 
at my will! 
The mind, the spirit, the Promethean 
spark, 
The lightning of my being, is as bright, 
Pervading, and far darting as your own, 
And shall not yield to yours, though 
coop’d in clay ! 
Answer, or I will teach you what I am. 
Spirit. We answer as we answer’d ; 
our reply 
Is even in thine own words. 
Man. Why say ye so? 
Spirit. If, as thou’ say’st, thine 
essence be as ours, 
We have replied in telling thee, the thing 
Mortals call death hath nought to do 
with us. 
Man. I then havecall’d ye from your 
realms in vain ; 
Ye cannot, or ye will not, aid me. 
Spirit. Say, 
What we possess we offer; it is thine: 
Bethink ere thou dismiss us ; ask again ; 
Kingdom, and sway, and strength, and 
length of days 
Man. Accursed! what have I to do 
with days ? 
They are too long already.—Hence—be- 
gone! 

Spirit. Yet pause: being here, our 
will would do thee service ; 
Bethink thee, is there then no other gift 
Which we can make not worthless in 

thine eyes? 
Man. No, none: yet stay—one mo- 
ment, ere we part, 





I would behold ye face to face. I hear 
Your voices. sweet and melancholy 
sounds, 


As music on the waters ; and I see 

The steady aspect of a clear large star ; 

But nothing more. Approach me as ye 
are, 

Or one, or all, in your accustom’d forms. 


ess lh ee 


ee 


ee awe ae 


BYRON 217 
enemas Werte ste EM rie So Se mn gine eevee mo 


Spirit. We have no forms, beyond 
the elements 
Of which we are the mind and principle : 
But choose a form—in that we willappear. 
Man. Ihave no choice; there is no 
form on earth 
Hideous or beautiful to me. Let him, 
Who is most powerful of ye, take such 
aspect 
As unto him may seem most fitting— 
Come! 
Seventh Spirit (appearing in the shape 
of a eee female figure). Be- 
O ! 


Man. Oh God! if it be thus, and thow 

Art not a madness and a mockery, 
T yet might be most happy, I will clasp 

thee, 
And we again will be—— 
[The figure vanishes. 
My heart is crush’d! 

[MANFRED falls senseless. 


(A voice is heard in the Incantation 
which follows.) 


When the moon is on the wave, 

And the glow-worm in the grass, 
And the meteor on the grave, 

And the wisp on the morass ; 
When the falling stars are shooting, 
And the answer’d owls are hooting, 
And the silent leaves are still 
In the shadow of the hill, 

Shall my soul be upon thine, 
With a power and with a sign. 


Though thy slumber may be deep 
Yet thy spirit shall not sleep ; 


There are shades which will not vanish, 


There are thoughts thou canst not 
banish ; 

By a power to thee unknown, 

Thou canst never be alone ; 

Thou art wrapt as with a shroud, 

Thou art gather’d in a cloud ; 

And for ever shalt thou dwell 

In the spirit of this spell. 


Though thou seest me not pass by, 
Thou shalt feel me with thine eye 
As a thing that, though unseen, 
Must be near thee. and hath been ; 
And when in that secret dread 
Thou hast turn’d around thy head, 
Thou shalt marvel I am not 

As thy shadow on the spot, 

And the power which thou dost feel 
Shall be what thou must conceal, 


And a magic voice and verse 

Hath baptized thee with a curse; 
And a spirit of the air 

Hath begirt thee with a snare ; 

In the wind there isa voice 

Shall forbid thee to rejoice 3, 

And to thee shall night deny 

All the quiet of her sky ; 

And the day shall have a sun, 
Which shall make thee wish it done. 


From thy false tears I did distil 

An essence which hath strength to kill ; 

From thy own heart I then did wring 

The black blood in its blackest spring ; 

From thy own smile I snatch’d the 
snake, 

For there it coil’d asin a brake ; 

From thy own lip I drew the charm 

Which gave all these their chiefest 
harm ; 

In proving every poison known, 

I found the strongest was thine own. 


By thy cold breast and serpent smile, 

By thy unfathom’d gulfs of guile, 

By that most seeming virtuous eye, 

By thy shut soul’s hypocrisy ; 

By the perfection of thine art 

Which pass’d for human thine own 
heart ; 

By thy delight in others’ pain, 

And by thy brotherhood of Cain, 

I call upon thee ! and compel 

Thyself to be thy proper Hell! 


And on thy head I pour the vial 

Which doth devote thee to this trial ; 
Nor to slumber, nor to die, 

Shall be in thy destiny ; 

Though thy death shall still seem near 
To thy wish, butas a fear ; 

Lo! the spell now works around thee, 
And the clankless chain hath bound thee; 
O’er thy heart and brain together 

Hath the word been pass’d—now wither! 


SCENE IT 


The Mountain of the Jungfrau.—Time, 
Morning.—MANFRED alone upon the 
Cliffs. 

Man. Thespirits I have raised aban- 
don me, 

The spells which I have studied baffle me, 

The remedy I reck’d of tortured me; 

IT lean no more on superhuman aid ; 

It hath no power upon the past, and for 

The future, till the past be gulf’d in 

darkness, 


218 


It is not of my search. My mother 
Earth ! 

And thou fresh breaking Day, and you, 
ye Mountains, 

Why are ye beautifui? I cannot love ye. 

And thou, the br ght eye of the universe, 

That openest over all, and unto all 

Art a delight—thou shin’st not ‘on my 
heart. 

And you, ye crags, upon whose extreme 
edge 

I stand, and on the torrent’s brink be- 
neath 

Behold the tall pines dwindled as to 
shrubs 

In dizziness of distance ; when a leap, 

A stir, a notion, even a breath, would 
bring 

My breast upon its rocky bosom’s bed 

To rest for ever—wherefore do I pause ? 

I feel the impulse—yet Ido not plunge ; 

I see the peril—yet do not recede ; 

And my brain reels—and yet my foot is 
firm : 

There is a power upon me which with- 
holds, : 

And makes it my fatality to live,— 

If it be life to wear within myself 

This barrenness of spirit, and to be 

My own soul’s sepulchre, for I have 
ceased 

To justify my deeds unto myself— 

The last infirmity of evil. Ay, 

Thou winged and cloud-cleaving minis- 


ter, [An eagle passes. 

Whose happy flight is highest into 
heaven, 

Well may’st thou swoop so near me—I 
should be 

Thy prey, and gorge thine eaglets ; thou 
art gone 

Where the eye cannot follow thee; but 
thine 


Yet pierces downward, onward,or above, 

With a pervading vision.—Beautiful ! 

How beautiful is all this visible world ! 

How glorious in its action and itself ! 

But we, who name ourselves its sover- 
eigns, we, 

Half dust, half deity, alike unfit 

To sink or soar, with our mix’d essence 
make 

A conflict of its elements, and breathe 

The breath of degradation and of pride, 

Contending with low wants and lofty 
will, 

Till our mortality predominates, 

And men are—what they name not to 
themselves, 


BRITISH POETS 


And trust not to each other. Hark ! the 

note, [The Shepherd’s pipe in 
the distance is heard. 

The natural music of the mountain 
reed 

For here the patriarchal days are not 

A pastoral fable—pipes in the liberal air, 

Mix’d with the sweet bells of the saun- 
tering herd ; 

My soul would drink those echoes. Oh, 
that I were 

The viewless spirit of a lovely sound, 

A living voice, a breathing harmony, 

A bodiless enjoyment—born and dying 

With the blest tone which made me! 





Enter from below a CHAMOIS HUNTER. 


Chamois Hunter. Even so 
This way the chamois leapt : her nimble 


feet 

Have baffled me ; my gains to-day will 
scarce 

Repay my break-neck travail.—What is 
here? 


Who seems not of my trade, and yet 
hath reach’d 

A height which none even of our moun- 
taineers, 

Save our best hunters, may attain: his 
garb 

Is goodly, his mien manly, and his air 

Proud as a free-born peasant’s, at this 
distance : 

I will approach him nearer. 

Man. (not perceiving the other). Tobe 

thus— 

Gray-hair’d with anguish, like these 
blasted pines, 

Wrecks of a single winter, barkless, 
branchless, 

A blighted trunk upon a cursed root, 

Which but supplies a feeling to decay— 

And to be thus, eternally but thus, 

Having been otherwise! now furrow’d 
o’er 

With wrinkles, plough’d by moments,—- 
not by years,— 

And hours, all tortured into ages— 


hours 

Which I outlive !—Ye toppling crags of 
ice! 

Ye avalanches, whom a breath draws 
down 


In mountainous o’erwhelming, come and 
crush me! 
I hear ye momently above, beneath, 


; Crash with a frequent conflict; but ye 


pass, 


BYRON 


And only fall on things that still would 
live ; 

On the young flourishing forest, or the 
hu 


And hamlet of the harmless villager. 
OC. Hun. The mists begin to rise from 
up the valley ; 
Tll warn him to descend, or he may 
chance 
To lose at once his way and life together. 
Man. The mists boil up around the 
glaciers ; clouds 
Rise curling fast beneath me, white and 
sulphury, 
Like foam from the roused ocean of deep 
Hell, 
Whose every wave breaks on a living 
shore, 
Heap’d with the damn’d like pebbles.— 
I am giddy. 
C. Hun. I must approach him cau- 
tiously ; if near, 
A sudden step will startle him, and he 
Seems tottering already. 
Man. Mountains have fallen, 
Leaving a gap in the clouds, and with 
the shock 
Rocking their alpine brethren; filling 


up 

The ripe green valleys with destruction’s 
splinters ; 

Damming the rivers with a sudden dash, 

Which crush’d the waters into mist and 
made 

Their fountains find another channel— 
thus, 

Thus, in its old age, did Mount Rosen- 


berg— 
Why stood I not beneath it ? 
C. Hun. Friend! havea care, 
Your next step may be fatal !—for the 
love 
Of him who made you, stand not on that 
brink! 
Man. (not hearing him). Such would 
have been for me a fitting tomb ; 
My bones had then been quiet in their 
depth ; 
They had not then been strewn upon the 
rocks 
For the wind’s pastime—as thus—thus 
they shall be— 
In this one plunge.—Farewell, ye open- 
ing heavens ! 
Look not upon me thus reproachfully— 
You were not meant for me—Earth! 
take these atoms ! 
{As MANFRED is in act to spring from 
the cliff, the CHAMOIS HUNTER 





219 


seizes and retains him with a sud- 
den grasp. 
C. Hun. Hold, madman !—though 
aweary of thy life, 
Stain not our pure vales with thy guilty 
blood : 
Away with me-—-I will not quit my 
hold. 
Man. 1 am most sick at heart—nay, 
grasp me not— 


I am all feebleness—the mountains 
whirl 
Spinning around me——I grow blind—- 


What art thou? 


C. Hun. Vl answerthatanon. Away 
with me— 
The clouds grow thicker——there—now 


lean on me— 

Place your foot here—here, take this 
staff, and cling 

A moment to that shrub—now give me 
your hand, 

And noe fast by my girdle—softly— 
we — 

The Chalet will be gain’d within an hour : 

Came on, we'll quickly find a surer foot- 


ing, 
And something like a pathway, which 
the torrent 
Hath wash’d since winter.—Come, ’t is 
bravely done— 
You should have been a hunter.—Follow 
me. 
[As they descend the rocks with 
difficulty, the scene closes. 


ACT II 


ScENE I.—A Cottage amongst the Ber- 
nese Alps. 


MANFRED and the CHAMOIS HUNTER. 


C. Hun. No, no—yet pause—thou 
must not yet go forth: 
Thy mind and body are alike unfit 
To trust each other, for some hours, at 


least ; 
When thou art better, I will be thy 
guide— 
But whither ? 
Man. It imports not: I do know 


My route full well, and need no further 
guidance 

C. Hun. Thy garb and gait bespeak thee 
of high lineage— 

One of the many chiefs, whose castled 
crags 

Look o’er the lower valleys—which of 
these 


220 


May call thee lord? 
portals ; 

My way of life leads me but rarely down 

To bask by the huge hearths of those old 
halls, 

Carousing with the vassals ; but the paths, 

Which step from out our mountains to 
their doors, 

I know from childhood—which of these 
is thine? 


I only know their 


Man. No matter. 
Coun Well, sir, pardon me the 
question, 
And be of better cheer. Come, taste my 
wine ; 


Tis of an ancient vintage ; 
‘T has thaw’d my 
glaciers 
Let it do thus for thine—Come, pledge 

me fairly. 
Man. Away, away ! there’s blood upon 
the brim ! 
Will it then never—never sink in the 
earth ? 
C. Hun. What dost thou mean ? thy 
senses wander from thee. 
Man. Isay ’tis blood—my blood ! the 
pure warm stream 
Which ran in the veins of my fathers, 
and in ours 
When we were in our youth, and had 
one heart, 
And loved each other as we should not 
love, 
And this was shed : 
Coloring the clouds, 
from heaven, 
Where thou art not—and I shall never be. 
C. Hun. Man of strange words, and 
some half-maddening sin, 
Which makes thee people vacancy, 
whate’er 
Thy dread and sufferance be, there’s 
comfort yet— 
The aid of holy men, 
patience— 
Man. Patience and patience! 
Hence—that word was made 
For brutes of burthen, not for birds of 


many a day 
veins among our 


but still it rises up, 
that shut me out 


and heavenly 


prey ; 
Preach it to mortals of a dust like 
thine,— 
Iam not of thine order. 
Cl, rane Thanks to heaven ! 


IT would not be of thine for the free fame 

Of William Tell; but whatsoe’er thine 
aL; 

It must be borne. and these wild starts 
are useless. 


BRIUTPSRSPOL TS 


Man. DoT not bear it ?—Look on me— 
I live. 
C. Hun. This is convulsion, and no 


healthful life. 
Man. I tell thee, 
many years, 
Many long years, but they are nothing 
now 
To those which I must number: 
ages— 
Space and eternity—and consciousness, 
With the fierce thirst of death—and still 
unslaked ! 
C. Hun. Why, on thy brow the seal 
of middle age 
Hath scarce been set; Iam thine elder 
far. 
Man. Think’st thou existence doth 
depend on time? 
It doth ; but actions are our epochs: mine 
Have made my days and nights im- 
perishable, 
Endless, and all alike, as sands on the 
shore, 
Innumerable atoms; and one desert, 
Barren and cold, on which the wild 
waves break, 
But nothing rests, save carcasses and 


man! I have lived 


ages-— 


Wrecks, 
Rocks and the salt-surf weeds of bitter- 
ness. 
C. Hun. Alas! he’s mad—but yet 


I must not leave him. 
Man. I would I were—for then the 
things I see 
Would be but a distemper’d dream. 
C. Hun. What is it 
That thou dost see, or think thou look’st 
upon ? 
Man. Myself, and thee—a peasant of 
the Alps— 
Thy humble virtues, hospitable home, 
And spirit patient, pious, proud, and 
free ; 
Thy self-respect, grafted on innocent 
thoughts ; 
The days of health, and nights of sleep ; 
thy toils, 
By danger dignified, yet guiltless ; hopes 
Of cheerful old age and a quiet grave, 
With cross and ‘garland over its green 
ture 
And thy grandchildren’s love for epi- 
taph ; 
This do I see—and then I look within— 
It matters not—my soul was scorch’d al- 
ready ! 
C. Hun. And wouldst thou then ex- 
change thy lot for mine? 


BYRON 


Man. No, friend! I would not wrong 
thee, nor exchange 
My lot with living being: I can bear— 
However wretchedly, ’tis still to bear— 
In life what others could not brook to 


dream, 
But perish in their slumber. 
C. Hun. And with this— 


This cautious feeling for another’s pain, 

Canst thou be black with evil ?—say not 
So, 

Can one of gentle thoughts have wreak’d 
revenge 

Upon his enemies ? 

Man. Oh! no, no, no! 

My injuries came down on those who 
~ loved me— 
On those whom I best loved : 
quelled 
An enemy, save in my just defence-— 
But my embrace was fatal. 
C. Hun. Heaven give thee rest ! 
And penitence restore thee to thyself ; 
My prayers shall be for thee. 
Man. I need them not— 
But can endure thy pity. I depart—— 
Tis time—farewell!—Here’s gold, and 
thanks for thee— 

No words--it is thy due.—Follow me 
not— 

ITknow my path—the mountain peril’s 
past : 

And once again I charge thee, follow 
not ! [| Hxit MANFRED. 


I never 


SCENE II 
A lower Valley in the Alps.—A Cataract. 
Enter MANFRED. 


It is not noon—the sunbow’s rays:still 


arch 

The torrent with the many hues of 
heaven, 

And roll the sheeted silver’s waving 
column 


O’er the crag’s headlong perpendicular, 

And fling its lines of foaming lightalong 

And to and fro, like the pale. courser’s 
tail, 

The Giant steed, to be bestrode by Death, 

As told in the Apocalypse. No eyes 

But mine now drink this sight of love- 
liness ; 

T should be sole in this sweet solitude, 

And with the Spirit of the place divide 

The homage of these waters.—I will call 
her. 


22% 


[MANFRED takes some of the water 
into the palm of his hand, and 
jlings it into the air, muttering the 
adjuration. After’ a pause, the 
WITCH OF THE ALPS rises beneath 
the arch of the sunbow of the tor- 
rent. 

Beautiful Spirit ! with thy hair of light, 

And dazzling eyes of glory, in whose 
form 

The charms of earth’s 
daughters grow 

To an unearthly stature, in an essence 

Of purer elements ; while the hues of 


least mortal 


youth,— 

Carnation’d like a sleeping infant’s 
cheek, 

Rock’d by the beating of her mother’s 
heart, 


Or the rose tints, which summer’s twi- 
light leaves 

Upon the lofty glacier’s virgin snow, 

The blush of earth embracing with her 
heaven— 

Tinge thy celestial aspect, and make 
tame 

The beauties of the sunbow which bends 
o’er thee. 

Beautiful Spirit ! in thy calm clear brow, 

Wherein is glass’d serenity of soul, 

Which of itself shows immortality, 

I read that thou wilt pardon to a Son 

Of Earth, whom the abstruser powers 


permit 
At times to commune with them—if 
that he 
Avail him of his spells—to call thee 
thus, 
And gaze on thee a moment. 
Witch. Son of Earth! 


I know thee, and the powers which give 
thee power ; 

I know thee for a man of many thoughts, 

And deeds of good and ill, extreme in 
both, 

Fatal and fated in thy sufferings. 

I have expected this—what wouldst thou 
with me? 

Man. To look upon thy beauty—noth- 

ing further. 

The face of the earth hath madden’d me, 
and [ 

Take refuge in her mysteries, and pierce 

To the abodes of those who govern her— 

But they can nothing aid me. I have 
sought 

From them what they could not bestow, 
and now 

I search no further. 








222 BRITISH POETS 
Writer. What could be the quest | In my lone wanderings, to the caves of 
Which is not in the power of the most death, 
rowerful, Searching its cause in its effect; av 
The rulers of the invisible ? drew 
Man. A boon ; From wither’d bones, and skull, dnd 
But why should T repeat it? “twere in heap’d up dust, 
vain, Conclusions most forbidden. Then I 


Witeh, T Know not that; let thy lips 
utter It, 
Man, Well, though it torture me, “tis 
but the same ; 
My pang shall tind a voice, 
youth upwards 
My spirit walk’d not with the souls of 


From my 


men, 

Nor look’d upon the earth with human 
@YeS § 

The thirst of their ambition was not 
mine, 

The aim of their existence was not 


mine ; 
My joys, my griefs, my passions, and my 


powers, 
Made me a stranger; though I wore the 
form, 


IT had no sympathy with breathing flesh, 

Nor midst the creatures of clay that 
girded me 

Was there but one who—but of her anon, 

IT said with men, and with the thoughts of 
men, 

Theld but slight communion; but instead 





My joy was in the wilderness,—to 
breathe 

The difticult air of the iced mountain's 
top 

Where the birds dare not build, nor in- 
sect’s wing 


Flit o'er the herbless granite ; or to plunge 

Into the torrent, and to roll along 

On the swift whirl of the new breaking 
ware 

Of river-stream, or ocean, in their flow. 

In these my early strength exulted ; or 

To follow through the night the moving 


Moon, 

The stars and their development ; or 
cateh 

The dazzling lightnings till my eyes grew 
dim ; 

Or to look, listning, on the scattered 
leaves, 


While Autumn winds wereat their even- 
ing song. 

These were my pastimes, and to be alone: 

For if the beings, of whom I was one.— 

Hating to be so,—crossd me in my path, 

I felt myself degraded back to them, 

And wasall clay again. And then I dived, 


<a I A NO LL CE 


pass’d 
The nights of years in sciences untaught 
Save in si old time ; and with time and 
toi 
And terrible ordeal, and such ee : 
As in itself hath power upon the air, 
And spirits that do compass air and 
earth, : 
Space, and the peopled infinite, I made 
Mine eves familiar with Eternity, 
Such as, before me, did the Magi, and 
He who from out their fountain dwell- 
ings raised 
Eros and Anteros, at Gadara, 
As I do thee ;—and with my knowledge 
grew 
The thirst of knowledge, and the power 
and joy 
Of this most bright intelligence, until— 
Witch. Proceed. 
Man. Oh! I but thus prolong’d my 
words, 
Boasting these idle attributes, because 
Asl approach the core of my heart’s 
grief— 
But to my task, Ihave not named to theo 
Father or mother, mistress, friend, or 
being, 
With whom I wore the chain of human 
ties ; 
If Thad such, they seem’d not such to me; 
Yet there was one— 
Witch. Spare not thyself——-proceed. 
Man. She was like mein lineaments ; 
her eyes, 
Her hair, her features, all, to the very 
tone 


Even of her voice, they said were like 


to mine ; 
But soften’d all, 
beauty : 
She had the same lone thoughts and 
wanderings, 
The quest of hidden knowledge, and a 
mind 
To comprehend the universe: nor these 


and temper’d into 


Alone, but with them gentler powers 


than mine, 
Pity, and smiles, and tears—which I had 
not ; 
And tenderness—but that I had for her; 
Humility—and that I never had. 








a ee 


BYRON 


Her faults were mine—her virtues were 
her own— 
I loved her, and destroy’d her ! 
Witch. With thy hand ? 
Man. Not with my hand, but heart, 
which broke her heart ; 
It coe on mine, and wither’d. I have 
she 
Blood, but not hers—and yet her blood 
was shed ; 
I saw—and could not stanch it. 
Witch And for this— 
A being of the race thou dost despise, 
The order, which thine own would rise 
above, 
Mingling with us and ours,—thou dost 
forego 
The gifts of our great knowledge, and 
shrink’st back 
To recreant mortality Away ! 
Man. Daughter of Air! I tell thee, 
since that hour— 
But words are breath—look on me in my 





sleep, 
Or watch my watchings—Come and sit 
by me! 


My solitude is solitude no more, 

But peopled with the Furies ;—I have 
gnash’d 

My teeth in darkness till returning morn, 

Then cursed myself till sunset ;—I have 
pray’d 

For madness as a blessing—’tis denied 
me, 

I have affronted death—but in the war 

Of elements the waters shrunk from me, 

And fatal things pass’d harmless; the 
cold hand 

Of an all-pitiless demon held. me back, 

Back by a single hair, which would not 
break 

In fantasy, imagination, all 

The affluence of my soul—which one day 
was 

A Croesus in creation—I plunged deep 

But, like an ebbing wave, it dash’d me 
back 

Into the gulf of my unfathom’d thought. 

I plunged amidst mankind—Forgetful- 
ness 

I sought in all, save where ’tis to be 
found, 

And that I have to learn ; my sciences, 

My long-pursued and superhuman art, 

Is mortal here: I dwell in my despair— 

And live—and live for ever. : 

Witeh. It may be 
That I can aid thee. 
Man, To do this thy power 


303 


Must wake the dead, or lay me low with 
them. 
Do so—in any shape—in any hour— 
With any torture—so it be the last. 
Witch. That is not in my province ; 
but if thou 
Wilt swear obedience to my will, and do 
My bidding, it may help thee to thy 
wishes. 
Man. I will not swear—Obey ! and 
whom ? the spirits 
Whose presence I command, and be the 
slave 
Of those who served me—Never ! 
Witch. Is this all? 
Hast thou no gentler answer ?—Yet be- 
think thee, 
And pause ere thou rejectest. 


Man. I have said it. 

Witch. Enough! Imay retire then— 
say ! 

Man. Retire ! 


[The WITCH disappears. 
Man. (alone). Weare the fools of time 
and terror: Days 
Steal onus, and steal from us ; yet we live, 
Loathing our life, and dreading still to die. 
In all the days of this detested yoke— 
This vital weight upon the struggling 
heart, 
Which sinks with sorrow, or beats quick 
with pain, 
Or joy that ends in agony or faintness— 
In all the days of past and future, for 
In life there is no present, we can number 
How few—how less than few—wherein 
the soul 
Forbears to pant for death, and yet draws 





back 
As from a stream in winter, though the 
chill 


Be but amoment’s. I have one resource 

Still in my science—I can call the dead, 

And ask them what it is we dread to be ; 

The sternest answer can but be the Grave, 

And that is nothing. If they answer 
not—— 

The buried Prophet answered to the Hag 

Of Endor; and the Spartan Monarch 
drew 

From the Byzantine maid’s unsleeping 
spirit 

An answer and his destiny—he slew 

That which he loved, unknowing what 


he slew, 

And died unpardon’d—though he call’d 
in aid 

The Phyxian Jove, and in Phigalia 
roused 


224 


BRITISH POETS 





The Arcadian Evocators to compel 

The indignant shadow to depose her 
wrath, 

Or fix her term of vengeance—she replied 

In words of dubious import, but fulfill’d. 

If I had never lived, that which I love 

Had still been living ; had Inever loved, 

That which I love would still be beauti- 
ful, 

Happy and giving happiness. 
she? 

What is she now ?--a sufferer for my 
sins— 

A thing I dare not think upon—or noth- 
ing. 

Within few hours I shall not call in 
vain— 

Yet in this hour I dread the thing I dare: 

Until this hour I never shrunk to gaze 

On spirit, good or evil-—now I tremble, 

And feel a strange cold thaw upon my 
heart. 

But I can act even what I most abhor, 

And champion human fears.—The night 
approaches. [ Bact. 


What is 


ScENE III 


The Summit of the Jungfrau Mountain. 
Enter First DESTINY. 


The moon is rising broad, and round, and 


bright ; 

And here on snows, where never human 
foot 

Of common mortal trod, we nightly 
tread, 


And leave no traces: o’er the savage sea, 

The glassy ocean of the mountain ice, 

We skim its rugged breakers, which put 
on 

The aspect of a tumbling tempest’s foam, 

Frozen in a moment—-a dead whirlpool’s 
image: 

And this most steep fantastic pinnacle, 

The fretwork of some earthquake-—- 
where the clouds 

Pause to repose themselves in passing 
bye 

Is sacred to our revels, or our vigils ; 

Here do I wait my sisters, on our way 

To the Hall of Arimanes, for to-night 

Is our great festival—tis strange they 
come not. 


A Voice without, singing. 


The Captive Usurper, 
Hurl’d down from the throne, 


Lay buried in torpor, 
Forgotten and lone ; 
IT broke through his slumbers, 
I shiver’d his chain, 
I leagued him with numbers— 
He’s Tyrant again ! 
With the blood of a million he’ll answer 
my care, 
With anation’s destruction—his flight 
and despair, 


Second Voice, without. 


The ship sail’d on, the ship sail’d fast, 

But I left not a sail, and I left not a 
mast ; 

There is not a plank of the hull or the 
deck, 

And there is not a wretch to lament o’er 
his wreck ; 

Save one, whom I held, as he swam, by 
the hair, 

And he was a subject well worthy my 
care ; 

A traitor on land, and a pirate at sea,— 

But I saved him to wreak further havoc 
for me! 


FIRST DESTINY, answering. 


The city lies sleeping ; 
The morn, to deplore it, 

May dawn on it weeping: 
Sullenly, slowly, 

The black plague flew o’er it— 
Thousands le lowly ; 

Tens of thousands shall perish ; 
The living shall fly from 

The sick they should cherish ; 
But nothing can vanquish 

The touch that they die from. 
Sorrow and anguish, 

And evil and dread, 
Envelop a nation ; 

The blest are the dead, 
Who see not the sight 

Of their own desolation ; 
This work of a night— 

This wreck of a realm—this deed of my 
doing— 
For ages I’ve done, and shall still be re- 
newing ! 


Enter the Skconp and THIRD DESTINIES 
The Three. 


Our hands contain the hearts of men, 
Our footsteps are their graves ;. 
We only give to take again 
The spirits of our slaves! 


BYRON 


225 





First Des. Welcome !—Where’s Nem- 


esis ? 
Second Des. At some great work; 
But what I know not, for my hands were 
full. 
Third Des. Behold she cometh. 


Enter NEMESIS. 


First Des. Say, where hast thou been ? 
My sisters and thyself are slow to-night. 
Nem. I was detain’d repairing 
shatter’d thrones, 
Marrying fools, restoring dynasties, 
Avenging men upon their enemies, 
And making them repent their own re- 
venge ; 
Goading the wise to madness; from the 
dull 
Shaping out oracles to rule the world 
Afresh, for they were waxing out of date, 
And mortals dared to ponder for them- 
selves, 
To weigh kings in the balance, and to 
speak 
Of freedom, the forbidden fruit.—Away ! 
We have outstay’d the hour—mount we 
our clouds! [| Hxeunt. 


SCENE IV 


The Hall of Arimanes—Arimanes on his 
Throne, a Globe of Fire, surrounded 
by the Spirits. 


Hymn of the SPIRItTs. 


Hail to our Master!—Prince of Earth 
and Air! 
Who walks the clouds and waters—in 
his hand ; 
The sceptre of the elements, which tear 
Themselves to chaos at his high 
command ! 
He breatheth—and a tempest shakes 
the sea; 
He speaketh—and the clouds reply in 
thunder ; 
He gazeth—from his glance the sun- 
beams flee ; 
He moveth—earthquakes rend 
world asunder. 
Beneath his footsteps the volcanoes rise ; 
His shadow in the Pestilence ; his path 
The comets herald through the crackling 
skies ; 
And planets turn to ashes at his wrath. 
To him War offers daily sacrifice ; 
To him Death pays his tribute; Life 
is his, 


5 


the 


With all its infinite of agonies— 
And his the spirit of whatever is! 


Enter the DESTINIES and NEMESIS. 


First Des. Glory to Arimanes ! on the 
earth 
His power increaseth—both my sisters 
did 


His bidding, nor did I neglect my duty! 
Second Des. Glory to Arimanes! we 
who bow 
The necks of men, bow down before his 
throne ! 
Third Des. Glory to Arimanes! we 
await His nod! 
Nem. Sovereign of Sovereigns ! we are 
thine, 
And all that liveth, more or less, is ours, 
And most things wholly so; still to 
increase 
Our power, increasing thine, demands 
our care, 
And weare vigilant. Thylatecommands 
Have been fulfill’d to the utmost. 
Enter MANFRED. 
A Spirit. What is here? 
A mortal !—Thou most rash and fatal 
wretch, 
Bow down and worship ! 
Second Spirit. Ido know the man— 
A Magian of great power, and. fearful 
skill! 
Third Spirit. 
slave !— 
What, know’st thou not 
Thine and our Sovereign ?—Tremble, 
and obey ! 
All the Spirits. Prostrate thyself, and 
thy condemned clay, 
Child of the Earth! or dread the worst. 
Man. I know it; 
And yet ye see I kneel not. 
Fourth Spirit. °T willbe taught thee. 
Man. °T is taught already ;—many a 
night on the earth, 
On the bare ground, have I bow’d down 
my face, 
And strew’d my head with ashes ; I have 
known 
The fulness of humiliation, for 
I sunk before my vain despair, and knelt 
To my own desolation. 
Fifth Spirit. Dost thou dare 
Refuse to Arimanes on his throne 
What the whole earth accords, behold- 
ing not 





Bow down and worship, 


226 


The terror of his glory ?—Crouch, I say. 
Man. Bid him bow down to that 
which is above him, 
The overruling Infinite—the Maker 
Who made him not for worship—let 
him kneel, 
And we will kneel together. 
The Spirits. Crush the worm ! 
Tear him in pieces !— 


First Des. Hence! avaunt! — he’s 
mine. 

Prince of the Powers invisible! This 
man 


Is of no common order, as his port 

And presence here denote ; his sufferings 

Have been of an immortal nature, like 

Our own ; his knowledge, and his powers 
and will, 

As far as is compatible with clay, 

Which clogs the ethereal essence, have 
been such 

As clay hath seldom borne; his aspira- 
tions 

Have been beyond the dwellers of the 
earth, 

And they have only taught him what 
we know— 

That knowledge is not happiness, and 
science 

But an exchange of ignorance for that 

Which is another kind of ignorance. 

This is not all—the passions, attributes 

Of earth and heaven, from which no 
power, nor being, 

Nor breath from the worm upwards is 
exempt, 

Have pierced his heart, and in their 
consequence 

Made him a thing which I, who pity not, 

Yet pardon those who pity. He is mine, 

And thine, it may be; be it so, or not, 

No other Spirit in this region hath 

A soul like his—or power upon his soul. 


Nem. What doth he here then ? 
First Des. Let him answer that. 
Man. Ye know what I have known ; 


and without power 
I could not be amongst ye: but there are 
Powers deeper still beyond—I come in 
quest 
Of such, to answer unto what I seek. 
Nem. What wouldst thou ? 
Man. Thou canst not reply to me. 
Call up the dead—my question is for 
them. 
Nem. Great Arimanes, doth thy will 
avouch 
The wishes of this mortal ? 
Art. Yea. 


BRITISH POETS 


Nem. Whom wouldst thou 
Uncharnel ? 

Man. One without a tomb—call up 
Astarte. 


NEMESIS 


Shadow ! or Spirit! 
Whatever thou art, 
Which still doth inherit 
The whole or a part 
Of the form of thy birth, 
Of the mould of thy clay, 
Which return’d to the earth, 
Re-appear to the day ! 
Bear what thou borest, 
The heart and the form, 
And the aspect thou worest 
Redeem from the worm. 
Appear !—Appear !—Appear ! 
Who sent thee there requires thee here! 
|The Phantom of ASTARTE rises 
‘ and stands in the midst. 
Man. Can this be death? there's 
bloom upon her cheek ; 
But now I see it is no living hue, 
But a strange hectic—like the unnatural 


red 

Which Autumn plants upon the perish’d 
leaf. 

It is the same! Oh, God! that I should 
dread 


To look upon the same—Astarte !—No. 

I cannot speak to her—but bid her 
speak— 

Forgive me or condemn me. 


NEMESIS 


By the power which hath broken 
The grave which enthrall’d thee, 

Speak to him who hath spoken, 
Or those who have call’d thee! 


Man. She is silent, 
And in that silence Iam more than an- 
swer’d. 
Nem. My power extends no further, 
Prince of Air! 
It rests with thee alone—command her 
voice. 
Ari. Spirit—obey this sceptre ! 
Nem. Silent still ! 
She is not of our order, but belongs 
To the other powers. Mortal! thy quest 
is vain, 
And we are baffled also. 
Man. Hear me, hear me— 
Astarte ! my beloved! speak to me : 
I have so much endured—so much 
endure— 


BYRON 


Look on me! the grave hath not 
changed thee more 

Than I am changed for thee. 

~ lovedst me 

Too much, as I loved thee: we were not 
made 

To torture thus each other, though it 
were 

The deadliest sin to love as we have 
loved. 

Say that thou loath’st me not—that I do 
bear 

This punishment for both—that thou 
wilt be 

One of the blessed—and that I shall die ; 

For hitherto all hateful things conspire 

To bind me in existence—in a life 

Which makes me shrink from immor- 
tality— 

A future like the past. I cannot rest. 

I know not what I ask, nor what I seek ; 

I feel but what thouart, and what I am: 

And I would hear yet once before I perish 

The voice which was my music—Speak 
to me! 

For I have call’d on thee in the still 
night, 

Startled the slumbering birds from the 
hush’d boughs, 

And woke the mountain wolves, and 
made the caves 

Acquainted with thy 
name, 

Which answer’d me — many things 
answer’d me— 

Spirits and men—but thou wert silent 


Thou 


vainly echoed 


all. 
Yet speak to me! I have outwatch’d 
the stars, 
And gazed o’er heaven in vain search of 
thee. ; 
Speak to me! I have wander’d o’er the 
earth, 
And never found thy likeness—Speak to 
me ! 
Look on the fiends around—they feel for 
me : 
I fear them not, and feel for thee alone— 
Speak to me! though it be in wrath ; — 
but say— 
IT reck not what — but let me hear thee 
once— 
This once—once more ! 
Phantom of Astarte. Manfred. 
Man. Say on, say on— 
I live but in the sound—it is thy voice ! 
Phan. Manfred! To-morrow ends 
thine earthly ills. 
Farewell ! 


a7 


Man. Yet one word more—am I for- 
given ? 


Phan. Farewell ! 
Man. Say, shall we meet again? 
Phan. Farewell ! 


Man. One word for mercy ! Say, thou 
lovest me. 
Phan. Manfred ! 
[The Spirit of ASTARTE disappears. 
Nem. She’s gone, and will not be 
recall’d ; 
Her words will be fulfill’d. Return to 
the earth. 
A Spirit. He is convulsed.—This isto 
be a mortal 
And seek the things beyond mortality. 
Another Spirit. Yet, see, he mas- 
tereth himself, and makes 
His torture tributary to his will. 
Had he been one of us, he would have 


made 
An awful spirit. 
Nem. Hast thou further question 


Of our great sovereign, or his worship- 
pers ? 
Man. None. 
Nem. Then for a time farewell. 
Man. We meet then ! where? On the 
earth ?— 
Even as thou wilt: and for the grace ac- 
corded 
I now depart a debtor. Fare ye well ! 
[ Hxvit MANFRED. 


(Scene closes. ) 
Act III 
ScENE I.—A Hall in the Castle of Manfred. 


MANFRED and HERMAN. 


Man. What is the hour ? 

Her. It wants but one till sunset, 
And promises a lovely twilight. 

Man. Say, 
Are all things so disposed of in the tower 
As I directed ? 

Her. All, my lord, are ready: 
Here is the key and casket. . 
Man. It is well : 
Thou may’st retire. [ Hvit HERMAN. 

Man. (alone). There is a calm upon me-- 
Inexplicable stillness! which till now 
Did not belong to what I knew of life. 
If that I did not know philosophy 
To be of all our vanities the motlhiest, 
The merest word that ever fool’d the ear 
From out the schoolman’s jargon, I 

should deem . 


228 





BRE Vokrri by loss 





The golden secret, the sought ‘‘ Kalon,” 
found, 

And seated in my soul. It will not last, 

But it is well to have known it, though 
but once : 

It hath enlarged my thoughts witha 
new sense, 

And I within my tablets would note 
down | 

That there is such a feeling. Who is 
there ? 


Re-enter HERMAN. 


Her. My lord, the abbot of St. Mau- 
rice craves 
To greet your presence. 


Enter the ABBOT OF ST. MAURICE. 


Abbot. Peace be with 
fred ! 
Man. Thanks, holy father! welcome 
to these walls ; 
Thy presence honors them, and blesseth 
those 
Who dwell within them. 
Abbot. Would it were so, Count !— 
But I would fain confer with thee alone. 
Man. Herman, retire.—What would 
my reverend guest ? 
Abbot. Thus, without prelude :—Age 
and zeal, my office, 
And good intent, must plead my privi- 


Count Man- 


lege ; 

Our near, though not acquainted neigh- 
borhood, 

May also be my herald. Rumors 
strange, 


And of unholy nature, are abroad, 
And busy with thy name ; a noble name 
For centuries: may he who bears it now 
Transmit it unimpair’d ! 
Man. Proceed,—TI listen. 
Abbot. ’T is said thou holdest converse 
with the things 
Which are forbidden to the search of 
man ; 
That with the dwellers of the dark 
abodes, 

The many evil and unheavenly spirits 
Which walk the valley of the shade of 
death, 

Thou communest. 
mankind, 

Thy fellows in creation, thou dost rarely 

Exchange thy thoughts, and that thy 
solitude 

Is as an anchorite’s, were it but holy. 


I-know that with 


Man. And what are they who do 
avouch these things? 


Abbot. My pious brethren—the scared 
peasantry— 
Even thy own vassals—who do look on 
thee 
With most unquiet eyes. Thy life’s in 
peril. 


Man. Take it. 
Abbot. I come to save, and not des- 
troy : 
I would not pry into thy secret soul ; 
But if these things be sooth, there still is 
time 
For penitence and pity: reconcile thee 
With the true church, and through the 
church to heaven. 


Man. I hear thee. Thisis my reply: 
whate’er 
Imay have been, or am, doth rest be- 
tween 
Heaven and myself. Ishall not choose 
a mortal 


To be my mediator. Have I sinn’d 

Against your ordinances? prove and 
punish ! 

Abbot. My son! I did not speak of 

punishment, 

But penitence and pardon ;—with myself 

The choice of such remains—and for the 
last, 

Our institutions and our strong belief 

Have given me power to smooth the 
path from sin 

To higher hope and better thoughts; the 


first 

I leave to heaven,—‘‘ Vengeance is mine 
alone!” 

So saith the Lord, and with all humble- 
ness 


His servant echoes back the awful word. 
Man. Old man! there is no power in 

holy men, 

Nor charm in prayer, nor purifying form 

Of penitence, nor outward look, nor fast, 

Nor agony—nor, greater than all these, 

The innate tortures of that deep despair, 

Which is remorse without the fear of 
hell, 

But all in all sufficient to itself 

Would make a hell of heaven—can ex- 
orcise 

From out the unbound spirit the quick 
sense 

Of its own sins, wrongs, sufferance, and 
revenge 

Upon itself ; there is no future pang 

Can deal that justice on the self-con- 
demn’d 


BYRON 


He deals on his own soul. 

Abbot. All this is well ; 
For this will passaway, and be succeeded 
By an auspicious hope, which shall look 


up 
With calm assurance to that blessed 
lace. 
Which all who seek may win, whatever 
be 
Their earthly errors, so they be atoned : 
And the commencement of atonement is 
The sense of its necessity. Say on— 
And all our church can teach thee shall 
be taught ; 


And all we can absolve thee shall be. 


pardon’d, 
Man. When Rome’s sixth emperor 

was near his last, 

The victim of a self-inflicted wound, 

To shun the torments of a public death 

From senates once his slaves, a certain 
soldier, 

With show of loyal pity, would have 
stanch’d 

The gushing throat with his officious 
robe ; 

The dying Roman thrust him back, and 
said— 

Some empire still in his expiring glance—— 

‘It is too late—is this fidelity ?” 
Abbot. And what of this? 
Man. LIanswer with the Roman— 
**It is too late !”’ 
Abbot. It never can be so, 
To reconcile thyself with thy own soul, 
And thy own soul with heaven. Hast 
thou no hope? 

‘Tis strange—even those who do de- 
spair above, 

Yet shape themselves some fantasy on 
earth, 

To which frail twig they cling, 
drowning men. 

Man. Ay-——father! I have had those 

earthly visions, 
And noble aspirations in my youth, 

To make my own the mind of other 
men, 

The enlightener of nations; and to rise 

I knew not whither—it might be to fall ; 

But fall, even as the mountain-cataract, 

Which having leapt from its more daz- 
zling height, 

Even in the foaming strength of its 
abyss, 

(Which casts up misty columns that be- 
come 

Clouds raining from the re-ascended 
skies, ) 


like 


229 


Lies low but mighty still.—-But this is 
past, . 

My thoughts mistook themselves. 
Abbot. And wherefore so? 
Man. I could not tame my nature 

down ; for he 

Must serve who fain would sway ; and 

soothe, and sue, 

And watch all time, and pry into all 

place, 

And be a living le, who would become 

A mighty thing amongst the mean, and 

such 

The mass are ; I disdain’d to mingle with 

A herd, though to be leader--and of 

wolves. att 

The lion is alone, and so am I. 

Abbot. And why not live and act with 

other men ? 

Man. Because my nature was averse 

from life; 

And yet not cruel ; for I would not make, 

But find a desolation. Like the wind, 

The red-hot breath of the most lone 

simoom, 

Which dwells but in the 

sweeps 0’er 

The barren sands which bear no shrubs 

to blast, 

revels o’er their 

waves, 

And seeketh not, so that itis not sought, 

But being met is deadly,—such hath 

been 

The course of my existence ; but there 

came 

Things in my path which are no more. 
Abbot. Alas! 

I ’gin to fear that thou art past all aid 

From me and from my calling; yet so 

young, 

I still would— 

Man. Look on me! there is an order 
Of mortals on the earth, who do become 
Old in their youth, and die ere middle 

age, 

Without the violence of warlike death ; 

Some perishing of pleasure, some of 

study, 

Some worn with toil, 

weariness, 

Some of disease, and some insanity, 

And some of wither’d or of broken 

hearts ; 

For this last is a malady which slays 

More than are number’d in the lists of 

Fate, 

Taking all shapes, and bearing many 

names. 


desert, and 


And wild and arid 


some of mere 


230 


BRITISH POETS 





Look upon me! for even of all these 
things 
Have I partaken; and of all these things, 
One were enough; then wonder not that I 
Am what Iam, but that I ever was, 
Or having been, that I am still on earth. 
Abbot. Yet, hear me still 
Man. — Old man! I do respect 
Thine order, and revere thine years; I 
deem 
Thy purpose pious, but it is in vain: 
Think me not churlish; I would spare 
thyself, 
Far more than me, in shunning at this 
time 
All further colloqguy—and so—farewell. 
[Exit MANFRED. 
Abbot. This should have been a noble 
creature ; he 
Hath all the energy which would have 
made 
A goodly frame of glorious elements, 
Had they been wisely mingled ; as it is, 
It is anawful chaos—light and darkness, 
And mind and dust, and passions and 
pure thoughts 
Mix’d, and contending without end or 





order,— 

All dormant or destructive: he will 
perish, 

And yet he must not; I will try once 
more 

For such are worth redemption ; and my 


duty 
Is to dare all things for a righteous end. 
T’ll follow him—but cautiously, though 
surely. | Hxit ABBOT. 


SCENE II 
Another Chamber. 
MANFRED and HERMAN. 


Her. My lord, you bade me wait on 
you at sunset : 
He sinks behind the mountain. 
Man. Doth he so? 
IT willlook on him. [MANFRED advances 
to the Window of the Hall. 
Glorious Orb! the idol 
Of early nature, and the vigorous race 
Of undiseased mankind, the giant sons 
Of the embrace of angels, with a sex 
More beautiful than they, which did 
draw down 
The erring spirits who can ne’er return.— 
Most glorious orb! that wert a worship, 
ere 
The mystery of thy making was re- 
veal’d ! 








Thou earliest minister of the Almighty, 

Which gladden’d, on their mountain 
tops, the hearts 

Of the Chaldean shepherds, till they 
pour’d 

Themselves in orisons ! 
God ! 

And representative of the unknown— 

Who chose thee for his shadow ! Thou 
chief star ! 

Centre of many stars! which mak’st our 
earth 

Endurable, and temperest the hues 

And hearts of all who walk within thy 


Thou material 


rays ! 

Sire of the seasons! Monarch of the 
climes, 

And those who dwell in them ! for near 
or far, 


Our inborn spirits have a tint of thee 
Even as our outward aspects ;—thou dost 


rise, 
And shine, and setin glory. Fare thee 
well ! 
I ne’er shall see thee more. As my first 
glance 
Of love and wonder was for thee, then 
take [one 


My latest look: thou wilt not beam on 
To whom the gifts of life and warmth 
have been 
Of a more fatal nature. 

I follow. 


He is gone: 
[Exit MANFRED. 


ScENE III 


The Mountains—The Castle of Manfred 
at some distance—A Terrace before a 
Tower—Time, Twilight. 


HERMAN, MANUEL and other Dependents 
of MANFRED. 


Her. ’Tis strange enough ; night after 

night, for years, 

He hath pursued long vigils in this tower, 

Without a witness. I have been within 
it,— 

So have we all been oft-times; but from it, 

Or its contents, it were impossible 

To draw conclusions absolute, of aught 

His studies tend to. To be sure, there is 

One chamber where none enter: I would 


give 
The fee of what I have to come these 
three years, 
To pore upon its mysteries. 
Manuel. *Twere dangerous; 
Content thyself with what thou know’st 
already. 


BYRON 


Her. Ah! Manuel! thou art elderly 
and wise, 
And couldst say much; thou hast dwelt 
within the castle— 
How many years is’t? 


Manuel. Ere Count Manfred’s birth, 
I served his father, whom he nought re- 
sembles. 
Her, There be more sons in like pre- 
dicament. 
But wherein do they differ ? 
Manuel. I speak not 
Of features or of form, but mind and 
habits ; 
-Count Sigismund was proud, but gay and 
tree, 


A warrior anda rev eller ; he dwelt not 
With books and solitude, nor made the 
night 
A gloomy vigil, but a festal time, 
Merrier than day; he did not walk the 
rocks 
And forests like a wolf, nor turn aside 
From men and their delights. 
Her. Beshrew the hour, 
But those were jocund times! I would 
that such 
Would visit the old walls again; they 
look 
As if they had forgotten them. 
Manuel. These walls 
Must change their chieftain first. Oh! I 
have seen 
Some strange things in them, Herman. 
Her. Come, be friendly ; 
Relate me some to while away our 
watch: 
I’ve heard thee darkly speak of an event 
Which happen’d hereabouts, by this 
same tower. 
Manuel. That was a night indeed! I 
do remember 
‘Twas twilight, as it may be now, and 
such 
Another evening ;—yon red cloud, which 
rests 
On Eigher’s pinnacle, so rested then,— 
So like that it might be the same; the 
wind 
Was faint and gusty, and the mountain 
snows 
Began to glitter with the climbing moon; 
Count Manfred was, as now, within his 
tower,— 
How occupied, we knew not, but with 
him 
The sole companion of his wanderings 
And watchings—her, whom of all earthly 
things 


231 


That lived, the only thing he seem’d to 
love,— 
As he, indeed, by blood was bound to do, 
The lady Astarte, his— 
Hush! who comes here ? 


Enter the ABBOT. 


Abbot. Where is your master ? 
fer. Yonder in the tower. 
Abbot. I must speak with him. 
Manuel. ’Tis impossible ; 


He is most private, and must not be thus 
Intruded on. 

Abbot. Upon myself I take 
The forfeit of my fault, if fault there be— 
But I must see him. 


Her. Thou hast seen him once 
This eve already. 
Abbot. Herman! I command thee, 


Knock, and apprize the Count of my ap- 
proach. 
Her. We dare not. 
Abbot. Then itseems I must be herald 
Of my own purpose. 


Manuel. Reverend father, stop— 
I pray you pause. 

Abbot. Why so? 

Manuel. But step this way, 


And I will tell you further. | Hxeunt. 


SCENE IV 
Interior of the Tower. 
MANFRED alone. 


The stars are forth, the moon above the 
tops 

Of the snow-shining mountains.—Beau- 
tiful ! 

I linger yet with Nature, for the Night 

Hath been to me a more familiar face 

Than that of man; and in her starry 
shade 

Of dim and solitary loveliness, 

I learn’d the language of another world. 

I do remember me, that in my youth, 

When I was wandering,—upon such a 
night 

I stood within the Coliseum’s wall, 

’Midst the chief relics of almighty Rome ; 

The trees which grew along the broken 
arches 

Waved dark in the blue midnight, and 
the stars 

Shone through the rents of ruin ; from 
afar 

The watch-dog bay’d beyond the Tiber ; 
and 


232 


More near from out the Ceesars’ palace 
came 

The owl’s long:cry, and, interruptedly, 

Of distant sentinels the fitful song 

Begun and died upon the gentle wind. 

Some cypresses beyond the time-worn 


breach 

Appear’d to skirt the horizon, yet they 
stood 

Within a bowshot. Where the Ceesars 
dwelt, 

And dwell the tuneless birds of night, 
amidst 

A grove which springs through levell’d 
battlements, 

And twines its roots with the imperial 
hearths, 


Ivy usurps the laurel’s place of growth ; 
But the gladiators’ bloody Circus stands, 
A noble wreck in ruinous perfection, 
While Ceesar’s chambers, and the Au- 
gustan halls, 
Grovel on earth in indistinct decay. 
And thou didst shine, thou rolling moon, 
upon 
All this, and cast a wide and tender light, 
Which soften’d down the hoar austerity 
Of rugged desolation, and fill’d up, 
As ’twere anew, the gaps of centuries ; 
Leaving that beautiful which still was so, 
And making that which was not, till the 
place 
Became religion, and the heart ran o’er 
With silent worship of the great of old,— 
The dead but sceptred sovereigns, who 
still rule 
Our spirits from their urns. 
’'Twas such a night ! 
’T is strange that I recall it at this time ; 
But I have found our thoughts take 
wildest flight 
Even at the moment when they should 
- array 
Themselves in pensive order. 
Enter the ABBOT. 


Abbot. My good lord! 
I crave a second grace for thisapproach 5 
But yet let not my humble zeal offend 
By its abruptness—all it hath of ill 
Recoils on me; its good in the effect 
May light upon your head—could I say 
heart— 
Could I touch that, 
prayers, I should 
Recall a noble spirit which hath wan- 


with words or 


der’d ; 
But is not yet all lost. 
Man, Thou know’st me not; 


BRITISH POETS 





My days are number’d, and my deeds re- 
corded : 
Retire, or ’twill be dangerous—Away ! 
Abbot. Thou dost not mean to menace 
me? 
Man. NotI; 
I simply tell thee peril is at hand, 
And would preserve thee. 


Abbot. What dost thou mean ? 

Man. Look there! 
What dost thou see ? 

Abbot. Nothing. 

Man. Look there I say. 


And steadfastly ;—now tell me what 
thou seest ? 
Abbot. That which should shake me, 
but I fear it not: 
I see a dusk and awful figure rise, 
Like aninfernal god, from out the earth ; 
His face wrapt in a mantle, and his form 
Robed as with angry. clouds : he stands be- 
tween 
Thyself and me—but I do fear him not. 
Man. Thou hast no cause—he shall not 
harm thee—but 
His sight may shock thine old limbs into 
palsy. 
I say to thee—Retire ! 
Abbot. And Ireply— 
Never—till I have battled with this 
fiend :— 
What doth he here ? 
Man. Why--ay—what doth he here? 
I did not send for him,—he is unbidden. 
Abbot. Alas! lost mortal! what with 
guests like these 
Hast thou to do? I tremble for thy sake: 
Why doth he gaze on thee, and thou on 
him ? 
Ah! he unveils his aspect : on his brow 
The thunder-scars are graven : from his 


eye 
Glares forth the immortality of hell— 
Avaunt !-- 
Man. Pronounce—what isthy mission ? 
Spirit. Come !— 
Abbot. What art thou, unknown being ? 
answer !—speak ! 
Spirit. The genius of this mortal.— 
Come! ’tis time. 
Man. Tam prepared for all things, but 
deny 
The power which summons me. Whosent 
thee here? 


Spirit. Thowlt know anon-—-Come! 
Come! 
Man. I have commanded 


Things of an essence greater far than 
thine, 


BYRON 


And striven with thy masters. Get thee 
hence ! 
Spirit. Mortal! thine hour is come— 
Away ! I say. 
Man. I knew, and know my hour is 
come, but not 
To render up my soul to such as thee: 
Away! Ill die as I have lived—alone. 
Spirit. Then I must summon up my 
brethren.—Rise ! 
[Other Spirits rise up. 
Abbot. Avaunt! ye evil ones! — 
Avaunt! I say ; 
Ye have no power where piety hath 


power, 
And I do charge ye in the name——- 
Spirit. Old man! 


We know ourselves, our mission, and 
thine order ; 
Waste not thy holy words on idle uses, 


It were in vain: this man is forfeited. 


Once more I summon him—Away ! 
Away ! 
Man. I do defy ye,—though I feel my 
soul 


Is ebbing from me, yet I do defy ye 
Nor will I hence, while I have earthly 


breath 
To breathe my scorn upon ye—earthly 
strength 
To wrestle, though with spirits; what 
ye take 
Shall be ta’en limb by limb. 
Spirit. Reluctant mortal! 


Is this the Magian who would so pervade 
The world invisible, and make himself 
Almostour equal? Can it be that thou 
Artthus in love with life? the very life 
Which made thee wretched ! 

Man. Thou false fiend, thou liest ! 
My life is in its last hour,—that I know, 
Nor would redeem a moment of that 

hour ; 
I do not combat against death, but thee 
And thy surrounding angels; my past 


power, 

Was purchased by no compact with thy 
crew, 

But by superior science—penance, dar- 


ing, 

And length: of watching, strength of 
mind, and skill 

In knowledge of our fathers—when the 
earth 

Saw men and spirits walking side by 
side, 

And gave ye no supremacy: I stand 

Upon my strength—I do defy—deny— 

Spurn back, and scorn ye !— 


add 


Spirit. 
Have made thee 
Man. What are they to such as thee ? 
Must crimes be punish’d but by other 
crimes, [hell ! 
And greater criminals ?—Back to thy 
Thou hast no power upon me, that I 
feeh;' [know : 
Thou never shalt possess me, that I 
What I have done is done ; I bear within 
A torture which could nothing gain 
from thine : 
The mind which is immortal makes itself 
Requital for its good or evil thoughts,— 
Is its own origin of ill and end 
And its own place and time: its innate 
sense, 
When stripp’d of this mortality, derives 
No color from the fleeting things with- 
out, 
But is absorb’d in Hitkablintds or in joy, 
Born from the knowledge of its own 
desert. 
Thou didst not tempt me, and thou 
couldst not tempt me ; 
I have not been thy dupe, nor am thy 
prey— 
But was my own destroyer and will be 
My own hereafter.—Back, ye _ baffled 
fiends !— 
The hand of death is on me—but not 
yours! [The Demons disappear. 
Abbot. Alas! how pale thou art—thy 
lips are white— 
And thy breast heaves—and in thy gasp- 
ing throat 
The accents rattle: Give thy prayers to 


But thy many crimes 





heaven— 
Pray—albeit but in thought,—but die not 
thus. 
Man. ’Tis over—my dull eyes can 


fix thee not; 

But all things swim around me, and the 
earth 

Heaves as it were beneath me. 
thee well ! 

Give me thy hand. 

Abbot. Cold — cold —even to the 

heart— 

But yet one prayer— Alas! how fares it 
with thee? 


Fare 


Man. Old man! ‘tis not so difficult 
to die. | MANFRED expires. 
Abbot. He’s gone—his soul hath ta’ en 


its ear thiess flight ; 
Whither? I dread to think—but he is 
gone, 
September, 1816—May, 1817, 
1817, 


June 16, 


TO THOMAS MOORE 


My boat is on the shore, 
And my bark is on the sea ; 
But, before I go, Tom Moore, 
Here’s a double health to thee! 


Here’s a sigh to those who love me, 
And a smile to those who hate ; 

And, whatever sky’s above me, 
Here’s a heart for every fate. 


Though the ocean roar around me, 
Yet it still shall bear me on ; 

Though a desert should surround me, 
It hath springs that may be won. 


Were’t the last drop in the well, 
As I gasp’d upon the brink, 
Ere my fainting spirit fell, 
Tis to thee that I would drink. 


With that water, as this wine, 
The libation I would pour 
Should be—peace with thine and mine, 
And a health to thee, Tom Moore. 
July, 1817. 1821. 


FROM CHILDE HAROLD. 
CANTO IV 


I stoop in Venice, on the Bridge of. 

Sighs ; [Stanza 1 
A palace and a prison on each hand: 
I saw from out the wave her structures 


rise 

As from the stroke of the enchanter’s 
wand: 

A thousand years their cloudy wings 
expand 


Around me, and a dying Glory smiles 

O’er the far times, when many a sub- 
ject land 

Look’d to the winged Lion’s marble piles, 

Where Venice sate in state, throned on 
her hundred isles ! 


She looks a sea Cybele, fresh from ocean, 

Rising with her tiara of proud towers 

At airy distance, with majestic motion, 

A ruler of the waters and their powers ; 

And such she was ;—her daughters had 
their dowers 

From spoils of nations, and the exhaust- 
less East . 

Pour’d in her lap all gems in sparkling 
showers. 

In purple was she robed, and of her feast 

Monarchs partook, and deem’d their 
dignity increased. 


BRITISH’ POETS 


In Venice Tasso’s echoes are no more, 

And silent rows the songless gondolier ; 

Her palaces are crumbling to the shore, 

And music meets not always now the 
ear: 


Those days are gone—but Beauty still is 
here. 

States fall, arts fade—but Nature doth 
not die, 

Nor yet forget how Venice once was 
dear, 


The pleasant place of all festivity, 
The revel of the earth, the masque of 
Italy ! 


But unto us she hath a spell beyond 

Her name in story, and her long array 
Of mighty shadows, whose dim forms 

despond 

Above the dogeless city’s vanish’d sway; 
Ours is a trophy which will not decay 
With the Rialto; Shylock and the Moor, 
And Pierre, cannot be swept or worn 


away— 

The keystones of the arch! though all 
were o’er, 

For us repeopled were the solitary shore. 


The beings of the mind are not of clay ; 


_ Essentially immortal, they create 


And multiply in us a brighter ray 

And more beloved existence : that which 
Fate 

Prohibits to dull life, in this our state 

Of mortal bondage, by these spirits sup- 
plied, 

First exiles, then replaces what we hate; 

Watering the heart whose early flowers 
have died, 

And with a fresher growth replenishing 
the void. 


e . . . . e 


When Athens’ armies fell at Syracuse, 

And fetter’d thousands bore the yoke of 
war, [St. 16 

Redemption rose up in the Attic Muse, 

Her voice their only ransom from afar: 

See! as they chant the tragic hymn, the 
car 

Of the o’ermaster’d victor stops, the 
reins 

Fall from his hands, his idle scimitar 

Starts from its belt—he rends his cap- 
tive’s chains, 

And bids him thank the bard for free- 
dom and his strains. 


Thus, Venice, if no stronger claim were 
thine, 


BYRON 


Were all thy proud historic deeds forgot, 

Thy choral memory of the Bard divine, 

Thy love of Tasso, should have cut the 
knot 

Which ties thee to thy tyrants; and thy 
lot 

Is shameful to the nations,—most of all, 

Albion! to thee: the Ocean queen 
should not 

Abandon Ocean’s children ; in the fall 

Of Venice think of thine, despite thy 
watery wall. 


I loved her from my boyhood ; she to me 
Was as a fairy city of the heart, 

Rising like water-columns from the sea, 
Of joy the sojourn, and of wealth the 


mart ; 

And Otway, Radcliffe, Schiller, Shake- 
speare’s art, 

Had stamp’d her image in me, and even 


so, 

Although I found her thus, we did not 
part, 

Perchance even dearer in her day of woe, 

Than when she was a boast, a marvel 
and a show. 


I can repeople with the past—and of 

The present there is still for eye and 
thought, 

And meditation chasten’d down,enough ; 

And more, it may be, than I hoped or 
sought ; 

And of the happiest moments which 
were wrought 

Within the web of my existence, some 

From thee, fair Venice! have their 
colors caught : 

There are some feelings Time cannot 
benumb, 

Nor Torture shake, or mine would now 
be cold and dumb. 


But my soul wanders ; I demand it back 

To meditate amongst decay, and 
stand [St. 25 

A ruin amidst ruins; there to track 

Fall’n statesand buried greatness, o’er a 
land 

Which was the mightiest in its old com- 
mand, 

And is the loveliest, and must ever be 

The master-mould of Nature’s heavenly 
hand ; 

Wherein were cast the heroic and the 


free, 
The beautiful, the brave, the lords of. 


earth and sea, 


“03 


Thecommonwealth of kings, the men of 
Rome! 

And even since, and now, fair Italy ! 

Thou art the garden of the world, the 
home 

Of all Art yields, and Nature can de- 
cree ; 

Even in thy desert, what is like to thee? 

Thy very weeds are beautiful, thy waste 

More rich than other climes’ fertility ; 

Thy wreck a glory, and thy ruin graced 

With an immaculate charm which can- 
not be defaced. 


The moon is up, and yet it is not night ; 
Sunset divides the sky with her ; a sea 


Of glory streams along the Alpine 
height 
Of blue Friuli’s mountains; Heaven is 
free 
From Tad but of all colors seems to 
e,— 


Melted to one vast Iris of the West,— 

Where the Day joins the past Eternity, 

While, on the other hand, meek Dian’s 
crest 

Floats through the azure air—an island 
of the blest ! 


A single star is at her side, and reigns 
With her o’er half the lovely heaven ; 


but still 

Yon sunny sea heaves brightly, and re- 
mains 

Roll’d o’er the peak of the far Rheetian 
hill, 

As Day and Night contending were, 
until 

Nature reclaim’d her order :—gently 
flows 

The deep-dyed Brenta, where their hues 
instil 


The odorous purple of a new-born rose, 
Which streams upon her stream, and 
glass’d within it glows, 


Fill’d with the face of heaven, which, 
from afar, 

Comes down upon the waters; all its 
hues, 

From the rich sunset to the rising star, 

Their magical variety diffuse : 

And now they change; a paler shadow 
strews 

Its mantle o’er the mountains; parting 


day 

Dies like the dolphin, whom each pang 
imbues 

With a new color as it gasps away, 


236 


The last still loveliest,—till—’t is gone 
—and all is gray. 


Italia ! oh Italia! thou who hast [St. 42 

The fatal gift of beauty, which became 

A funeral dower of present woes and 
past, 

On thy sweet brow is sorrow plough’d 
by shame, 


And annals graved in characters of 


flame. 

Oh, God! that thou wert in thy naked- 
ness 

Less lovely or more powerful, and 


couldst claim 

Thy right, and awe the robbers back, 
who press 

To shed thy blood, and drink the tears 
of thy distress ; 


Then might’st thou more appal; or, less 
desired, 

Be homely and be peaceful, undeplored 

For thy destructive charms ; then, still 
untired, 

Would not be seen the armed torrents 
pour’d 

Down the deep Alps; nor would the 
hostile horde 

Of many-nation’d spoilers from the Po 

Quaff blood and water ; nor the stranger’s 
sword 

Be thy sad weapon of defence, and so, 

Victor or vanquish’d, thou the slave of 
friend or foe. 


Yet, Italy! through every other 
land [St. 47 

Thy wrongs should ring, and shall, from 
side to side ; 

Mother of Arts! as once of arms; thy 


hand 
Was then our guardian, and is still our 
guide ; 


Parent of our religion! whom the wide 

Nations have knelt to for the keys of 
heaven ! 

Kurope, repentant of her parricide, 

Shall yet redeem thee, and, all backward 
driven, 

Roll the barbarian tide, and sue to be 
forgiven. 


Oh Rome! my country! city of the 


soul [St. 78 
The orphans of the heart must turn to 
thee, [trol 


Lone mother of dead empires! and con- 


BRITISH POETS 


In their shut breast their petty misery. 

What are our woes and sufferance? 
Come and see 

The cypress, hear the owl, and plod your 
way 

O’er steps of broken thrones and tem- 
ples, Ye! 

Whose agonies are evils of a day— 

A world is at our feet as fragile as our 
clay. 


The Niobe of nations! there she stands, 

Childless and crownless, in her voiceless 
woe ; 

An empty 
hands, 

Whose holy dust was scatter’d long ago; 

The Scipios’ tomb contains no ashes now ; 

The very sepulchres lie tenantless 

Of their heroic dwellers: dost thou flow, 

Old Tiber! through a marble wilder- 
ness ? 

Rise, with thy yellow waves, and mantle 
her distress. 


The Goth, the Christian, Time, War, 
Flood, and Fire, 

Have dealt upon the seven-hill’d city’s 
pride ; 

She saw her glories star by star expire, 

And up the steep barbarian monarchs 
ride, 

Where the car climb’d the Capitol ; far 
and wide 

Temple and tower went. down, nor left a 
site : 

Chaos of ruins ! who shall trace the void, 

O’er the dim fragments cast a lunar 
light, 

And say, ‘‘ here was, or is,” where all is 
doubly night? — 


urn within her wither’d 


Can tyrants but by tyrants conquer’d be, 

And Freedom find no champion and no 
child 

Such as Columbia saw arise when she 

Sprung forth a Pallas, arm’d and un- 
defiled ? 

Or must such minds be nourish’d in the 
wild, 

Deep in the unpruned forest, ’midst the 
roar 

Of cataracts, where nursing Nature 
smiled 

On infant Washington ? 
more 

Such seeds within her breast, or Europe 
nosuch shore? 


° ° e . @ 


Has Earth no 


BYRON 


Where is the rock of Triumph, the high 
place St. 112 

Where Rome embraced her heroes ? 
where the steep 

Tarpeian? fittest goal of Treason’s race, 

The promontory whence the Traitor’s 
Leap 

Cured all ambition. 
heap 

Their spoils here? Yes ; and in yon field 
below, 

A thousand years of silenced factions 
sleep-—— ' 

The Forum, where the immortal accents 
glow, 

And still the eloquent air breathes— 
burns with Cicero! 


Did the conquerors 


Arches on arches! as it were that Rome, 

Collecting the chief trophies of her line, 

Would build up all her triumphs in one 
dome, 


Her Coliseum stands; the moonbeams 


shine 
As ’twere its natural torches, for divine 
Should be the light which streams here 
to illume 
This long-explored but still exhaustless 
mine 
Of contemplation ; and the azure gloom 
Of an Italian night, where the deep skies 


assume 

Hues which have words, and speak to ye 
of heaven, 

Floats o’er this vast and wondrous 
monument, 

And shadows forth its glory. There is 
given 

Unto the things of earth, which Time 
hath bent, 

A spirit’s feeling, and where he hath 
leant 

His hand, but broke his scythe, there is 
a power 


And magic in the ruin’d battlement, 

For which the palace of the present hour 

Must yield its pomp, and wait till ages 
are its dower. 


And here the buzz of eager nations ran, 

In murmur’d pity, or loud-roar’d ap- 
plause, 

As man was slaughter’ by his fellow- 
man. 

And wherefore slaughter’d ? wherefore, 
but because 

Such were the bloody Circus’ genial 
laws, 


237 

And the imperial pleasure.—Wherefore 
not? 

What matters where we fall to fill the 
maws 

Of worms—on battle-plains or 
spot ? 

Both are but theatres where the chief 

actors rot. 


listed 


I see before me the Gladiator he [St. 140 

He leans upon his hand—his manly 
brow 

Consents to death, but conquers agony, 

And his droop’d head sinks gradually 
low— 

And through his side the last drops, 
ebbing slow 

From the red gash, fall heavy, one by 


one, 

Like the first of a thunder-shower; and 
now 

The arena swims around him—he is 
gone, 


Ere ceased the inhuman shout which 
hail’d the wretch who won. 


He heard it, but he heeded not—his eyes 

Were with his heart, and that was far 
away ; 

He reck’d not of the life he lost nor prize, 

But where his rude hut by the Danube 


lay, 
There were his young barbarians all at 
play, 


There was their Dacian mother—he, 
their sire, 

Butcher’d to make a Roman holiday— 

All this rush’d with his blood—Shall he 
expire 

And unavenged? Arise! ye Goths, and 
glut your ire! 


But here, where Murder breathed her 
bloody steam ; 

And here, where buzzing nations choked 
the ways, 

And roar’d or murmur’d like a mountain 
stream 

Dashing or winding as its torrent strays ; 

Here, where the Roman million’s blame 
or praise 

Was death or life, the playthings of a 
crowd, 

My voice sounds much—and fall the 
stars’ faint rays 

On the arena void—seats crush’d, walls 

bow’d— 

galleries, where my steps seem 

echoes strangely loud. 


And 


238 


BRITISH POETS 





A ruin—yet what ruin! from its mass 

Walls, palaces, half-cities, have been 
rear’d ; 

Yet oft the enormous skeleton ye pass, 

And marvel where the spoil could have 
appear’d. 

Hath it indeed been plunder’d, or but 
clear’d ? 

Alas! developed, opens the decay, 

When the colossal fabric’s form is near’d : 

It will not bear the brightness of the day, 

Which streams too much on all years, 
man, have reft away. 


But when the rising moon begins to 
climb 

Its topmost arch, and gently pauses 
there ; 

When the stars twinkle through the 
loops of time, 

And the low night-breeze waves along 
the air 

The garland-forest, which the gray walls 
wear, 

Like laurels on the bald first Czesar’s 
head ; 

When the light shines serene but doth 
not glare, 

Then in this magic circle raise the dead : 

Heroes have trod this spot—'tis on their 
dust xe tread. 


But ett oa the Pilgrim of my song, 

The being who upheld it through the 
past ? [St. 164 

Methinks he cometh late and tarries long. 

He is no more--these breathings are his 
Jast ; 

His wanderings done, his visions ebbing 
fast 

And he himself as nothing :—if he was 

Aught but a phantasy, and could be 
class’d 

With forms which live and suffer—let 
that pass— 

His shadow fades away into Destruc- 
tion’s mass, 


Which gathers shadow, substance, life, 
and all 

That we inherit in its mortal shroud, 

And spreads the dim and universal pall 

Through which all things grow phan- 
toms; and the cloud 

Between us sinks, and all which ever 
glow’d, 

Till Glory’s self is twilight, and displays 

A melancholy halo scarce allow’d 

To hover on the verge of darkness ; rays 








Sadder than saddest night, for they dis- 
tract the gaze, 


And send us prying into the abyss, 
To gather what we shall be when the 


frame 

Shall be resolved to something less than 
this 

Its wretched essence ; and to areal of 
fame. 


And wipe the dust from off the idle name 
We never more shall hear,—but never 


more, 

Oh, happier thought! can we be made 
the same : 

It is enough in sooth that once we bore 

These fardels of the heart—the heart 
whose sweat was gore. 


But I forget.—My Pilgrim’s shrine is won, 
And he and I must part,—-so let it be— 

His task and mine alike are nearly done ; 
Yet once more let us look upon the sea ; 
The midland ocean breaks on him and 


me ; 

And from the Alban Mount we now be- 
hold 

Our friend of youth, that Ocean, which 
when we 

Beheld it last by Calpe’s rock unfold 

Those waves. we follow’d on till the 
dark Euxine roll’d 


Upon the blue Symplegades: long years— 

Long, though not very many—since 
have done [St. 176 

Their work on both; some suffering 
and some tears 

Have left us nearly where we had begun : 

Yet not in vain our mortal race hath run ; 

We have had our reward, and it is here,— 

That we can yet feel gladden’d by the sun, 

And reap from earth, sea, Joy almost as 
dear’ 

As if there were no man to trouble what 
is clear. 


Oh! that the Desert were my dwelling- 
place, 

With one fair Spirit for my minister, 

That I might all forget the human race, 

And, hating no one, love but only her! 

Ye elements !—in whose ennobling stir 

I feel myself exalted—Can ye not 

Accord me such a being! Do I err 

In deeming such inhabit many a spot? 

Though with them to converse can rare- 
ly be our lot. 


BYRON 


There isa pleasure in the pathless woods, 
There is a rapture on the lonely shore, 
There is society, where none intrudes, 
By the deep Sea, and music in its roar : 
I love not Man the less, but Nature more, 
From these our interviews, in which I 
steal 
From all I may be, or have been before, 
To mingle with the Universe, and feel 
What I can ne’er express, yet cannot 
all conceal. 


Roll on, thou deep and dark blue Ocean 
—roll! 

Ten thousand fleets sweep over thee in 
vain ; 

Man marks the earth with ruin—his 

~ control 

Stops with the shore; upon the watery 
plain 

The wrecks are all thy deed, nor doth 
remain 

A shadow of man’s ravage. save his own, 

When, for a moment, likea drop of rain, 

He sinks into thy depths with bubbling 
groan, 

Without a grave, unknell’d, uncoffin’d, 
and unknown. 


His steps are not upon thy paths—thy 
fields 

Are not a spoil for him,—thou dost arise 

And shake him from thée; the vile 

strength he wields 

For earth’s destruction thou dost all de- 
spise, 

Spurning him from thy bosom to the 
skies, 

And send’st him, shivering in thy play- 
ful spray 

And howling, to his Gods, where haply 
lies 

His petty home in some near port or bay 

And dashest him again to earth :—-there 
let him lay. 


The armaments which thunderstrike the 
walls, 

Of rock-built cities, 
quake, 

And monarchs tremble in their capitals, 

The oak leviathans, whose huge ribs 
make 

Their clay creator the vain title take 

Of lord of thee, and arbiter of war—- 

These are thy toys, and, as the snowy 
flake, 

They melt into thy yeast of waves, 
which mar 


bidding nations 


20 


Alike the Armada’s pride or spoils of 
Trafalgar. 


Thy shores are empires, changed in all 
save thee— 

Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what 
are they ? 

Thy waters wash’d them power while 
they were free, 

And many a tyrant since ; their shores 
obey 

The stranger, slave, or savage; their de- 
cay 

Has dried up realms to deserts: not so 
thou ;— 

Unchangeable, save to thy wild waves’ 
play, 

Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure 
brow : 

Such as creation’s dawn beheld, thou- 
rollest now. 


Thou glorious mirror, where the Al- 
mighty’s form 

Glasses itself in tempests ; in all time,— 

Calm or convulsed, in breeze, or gale, 
or storm, 

Icing the pole, or in the torrid clime 

Dark-heaving—boundless, endless, and 
sublime, 

The image of eternity, the throne 

Of the Invisible; even from out thy slime 

The monsters of the deep are made; 
each zone 

Obeys thee; thou goest forth, dread, 
fathomless, alone. 


And I have loved thee, Ocean! and my 


JOY 
Of youthful sports was on thy breast to 


be 

Borne, like thy bubbles, onward ; from 
a bo 

I wanton’d with thy breakers—they to 


me 

Werea delight ; and if the freshening sea 

Made thema terror—’twas a pleasing 
fear, 

For I was as it were a child of thee, 

And trusted to thy billows far and near, 

And laid my hand upon thy mane—as I 
do here. 


My task is done, my song hath ceased, 
my theme 

Has died into an echo; it is fit 

The spell should break of this protracted 
dream. 


240 


The torch shall be extinguish’d which 
hath lit 

My midnight lamp—and what is writ, is 
writ ; 

Would it were worthier! but Iam not 
now 

That which I have been—and my visions 
flit 

Less palpably before me—and the glow 

Which in my spirit dwelt is fluttering, 

faint, and low. 


Farewell! a word that must be, and hath 
been— 

A sound which makes us linger ;—yet— 
farewell ! 

Ye! who have traced the Pilgrim to the 
scene 

Which is his last, if in your memories 
dwell 

A thought which once was his, if on ye 
swell 

A single recollection, not in vain 

He wore his sandal-shoon and scallop- 
shell ; 

Farewell! with him alone may rest the 
pain, 

If such there were—with you, the moral 
of his strain. 

June 26—July 20, 1817. 1818. 


DON JUAN 
DEDICATION 


BoB SOUTHEY ! 
laureate, 
And representative of all the race ; 
Although ’t is true that you turn’d out a 
Tory at 
Last,—yours has lately been a com- 
mon case ; 
And now, my Epic Renegade! what are 
eat? 
With all the Lakers, in and out of 
place ? 
A nest of tuneful persons, to my eye 
Like ‘‘ four and twenty Blackbirds in a 
pye ; 


You ’re a poet—-Poet- 


‘* Which pye being open’d they began to 
sing ” 
(This old song and new simile holds 
good). 
‘“ A dainty dish to set before the King,” 
Or Regent, who admires such kind of 
food ;— 
And Coleridge, too, has lately taken 
wing, 


BRITISH POETS 


But like a hawk encumber’d with his 
hood,— 
Explaining metaphysics to the nation— 

I wish he would explain his Explanation. 


Bob! 
know, 
At being disappointed in your wish 

To supersede all warblers here below, 
And be the only Blackbird in the dish ; 
And then you overstrain yourself, or so, 
And tumble downward like the flying 
fish 
Gasping on deck, because you soar too 
high, Bob, 
And fall for lack of moisture quite 
a-dry, Bob! 


You, are rather insolent, you 


And Wordsworth, in a rather long ‘* Ex- 
cursion ” 
(I think the quarto holds five hundred 


pages), 
Has given a sample from the vasty ver- 
sion 
Of his new system to perplex the 
Sages ; 


*T is poetry—at least by his assertion, 
And may appear so when the dog-star 
rages— 
And he who understands it would be able 
To add a story to the Tower of Babel. 


You—Gentlemen ! by dint of long seclu- 
sion 
From better company, have kept your 
own 
At Keswick, and through still continued 
fusion 
Of one another’s minds, at last have 
grown 
To deem as a most logical conclusion, 
That poesy has wreaths for you alone ; 
There is a narrowness in such a notion, 
Which makes me wish you'd change 
your lakes for ocean. 


I would not imitate the petty thought, — 
Nor coin my self-love to so base a vice. 


For all the glory your conversion 
brought, 

Since gold alone should not have been 
its price, 


You have your salary ; was ’t for that 
you wrought? 
And Wordsworth has his place in the 
Excise. 
You're shabby fellows—true—but poets 
still, 
And duly seated on the immortal hill. 


FF 
: val, 
™ 


i ae 


a 





Your bays may hide the baldness of your 
brows— 
Perhaps some virtuous’ blushes ;—let 
them go— 


To you I envy neither fruit nor boughs— 


And for the fame you would engross 
below, 
The field is universal, and allows 
Scope to all such as feel the inherent 
glow ; 
Scott, Rogers, Campbell, Moore 
Crabbe will try 


and 


’Gainst you the question with posterity. 


For me, who, wandering with pedestrian 
Muses, 
Contend not with you on the winged 
steed, 
I wish your fate may yield ye, whenshe 
chooses, 
The fame you envy, and the skill you 
need ; 
And recollect a poet nothing loses 
In giving to his brethren their full 
meed 
Of merit, and complaint of present days 
Is not the certain path to future praise. 


He that reserves his laurels for posterity 
(Who does not often claim the bright 
reversion ) 


Has generally no great crop to spare it, 3 
h 


e 
Being only injured by his own asser- 
tion ; 
And although here and there some glori- 
; ous rarity 
Arise like Titan from the sea’s immer- 
sion, 
The major part of such appellants go 
To—God knows where—for no one else 
can know. 


If, fallen in evil days on evil tongues,’ 
Milton appealed to the Avenger, Time, 
If Time, the Avenger, execrates his 
wrongs, 
And makes the word ‘‘ Miltonic ” mean 
** sublime,” 

He deign’d not to belie his soul in songs, 
Nor turn his very talent to a crime ; 
He did not loathe the Sire to laud the 

Son, 
But closed the tyrant-hater he begun. 


Think’st thou, could he—the blind Old 
Man,—arise, 
Like Samuel from the grave, to freeze 
once more 


16 


BYRON 241 


The blood of monarchs with his prophe- 
cies, 
Or be alive again—again all hoar 
With time and trials, and those helpless 


eyes, 
And heartless daughters—worn—and 
pale—and poor ; 
Would he adore a sultan ? he obey 
The intellectual eunuch Castlereagh ? 


Cold-blooded, smooth-faced, placid mis- 
creant ! 
Dabbling its sleek young hands in 
Erin’s gore 
And thus for wider carnage taught to 


pant, 
Transferr’d to gorge upon a sister 
shore, 
The vulgarest tool that Tyranny could 
want, . 
With just enough of talent, and no 
more, 
To lengthen fetters by another fix’d, 
And offer poison long already mix’d. 


An orator of such set trash of phrase 
Ineffably—legitimately vile, 
That even its grossest flatterers dare not 


praise, 
Nor foes—all nations—condescend to 
smile ; 
Not even a sprightly blunder’s spark can 
blaze 7 
From that Ixion grindstone’s ceaseless 
toil, 
That turns and turns to give the worlda 
notion 
Of endless torments and perpetual mo- 
tion. 


A bungler even in its disgusting trade, 
And botching, patching, leaving still 
behind 
Something of which its masters are 
afraid, 
States to be curb’d, and thoughts to be 
confined, 
Conspiracy or Congress to be made— 
Cobbling at manacles for all man- 
kind— 
A tinkering slave-maker, who mends 
old chains, 
With God and man’s abhorrence for its 
gains. 


If we may judge of matter by the mind, 
Emasculated to the marrow It 
Hath but two objects, how to serve, and 
bind, 


242 


Deeming the chain it wears even men 
may fit, 
Eutropius of its many masters—blind 
To worth as freedom, wisdom as to wit, 
Fearless—because no feeling dwells in 
ice, 
Its very courage stagnates to a vice. 


Where shall I turn me not to view its 
bonds, 
For I will never feel them ;—Italy ! 
Thy late reviving Roman soul desponds 
Beneath the lie this State-thing 
breathed o’er thee— 
Thy clanking chain, and Erin’s yet green 
wounds, 
Have voices—tongues to cry aloud for 
me. 
Europe has slaves, allies, kings, armies 
still, : 
And Southey lives to sing them very ill. 


Meantime, Sir Laureate, I proceed to ded- 


icate, 
In honest simple verse, this song to 
you. 
And, if in flattering strains I do not pred- 
icate, 
‘'T is that I still retain my ‘‘ buff and 
blue ; ” 


My politics as yet are all to educate : 
Apostasy’s so fashionable, too, 
To keep one creed’s a task grown quite 
Herculean : 
Is it not so, my Tory. Ultra-Julian ? 
September, 1818. July 15, 1819. 


FROM CANTO I 
POETICAL COMMANDMENTS 


Ir ever I should condescend to prose, 
TV'll write poetical commandments, 


which [St. 204 
Shall supersede beyond all doubt all 
those 
That went before ; in these I shall en- 
rich 
My text with many things that no one 
knows, 


And carry precept to the highest pitch : 
I'll call the work ‘* Longinus o’er a Bottle, 
Or, Every Poet his own Aristotle.” 


Thou shalt believe in Milton, Dryden, 
Pope ; 
Thou shalt not set up Wordsworth, 
Coleridge, Southey ; 
Because the first is crazed beyond all 
hope, 


BRITISH POETS 





The second drunk, the third so quaint 
and mouthy : 
With Crabbe it may be difficult to cope, 
And Campbell’s Hippocrene is some- 
what drouthy : 
Thou shalt not steal from Samuel Rogers, 
nor $ 
Commit—flirtation with the muse of 
Moore. 


Thou shalt not covet Mr. Sotheby’s 
Muse, 
His Pegasus, nor anything that’s his ; 
Thou-.shalt not bear false witness like - 
‘*the Blues ”— 
(There ’s one, at least, is very fond of 
this) ; 
Thou shalt not write, in short, but what 
I choose ; 
This is true criticism, and you may 
kiss— 
Exactly as you please, or not—the rod ; 
But if you don’t, I'll lay it on, by G—-d! 


. e 


LABUNTUR ANNI 


‘* Non ego hoe ferrem calida juventa 
Consule Planeo,” Horace said, and so 
Say I; by which quotation there its 
meant a [St. 212 
Hint that some six or seven good years 
ago 
(Long ere I dreamt of dating from the 
Brenta) 
I was most ready to return a blow, 
And would not brook at all this sort of 
thing ! 
In my hot youth—when George the 
Third was King. 


But now at thirty years my hair is gray— 
(I wonder what it will be like at forty ? 
I thought of a peruke the other day—) 
My heart is not much greener ; and, in 
short, I 
Have squander’d my whole summer 
while ’t was May, 
And feel no more the spirit to retort ; I 
Have spent my life, both interest and 
principal, 
And deem not, what I deem’d, my soul 
invincible. 


No more—no more—Oh ! never more on 
me 
The freshness of the heart can fall like 


dew, 
Which out of all the lovely things we see 
Extracts emotions beautiful and new, 


BYRON 


Hived in our bosoms like the bag o’ the 
bee. 
Think’st thou the honey with those ob- 
jects grew? 


Alas ! ‘t was not in them, but in thy power 


To double even the sweetness of a flower. 


‘ . 
No more—no more—Oh ! never more, my 


heart, 
Canst thou be my sole world, my uni- 
verse ! * 


Once all in all, but now a thing apart, 

- Thou canst not be my blessing or my 
curse : 

The illusion’s gone for ever, and thou art 

Insensible, I trust, but none the worse, 

And in thy stead I’ve got a deal of 

judgment, 

Though heaven knows how itever found 
a lodgment. 


My days of love are over; me no more 
The charms of maid, wife, and still less 
of widow, 
Can make the fool of which they made 
before,— 
In short, I must not lead the life I did 
do; 
The credulous hope of mutual minds is 
o’er, 
The copious use of claret is forbid too, 
So for a good old-gentlemanly vice, 
I think I must take up with avarice. 


Ambition was my idol, which was broken 
Before the shrines of Sorrow, and of 
Pleasure ; 
And the two last have left me many a 
token 
O’er which reflection may be made at 
leisure ; 
Now, like Friar Bacon’s brazen head, 
I’ve spoken, 
‘* Time is, Time was, Time’s past : ’”’—a 
chymic treasure 
Is glittering youth, which I have spent 
betimes—- 
My heart in passion, and my head on 
rhymes. 


What is the end of fame? ’t is but to fill 
A certain portion of uncertain paper : 
Some liken it to climbing up a hill 
Whose summit, like all hills, is lost in 
vapor ; 
For this men write, speak, preach, and 
heroes kill, 


And bards burn what they call their 


‘midnight taper,” 
To have, when the original is dust, 


243 


A name, a wretched picture, and worse 
bust. 
Canto I. September, 1818. July 15, 1819. 


FROM CANTO II 


THE SHIPWRECK 


‘TWas twilight, and the sunless day 
went down [St. 49. 

Over the waste of waters ; like a veil, 

Which, if withdrawn, would but disclose 
the frown 

Of one whose hate is mask’d but to assail. 

Thus to their hopeless eyes the night was 
shown, 

And grimly darkled o’er the faces pale, 

And the dim desolate deep : twelve days 
had Fear 

Been their familiar, and now ee was 
here. 


Some trial had been making at a raft, 
With little hope in such a rolling sea, 
A sort of thing at which one would have 
laugh’d, 
If any laughter at such times could be, 
Unless with people who too much have 
quaff’d, 
And have a kind of wild and horrid 
glee, 
Half epileptical, and half hysterical :— 
Their preservation would have been a 
miracle. 


At half-past eight o’clock, booms, hen- 
Coops, spars, 
And all things, for a chance, had been 
cast loose 
That still could keep afloat the struggling 
tars, 
For yet they strove, although of no 
great use: 
There was no light in heaven but a few 
stars, 
The boats put off o’ercrowded with 
their crews; 
She gave aheel, and then a lurch to port, 
And, going down head-foremost—sunk, 
in short. 


Then rose from sea to sky the wild fare- 
well—_ 
Then shriek’d the timid, and stood 
still the brave— 
Then some leap’d overboard with dread- 
ful yell, 
As eager to anticipate their grave ; 
And the sea yawn’d around her like a 
hell, 


244 


BRITISH’ POETS 





And down she suck’d with her the 
whirling wave, 

Like one who grapples with his enemy, 

And strives to strangle him before he die. 


And first one universal shriek there 


rush’d, 
Louder than the loud ocean, like a 
crash 
Of echoing thunder ; and then all was 
hush’d, 


Save the wild wind and the remorse- 
less dash 
Of billows ; but at intervals there gush‘d, 
Accompanied witha convulsive splash, 
A solitary shriek, the bubbling cry 
Of some strong swimmer in his agony. 


HAIDEE 


How long in his damp trance young 
Juan lay [St. 111. 
He knew not, for the earth was gone 
for him. 
And time had nothing more of night 
nor day 
For his congealing blood, and senses 
dim ; 
And how this heavy faintness pass’d 
away 
He knew not, till each painful pulse 
and limb, 
And tingling vein, seem’d throbbing 
back to life, 
For Death, though vanquish’d, still re- 
tired with strife. 


His eyes he open’d, shut, again unclosed, 
For all was doubt and dizziness; he 
thought 
He still was in the boat, and had but 
dozed, 
And felt again with his despair o’er- 
wrought, 
And wish’d it death in which he had 
reposed, 
And then once more his feelings back 
were brought, 
And slowly by his swimming eyes was 
seen 
A lovely female face of seventeen. 


‘Twas bending close o’er his, and the 
small mouth 
Seem’d almost prying into his for 
breath ; 
And chafing him, the soft warm hand 
of youth 





Recall’d his answering spirits back 
from death ; 
And, bathing his chill temples, tried to 
soothe 
Each pulse to animation, till beneath 
Its gentle touch and trembling care, a 
sigh | ‘ 
To these kind efforts made a low reply . 


Then was the cordial gour’d, and mantle 
flung 
Around his scarce-clad limbs ; and the 
fair arm 
Raised higher the faint head which o’er 
it hung ; 
And her transparent cheek, all pure 
and warm, 
Pillow’d his death-like forehead; then 
she wrung 
His dewy curls, long drench’d by 
every storm ; 
And watch’d with eagerness each throb 
that drew 
A sigh from his heaved bosom—and 
hers, too. 


And lifting him with care into the cave, 
The gentle girl, and her attendant,— 
one 
Young, yet her elder, and of brow less 
grave, 
And more robust of figure—then begun 
To kindle fire, and as the new flames 
gave 
Light to the rocks that roof’d them, 
which the sun 
Had never seen, the maid, or whatsoe’er 
She was, appear’d distinct, and tall, 
and fair. 


Her brow was overhung with coins of 
gold, 
That sparkled o’er the auburn of her 
hair, 
Her clustering hair, whose longer locks 
were roll’d 
In braids behind; and though her 
stature were 
Even of the highest for a female mould, 
They nearly reach’d her heel; and in 


her air 
There was a something which bespoke 
command, 


As one who was a lady in the land. 


Her hair; I said, was auburn; but her 
eyes 
Were black as death, their lashes the 
same hue, 


BYRON 


245 





Of downcast length, in whose silk 
shadow les 
Deepest attraction; for when to the 
view 
Forth from its raven fringe the full 
glance flies, 
Ne’er with such force the swiftest 
arrow flew ; 
'Tis as the snake late coil’d, who pours 
his length, 
And hurls at once his venom and his 


strength. 


Her brow was white and low, her cheek’s 
pure dye 
Like twilight rosy still with the set 
sun ; 
Short upper ip—sweet lips! that make 
us sigh 
Ever to have seen such ; 
one 
Fit for the model of a statuary 
(A race of mere impostors, when all’s 
done— 
I’ve seen much finer women, ripe and 
real, 
Than all the nonsense of their stone 
ideal). 


for she was 


Til tell you why I say so, for ’t is just 
One should not rail without a decent 
cause : 
There was an Irish lady, to whose bust 
I ne’er saw justice done, and yet she 
was 
A frequent model; and if e’er she must 
Yield to stern Time and Nature’s 
wrinkling laws, 
They will destroy a face which mortal 
thought 
Ne’er compass’d, nor less mortal chisel 
wrought. 


And such was she, the lady of the cave: 
Her dress was very different from the 
Spanish, 
Simpler, and yet of colors not so grave ; 
For, as you know, the Spanish women 
banish 
Bright hues when out of doors, and yet, 
while wave 
Around them (what I hope will never 
vanish ) 
The basquina and the mantilla, they 
Seem at the same time mysticaland gay. 


But with our damsel this was not the 
case : 
dress was many-color’d, 
spun ; 


Her finely 


Her locks curl’d negligently round her 
face, 
But through them gold and gems pro- 
fusely shone: 
Her girdle sparkled, and the richest lace 
Flow’d in her veil, and many a precious 


stone 

Flash’d on her little hand; but, what 
was shocking, 

Her small snow feet had slippers, but no 
stocking. 


The other female’s dress was not unlike, 
But of inferior materials: she 
Had not so many ornaments to strike, 
Her hair had silver only, bound to be 
Her dowry ; and her veil, in form alike, 
Was coarser; and her air, though 
firm, less free ; 
Her hair was thicker, but less Iong ; her 
eyes 
As black, but quicker, and of smaller 
size. 


And these two tended him, and cheer’d 
him both 
With food and raiment, and those soft 
attentions, 
Which are—(as I must own)——-of female 
growth, 
And have ten thousand delicate inven- 
tions : 
They made a most superior mess of broth, 
A thing which poesy but seldom men- 
tions, 
But the best dish that e’er was cook’d 
since Homer’s 
Achilles order’d dinner for new comers. 


The coast—I think it was the coast that I 

Was just describing—Yes, it was the 

coast— [St. 181 

Lay at this period quiet as the sky, 

The sands untumbled, the blue waves 
untost, 

And ahi was stillness, save the sea-bird’s 


ie aatonings leap, and little billow 
crost 
By some low rock or shelve, that made 
it fret 
Against the boundary it scarcely wet. 


And forth they wander’d, her sire being 
gone, 
As I have said, upon an expedition ; 
And mother, brother, guardian, she had 
none, 
Save Zoe, who, although with due pre- 
cision 


BRITIBEAPOETS 





246 
She waited on her lady with the sun, 
Thought daily service was her only 
mission, 


. Bringing warm water, wreathing her 
long tresses, 

And asking now and then for cast-off 
dresses. 


It was the cooling hour, just when the 
rounded 
Red sun sinks down behind the azure 
hill, 
Which then seems as if the whole earth 
it bounded, 
Circling all nature, hush’d, and dim, 
and still, 
With the far mountain-crescent half 
surrounded 
On one side, and the deep sea calm 
and chill, 
Upon the other, and the rosy sky, 
With one star sparkling through it like 
an eye. 


And thus they wander’d forth, and hand 
in hand, 
. Over the shining pebbles and the shells, 
Glided along the smooth and harden’d 
sand, 
And in the worn and wild receptacles 
Work’d by the storms, yet work’d as it 
were plann’d, 
In hollow halls, with sparry roofs and 
cells, 
They turn’d to rest; and, each clasp’d 
y an arm, 
Yielded to the deep twilight’s purple 
charm. 


They look’d up to the sky, whose float- 


ing glow 
Spread like a rosy ocean, vast and 
bright ; 
They gazed upon the glittering sea be- 
low, 


Whence the broad moon rose circling 
into sight ; 
They heard the waves splash, and the 
wind so low, 
And saw each other’s dark eyes darting 
light 
Into each other—and, beholding this, 
Their ne drew near, and clung into a 
<1SS 5 


A long, long kiss, a kiss of youth, and 
love, 
And beauty, all concentrating like rays 
Into one focus, kindled from above ; 


Such kisses as belong to early days, 
Where heart, and soul, and sense, in 
concert move, 
And the blood’s lava, and the pulse a 
blaze, 
Kach kiss a heart-quake,—for a kiss’s 
strength, 
I think it must be reckon’d by its length. 


By length I mean duration; theirs en- 
dured : 
Heaven knows how long—no doubt 
they never reckon’d : 
And if they had, they could not have 
secured 
The sum of their sensations toa second; 
They had not spoken; but they felt al- 
lured, 
Asif their souls and lips each other 
beckon’d, 
Which, being join’d, like swarming bees 
they clung— 
Their hearts the flowers from whence 
the honey sprung. 


They were alone, but not alone as they 
Who shut in chambers think it lone- 
_ liness ; 
The silent ocean, and the starlight bay, 
The twilight glow, which momently 
grew less, 
The voiceless sands, and dropping caves, 
that lay 
Around them, made them to each other 
press, 
As if there were no life beneath the sky 
Save theirs, and that their life could 
never die. 


They fear’d no eyes nor ears on that lone 
beach, 
They felt no terrors from the night ; 
they were 
All in all to each other; though their 
speech c 
Was broken words, they thought a 
language there,— 
And all the burning tongues the passions 
teach 
Found in one sigh the best interpreter 
Of nature’s oracle—first love,—that all 
Which Eve has left her daughters since 
her fall. 


Alas! the love of women! it is known 
To be a lovely and a fearful thing ; 
For all of theirs upon that die is thrown, 
And if ’t is lost, life hath no more to 

bring 


4 


BYRON 


To them but mockeries of the past alone, 
And their revenge is as the tiger’s 


spring, 
Deadly, and quick, and crushing; yet, 
as real 
Torture Zz theirs, what they inflict they 
feel. 


They are right ; for man, to man so oft 
unjust, 
Is always so to women; one sole bond 
Awaits them, treachery is all their trust; 
Taught to conceal, their bursting 
hearts despond 
Over their idol, till some wealthier lust 
Buys them in marriage—and what 
rests beyond ? 


A thankless husband, next a faithless © 


lover, 
Then dressing, nursing, praying, and 
all’s over. 


Some take a lover, some take drams or 
prayers, 
Some mind their household, others 
dissipation, 
Some run away, and but exchange their 
cares, 
Losing the advantage of a virtuous 
e station; 

Few changes e’er can better their affairs, 
Theirs being an unnatural situation, 
From the dull palace to the dirty hovel : 
Some play the devil, and then write a 

novel. 


Haidée was Nature’s bride, and knew 
not this: 
Haidée was Passion’s 
where the sun 
Showers triple light, and scorches even 


child, born 


the kiss 
Of his gazelle-eyed daughters ; she was 

one 

Made but to love, to feel that she was 
his 

~ Who was her chosen : what was said or 
done 

Elsewhere was nothing. She had nought 
to fear, 

Hope, care, nor love beyond,—her heart 
beat here. 


And oh! that quickening of the heart, 
that beat ! 
How much it costs us! yet each rising 
throb. 
Is in its cause as its effect so sweet, 
That wisdom, ever on the watch to rob 
Joy of its alchemy, and to repeat 


247 


Fine truths ; even Conscience, too, has 
a tough job 
To make us understand each good old 
maxim, 
So good—I wonder ‘Castlereagh don’t tax 
em. 


And now *t was done—on the lone shore 
were plighted 
Their hearts; the stars, their nuptial 
torches, shed 
Beauty upon the beautiful they lighted ; 
Ocean their witness, and the cave 
their bed, 
By their own feelings hallow’d and 
united, 
Their pr iest was Solitude, and they 
were wed : 
And they were happy, for to their young 
eyes 
Each was an angel, and earth paradise. 


Oh, Love! of whom great Czesar was the 
suitor, 
Titus the master, Antony the slave, 
Horace, Catullus, scholars, Ovid tutor, 
Sappho the sage blue-stocking, in 
whose grave f 
All those may leap who rather would be 
neuter— 
(Leucadia’s rock still overlooks the 
wave)— 
Oh, Love! thou art the very god of evil, 
For, after all, we cannot call thee devil. 


Thou mak’st the chaste connubial state 
precarious, 
And jestest with the brows of might- 
jest men : 
Cesar and Pompey, Mahomet, Belisarius, 
Have much employ’d the muse of his- 
tory’s pen: 
Their lives and fortunes were extremely 
various, 
Such worthies Time will never see 
again ; 
Yet to these four in three things the 
same luck holds, 
They all were heroes, conquerors, and 
cuckolds. 


Thou mak’st philosophers ; there’s Epi- 
curus 
And Aristippus, a material crew ! 
Who to immoral courses would allure us 
By theories quite practicable too ; 
If only from the devil they would insure 
us, 
How pleasant were the maxim (not 


quite new), 


248 


“Kat, drink, and love; what can the 
rest avail us?” 
So said the royal sage Sardanapalus. 


But Juan ! had he quite forgotten Julia ? 
And should he have forgotten her so 
soon ? 
Ican’t but say it seems to me most 
truly a 
Perplexing question ; but, no doubt, 
the moon 
Does these things for us, and whenever 
newly a 
Strong palpitation rises, *t is her boon, 
Else how the devil is it that fresh fea- 
tures 
Have such a charm for us poor human 
creatures ? 


I hate inconstancy—I loathe, detest, 
Abhor, condemn, abjure the mortal 
made ; 
Of such quicksilver clay that in his 
breast 
No permanent foundation can be laid ; 
Love, constant love, has been my con- 
stant guest, 
And yet last night, being at a masque- 
rade, 
I saw the prettiest creature, fresh from 
Milan, 
Which gave me some sensations like a 
villain. 


But soon Philosophy came to my aid, 
And whisper’d, ‘‘Think of every 
sacred tie!” 
‘*] will, my dear Philosophy !” I said, 
‘*But then her teeth, and then, oh, 
Heaven ! her eye! 
V’ll just inquire if she be wife or maid, 
Or neither—out of curiosity.” 
‘*Stop !” cried Philosophy, with air so 
Grecian 
(Though she was masqued then as a fair 
Venetian) ; 


**Stop!” so I stopp’d.—But to return : 
that which 
Men call inconstancy is nothing more 
Than admiration due where nature’s 
rich 
Profusion with young beauty covers 
o’er 
Some favor’d object ; and as in the niche 
A lovely statue we almost adore, 
This sort of adoration of the real 
Is but a heightening of the 
ideal,” 


** beau 


BRITISH POETS . 


°T is the perception of the beautiful, 
A fine extension of the faculties, 
Platonic, universal, wonderful, 
Drawn from the stars, and filter’d 
through the skies, 
Without which life would be extremely 
dull : 
In short, it is the use of our own eyes, 
With one or two small senses added, just 
To hint that flesh is form’d of fiery dust. 


Yet ‘tisa painful feeling, and unwilling, 
For surely if we always could perceive 
In the same object graces quite as kill- 
ing 
As when she rose upon us like an Eve, 
’T would save us many a heart-ache, 
many a shilling 
(For we must get them anyhow, or 


grieve), 

Whereas, if one sole lady pleased for- 
ever, 

How pleasant for the heart, as well as 
liver. 


The heart is like the sky, a part of 
heaven, 
But changes night and day, too, like 
the sky ; 
Now o’er it clouds and thunder must %e 
driven, 
And darkness and destruction as on 
high : 
But when it hath been scorch’d, and 
pierced, and riven, 
Its storms expire in water-drops ; the 
eye 
Pours forth at last the heart’s blood 
turn’d to tears, 
Which make the English climate of our 
years. 


The liver is the lazaret of bile, 
But very rarely executes its function, 
For the first passion stays there such a 
while, 
That all the rest creep in and form a 
2 junction; 
Like knots of vipers on a dunghill’s soil, 
Rage, fear, hate, jealousy, revenge, 
compunction, 
So that all mischiefs spring up from this 
entrail, 
Like earthquakes from the hidden fire 
call’d ‘* central.” : 


In the mean time, without proceeding 
more 
In this anatomy, I’ve finish’d now 


BYRON 


Two hundred and odd stanzas as before, 
That being about the number Ill 
allow 
Each canto of the twelve, or twenty- 
four ; 
And, laying down my pen, I make my 
bow, 
Leaving Don Juan and Haidée to plead 
For them and theirs with all who deign 
to read. 
Canto II., December, 1818, January, 
1819. July 15, 1819. 


FROM CANTO III 
THE ISLES OF GREECE 


The isles of Greece, the isles of Greece ! 
Where burning Sappho loved and 
sung, 
Where grew the arts of war and peace,— 
Where Delos’ rose, and Phoebus 
sprung! 
Eternal summer gilds them yet, 
But all, except their sun, is set. 


The Scian and the Teian muse, 
The hero’s harp, the lover’s lute, 
Have found the fame your shores refuse: 
Their place of birth alone is mute 
To sounds which echo further west 
Than your sires’ ‘‘Islands of the Blest.” 


The mountains look on Marathon— 
And Marathon looks on the sea ; 
And musing there an hour alone, 
I dream’d that Greece might still be 
free ; 
For standing on the Persians’ grave, 
I could not deem myself a slave. 


A king sate on the rocky brow 
Which looks o’er sea-born Salamis ; 
And ships, by thousands, lay below, 
And men in nations ;—all were his! 
He counted them at break of day— 
And when the sun set, where were they ? 





And where are they ? and where art thou, 
My country? On thy voiceless shore 
The heroic lay is tuneless now— 
The heroic bosom beats no more ! 
And must thy lyre, so long divine, 
Degenerate into hands like mine? 


Tis something, in the dearth of fame, 
Though link’d among a fetter’d race, 
To feel at least a patriot’s shame, 
Even as I sing, suffuse my face ; 
For what is left the poet here ? 
For Greeks a blush—for Greece a tear. 


249 





Must we but weep o’er days more blest ? 
Must we but blush ?--Our fathers bled. 

Earth ! render back from out thy breast 
A remnant of our Spartan dead ! 

Of the three hundred grant but three, 

To make a new Thermopyle ! 


What, silent still ? and silent all ? 
Ah! no ;—the voices of the dead 
Sound like a distant torrent’s fall, 
And answer, ‘‘ Let one living head, 
But one arise,—we come, we come!” 
Tis but the living who are dumb. 


In vain—in vain: strike other chords ; 
. Fill high the cup with Samian wine ! 
Leave battles to the Turkish hordes, 
And shed the blood of Scio’s vine ! 
Hark ! rising to the ignoble call— 
How answers each bold Bacchanal ! 


You have the Pyrrhic dance as yet ; 
Where is the Pyrrhic phalanx gone ? 
Of two such lessons, why forget 
The nobler and the manlier one ? 
You have the letters Cadmus gave— 
Think ye he meant them for a slave ? 


Fill high the bow] with Samian wine ! 
We will not think of themes like these! 
It made Anacreon’s song divine ; 
He served—but served Polycrates— 
A tyrant ; but our masters then 
Were still, at least, our countrymen. 


The tyrant of the Chersonese 
Was freedom’s' best and_ bravest 
friend ; 
That tyrant was Miltiades ! 
Oh! that the present hour would lend 
Another despot of the kind ! 
Such chains as his were sure to bind, 


Fill high the bowl with Samian wine! 
On Suli’s rock, and Parga’s shore, 
Exists the remnant of a line 
Such as the Doric mothers bore ; 
And there, perhaps, some seed is sown, 
The Heracleidan blood might own. 


Trust not for freedom to the Franks, 
They have a king who buys and sells ; 
In native swords and native ranks, 
The only hope of courage dwells : 
But Turkish force, and Latin fraud, 
Would break your shield, however broad. 


Fill high the bowl with Samian wine ! 
Our virgins dance beneath the shade— 

I see their glorious black eyes shine ; 
But gazing on each giowing maid, 


250 


My own the burning tear-drop laves, 
To think such breasts must suckle slaves. 


Place me on Sunium’s marbled steep, 
Where nothing, save the waves and I, 
May hear our mutual murmurs sweep ; 
There, swan-like, let me sing and die: 
A land of slaves shall ne’er be mine— 
Dash down yon cup of Samian wine! 


Thus sung, or would, or could, or should 
have sung, St. 87 
The modern Greek, in tolerable verse ; 
If not like Orpheus quite, when Greece 
was young, 
Yet in these times he’‘might have done 
much worse : 
His strain display’d some feeling—right 
or wrong; 
And feeling, in a poet, is the source 
Of others’ feeling ; but they are such 
liars, 
ARG take all colors—like the hands of 
_dyers. 


But words are things, and-a small drop 
of ink, Ex 
Falling like dew, upon a thought, pro- 
duces 
That which makes thousands, perhaps 
millions, think ; 
‘Tis strange, ‘the shortest eee which 


man uses 

Instead of speech, may form a lasting 
link at 

Of ages; to what straits old Time re- 

duces | 

Frail man when paper—even a rag like 
this, 

Survives himself, his tomb, and all that’s 
his ! 


And when his bones are dust, his grave 
a blank, 
His station, generation, even his na- 
tion, 
Become a thing, or nothing, save to rank 
In chronological commemoration, 
Some dull MS, oblivion long has sank, 
Or graven stone found ina barrack’s 
station 
In digging the foundation of a closet, 
May turn his name up, as a rare deposit. 


And glory long has made the sages smile ; 
‘Tis something, nothing, words, il- 
usion wind— 
Depending more upon the _ historian’s 
style 


BRITISH POETS 


Than on the name a person leaves 
behind : 
Troy owes to Homer what whist owes to 
Hoyle; 
The present century was growing blind 
To the great Marlborough’s skill in giv- 
ing knocks, 
Until his late Life by Archdeacon Coxe. 


Milton’s the prince of poets—so we say ; 
A little heavy, but no less divine: 
An independent being in his day— 
Learn’d, pious, temperate in love and 
wine ; 
But his life falling into Johnson’s way, 
We're told this great high priest of all 
the Nine 
Was whipt at college—a harsh sire— 
odd spouse, 
For the first Mrs. Milton left his house. 


All these are, certes, entertaining facts, 
Like Shakspeare’s stealing deer, Lord 
Bacon’s bribes ; 
Like Titus’ youth, and Cesar’s earliest 
acts ; 
Like Burns (whom Doctor Currie well 
describes) ; 
Like Cromwell’s pranks ;—but although 
truth. exacts 
These amiable descriptions from the 
scribes, 
As most essential to their hero’s story, 
They do not much contribute to his glory. 


All are not moralists, like Southey, when 
He prated to the world of ‘* Pantis- 
ocrasy < 
Or Wordsworth unexcised, unhired, who 
then 
Season’d his pedlar poems with de- 
mocracy ; 
Or Coleridge, long before his flighty pen 
Let to the Morning Post its aris- 
tocracy ; 
When he and Southey, following the 
same path, 
Espoused two partners (milliners of 
Bath). 


Such names at present cut a convict 
figure, 
The very Botany Bay in moral geo- 
graphy ; 
Their royal treason, renegado rigor, 
Are good manure for their more bare 
biography. 
Wordsworth’s last quarto, by the way, 
is bigger 


BYRON 


Than any since the birthday of typo- 
graphy ; 

A drowsy frowzy poem, call’d the ‘‘ Ex- 
cursion,”’ 

Writ in a manner which is my aversion. 


He there builds up a formidable dyke 
Between his own and others’ intel- 
lect ; 
But Wordsworth’s poem; 
lowers, like 
Joanna Southcote’s Shiloh, 
sect, 
Are things which in this century don’t 
strike 
The public mind,—so few are the elect ; 
And the new births of both their stale 
virginities 
Have proved but dropsies, taken for 
divinities. 


and his fol- 


and her 


But let me to my story: I must own, 
If I have any fault, it is digression, 
Leaving my people to proceed alone, 
While I soliloquize beyond expression: 
But these are my addresses from the 
throne, 
Which put off business to the ensuing 
Session : 
Forgetting each omission is a loss to 
The world, not quite so great as Ariosto. 


I know that what our neighbors call 
‘*longueurs,” 
(We ’ve not so good a word, but have 
the thing, 
In that complete perfection which in- 
sures 
An epic from Bob Southey every 
Spring—) 
Form not the true temptation which 
allures 
The reader ; 
to bring 
Some fine examples of the epopée, 
To prove its grand ingredient is ennui. 


but *t would not be hard 


We learn from Horace, ‘‘ Homer some- 
times sleeps ; ” 

We feel without him, Wordsworth 
sometimes wakes,— 


To show with what complacency he 


creeps, 

With his dear ‘‘ Wagoners,” around 
his lakes. 

He wishes for ‘‘a boat” to sail the 
deeps— 


Of ocean ?—No, of air; and then he 


makes 


251 


Another outcry for ‘‘a little boat,” 
And drivels seas to set it well afloat. 


If he must fain sweep o’er the ethereal 
plain, 
And Pegasus 
‘* Wagon,” 
Could he not beg the loan of Charles’s 
Wain? 
Or pray Medea for a single dr agon ? 
Or if, too classic for his v ulgar brain, 
He fear’d his neck to venture such a 


runs restive in his 


nag on, 

And he must needs mount nearer to the 
moon, 

Could not the blockhead ask for a bal- 
loon ? 

‘*Pedlars,” and ‘‘ Boats,” and ‘‘ Wag- 
ons!” Oh! ye shades 


Of Pope and Dryden, are we come to 
this ? 
That trash of such sort not alone evades 
‘Contempt, but from the bathos’ vast 
abyss 
Floats scumlike uppermost, and these 
Jack Cades 
Of sense and song above your graves 
may hiss— 


The “little boatman ’”’ and his ‘‘ Peter 
Bell ” 

Can sneer at him who drew ‘‘Achito- 
phel ! ” 


T’ our tale-—The feast was over, the 
slaves gone, 
The dwarfs ‘and dancing girls had all 
retired ; 
The Arab lore and poet’s song were 
done, 
And every sound of revelry expired ; 
The lady and her lover, left alone, 
The rosy flood of twilight’s sky ad- 
mired ; 
Ave Maria! o’er the earth and sea, 
That heavenliest hour of Heaven is 
worthiest thee! 


Ave Maria! blessed be the hour! 
The time, the clime, the spot, where I 
so oft 
Have felt that moment in 
power 
Sink o’er 
soft, 
While swung the deep bell in the distant 
tower, 
Or the faint dying day-hymn_ stole 
aloft, 


its fullest 


the earth so beautiful and 


* 


ae 


BRITISH POETS. 








And not a breath crept through the rosy 
air, 

And yet the forest leaves seem’d stirr’d 
with prayer. 


Ave Maria ! ’t is the hour of prayer ! 
Ave Maria ! ’t is the hour of love! 
Ave Maria! may our spirits dare 
Look up to thine and to thy Son’s 
above! 
Ave Maria! oh that face so fair ! 
Those downcast eyes beneath the Al- 
mighty dove— 
What though ’tis but a pictured image 
strike, 
That painting is no idol,—’t is too like. 


Some kinder casuists are pleased to say, 

In nameless print—that I have no de- 
votion ; 

But set those persons down with me to 


pray, 
And you shall see who has the pr oper- 
est notion 
Of getting into heaven the shortest way ; 
My altars are the mountains and the 
ocean, 
Earth, air, stars,—all that springs from 
the great Whole, 
Who hath produced, ‘and will receive 
the soul. 


Sweet hour of twilight !—in the solitude 
Of the pine forest, and thesilent shore 
Which bounds Ravenna’s immemorial 
wood, 
Rooted where once the Adrian wave 
flow’d o’er, 
To where the last Cesarean fortress 
stood, 
Evergreen forest! which Boccaccio’s 
lore 
And Dryden’s lay made haunted ground 
to me, 
How have I loved the twilight hour and 
thee ! 


The shrill cicalas, people of the pine, 
Making their summer lives one cease- 
less song, 
Were the sole "echoes, save my steed’s 
and mine, 
And vesper bell’s that rose the boughs 
along ; 
The spectre huntsman of Onesti’s line. 
His hell-dogs, and their chase, and the 
fair throng 
betolulenen'Y from this example not to 
y 


Froma true lover,—shadow’d my mind’s 


eye. 
Oh, Hesperus! thou bringest all good 
things— 
Home to the weary, to the hungry 
cheer, 
To the young bird the parent’s brooding 
wings, 
The welcome stall to the o’erlabor’d 
steer ; 
Whate’er of peace about our hearthstone 
clings, 
Whate’er our household gods protect 
of dear, 
Are gather’d round us by thy look of 
rest ; 


Thou bring’st the child, too, to the 
mother’s breast. 


Soft hour! which wakes the wish and 
melts the heart 
Of those who sail the seas, on the first 
da 
When they from their sweet friends are 
torn apart ; 
Or fills with love the pilgrim on his 
wa 
As the far bell of vesper makes him start, 
Seeming to weep the dying day’s 
decay ; 
Is this a fancy which our reason scorns ? 
Ah! surely nothing dies but something 
mourns! 


When Nero perish’d by the justest doom 
Which ever the destroyer yet destroy’d, 
Amidst the roar of liberated Rome, 
Of nations freed, and the world over- 
joy’d, 
Some hands unseen strew’d flowers upon 
his tomb : 
Perhaps the weakness of a heart not 
void 
Of feeling for some kindness done, when 
power 
Had left the wretch an uncorrupted hour, 


But I’m digressing; what on earth has 
Nero, 
Or any such like sovereign buffoons, 
To do with the transactions of my hero, 
More than such madmen’s fellow-man 
—the moon’s? 
Sure my invention must be down at zero, 
And I grown one of many ‘‘ wooden 
spoons ” 
Of verse (the name with which we Can- 
tabs please 
To dub the last of honors in degrees). 


BYRON 


253 








I feel this tediousness will never do— 
’T 1s being too epic, and I must cut down 


(In copying) this long canto into two ; © 


They’ll never find it out, unless I own 
The fact, excepting some experienced 
few ; 
And then as an improvement ’t will be 
shown : 
Pll prove that such the opinion of the 
critic is 
From Aristotle passim.—See Uorjrinie. 
Canto HI. 1819-1820. August 8, 1821. 


FROM CANTO IV . 


NOTHING so difficult as a beginning [St. 1 
In poesy, unless perhaps the end ; 


For oftentimes when Pegasus seems 
winning 

The race, he sprains a wing, and down 
we tend, 


_ Like Lucifer when hurl’d from heaven 
for sinning ; 

- Our sin the same, and hard as his to 
mend, 

Being pride, which leads the mind to soar 
too far, 

Till our own weakness shows us what we 
are. 


But time, which brings all beings to their 
level, 
And sharp Adversity, will teach at last 
Man,—and, as we would hope,—perhaps 
the devil, 
That neither of their intellects are vast : 
While youth’s hot wishes in our red veins 


revel, 
We know not this—the blood flows on 
too fast: 
But as the torrent widens towards the 
ocean, 


We ponder deeply on each past emotion. 


As boy, I thought myself a clever fellow, 
And wish’d that others held the same 
opinion ; 
They took it up when my days grew more 
mellow, 
And other minds acknowledged my 
dominion : 
Now my sere fancy ‘‘ falls into the yellow 
Leaf,” and Imagination droops her 
pinion, 
And the sad truth which hovers o’er my 
desk 
Turns what was once romantic to bur- 
lesque. 


And if I laugh at any mortal thing, 
°’Tis that I may not weep; and if I 
weep, 
’'T is that our nature cannot always bring 
Itself to apathy, for we must steep 
Our hearts first in the depths of Lethe’s 
spring, 
Ere what we least wish to behold will 
sleep : 
Thetis baptized her mortal son in Styx ; 
A mortal mother would on Lethe fix. 


Some have accused me of astrange design 
Against the creed and morals of the 
land, 
And trace it in this poem every line ; 
I don’t pretend that I quite understand 
My own meaning when I would be very 
fine ; 
But the fact is that I have nothing 
plann’d, 
Unless it were to be a moment merry, 
A novel word in my vocabulary. 


To the kind reader of our sober clime 
This way of writing will appear exotic ; 
Pulci was sire of the half-serious rhyme, 
Who sang when chivalry was more 
Quixotic, 
And revell’d in the fancies of the time, 
True knights, chaste dames, huge giant 
kings despotic : 
But all these, save the last, being obsolete, 
I chose a modern subject as more meet, 


How I have treated it, I do not know ; 
Perhaps no better than they have 
treated me, 
Who have imputed such designs as show 
Not what they saw, but what they 
wish’d to see ; 
But if it gives them pleasure, be it so, 
This is a liberal age, and thoughts are 
free : 
Meantime Apollo plucks me by the ear, 
And tells me to resume my story here. 
Canto IV. 1879—1820. August 8 , 1821. 


FROM CANTO XI 


LONDON LITERATURE AND SOCIETY 


JUAN knew several languages-as well 
He might—and brought them up with 
skill, in time [St. 53 
To save his fame with each accomplish’d 
belle, 
Who still regretted that he did not 
rhyme, 


254 


There wanted but this requisite to swell 
His qualities( with them) into sublime : 
Lady Fitz-Frisky, and Miss Mevia Man- 


nish, 

Both long’d extremely to be sung in 
Spanish. 

However, he did pretty well, and was 


Admitted as an aspirant to all 
The coteries, and, as in Banquo’s glass, 
At great assemblies or in parties small, 
He saw ten thousand living authors pass, 
That being about their average num- 
eral ; 
Also the eighty ‘‘ greatest living poets,” 
As every paltry magazine can show it’s. 


In twice five years the ‘“‘ greatest living 
poet.”’ 
Like to the champion fisty in the ring, 
Is call’d on to support his claim, or show 
it, 
Although ’tis an imaginary thing. 
Even I—albeit I’m sure I did not know it, 
Nor sought of foolscap subjects to be 
king,— 
Was reckon’d a considerable time, 
The grand Napoleon of the realms of 
rhyme. 


But Juan was my Moscow, and Faliero 
My Leipsic, and my Mont Saint Jean 
seems Cain : 
‘* La Belle Alliance ” of dunces down at 
Zero, 
Now that the Lion’s fall’n, may rise 
again : 
But I will fall at least as fell my hero 
Nor reign at all, or asa monarch reign ; 
Or to some lonely isle of gaolers go, 
With turncoat Southey for my turnkey 
Lowe. 


Sir Walter reign’d before me; Moore 
and Campbell 
Before and after : 
holy, 
The Muses upon Sion’s hill must ramble 
With poets almost clergymen, or 
wholly : 
And Pegasus has a psalmodic amble 
Beneath the very Reverend Rowley 
Powley, 
Who shoes the glorious animal with 
stilts, 
A modern Ancient Pistol—by the hilts ! 


but now grown more 


Still he excels that artificial hard 
Laborer in the same vineyard, though 
the vine 


BRITISH POETS 


Yields him but vinegar for his reward,— 
That neutralized dull Dorus of the 
Nine ; 
That swarthy Sporus, neither man nor 
bard ; 
That ox of verse, who ploughs for every 
line :— 
Cambyses’ roaring Romans beat at least 
The howling Hebrews of Cybele’s 
priest.— 


Then there’s my gentle Euphues; who, 
they say, 
Sets up for being a sort of moral me :1 
He ‘ll find it rather difficult some day 
To turn out both, or either, it may be. 
Some persons think that Coleridge hath 
the sway ; 
And Wordsworth has supporters, two 
or three ; 
And that deep-mouth’d Boeotian ‘‘ Say- 
age Landor” 
Has taken for a swan rogue Southey’s 
gander. 


John Keats, who was kill’d off by one 
critique,? 
Just as he really promised something 
great, 
If not intelligible, without Greek 
Contrived to talk about the Gods of 
late, 
Much as they might have been supposed 
to speak. 
Poor fellow ! His was an untoward fate; 
’'T is strange the mind, that very fiery 
par ticle, 
Should let itself be snuff’d out by an 
article. 


The list grows long of live and dead pre- 
tenders 
To that which none will gain—or none 
will know 
The conqueror at least; who, ere Time 
renders 
His last award, will have the long grass 
grow 
Above his burnt-out brain, and sapless 
cinders. 
If Imight augur, I should rate but low - 


1 Barry Cornwall, once called “amoral Byron.” 

2The entirely mistaken idea that Keats’ de- 
cline and death were due to the severe criticism 
on his Endymion in the Quarterly Review, was 
shared by Shelley, and was generally prevalent 
until the publication of Milnes’ Life of Keats. 
See H. Buxton Forman’s edition of Keats’: 
Works, Vol. IV., pp. 225-272, and Colvin’s Life of 
Keats, pp. 1% 24 and 208. 


BYRON orm 


Their chances ;—they ’re too numerous, 
like the thirty 

Mock tyrants, when Rome’s annals wax’d 
but dirty. 


This is the literary lower empire, 
Where the pretorian bands take up 
the matter ;— 
A ‘‘ dreadful trade,” like his who ‘‘ ga- 
thers samphire,” 
‘ The insolent soldiery to soothe and 
flatter, 
With the same feelings as you’d coax a 
vampire. 
Now, were I once at home, and in 
good satire, 
I'd try conclusions with those Janizaries, 


And show them what an _ intellectual 
war is. 
I think I know a trick or two, would 
turn 
Their flanks ;—but it is hardly worth 
my while 


With such small gear to give myself 
concern : 
Indeed I ’ve not the necessary bile ; 
My natural temper ’s really aught but 
stern, 
And even my Muse’s worst reproof ’s a 
smile ; 
And then she drops a brief and modern 
’ curtsy, 
And glides away, assured she never 
hurts ye. 


My Juan, whom I left in deadly peril 
Amongst live poets and blue ladies, 
pass’d 
With some small profit through that 
field so sterile, 
Being tired in time, and neither least 
nor last, 
Left it before ‘he had been treated ver y 


ill ; 
and henceforth found himself more 
gaily class’d 
Amongst the higher spirits of the day, 
The sun’s true son, no vapor, but a ray. 


His morns he pass’d in business—which 
dissected, 
Was like all business, a laborious noth- 


ing 
That leads to lassitude, the most infected 
And Centaur Nessus garb of mortal 
clothing, 
And on our sofas makes us lie dejected, 
And talk 
loathing 


“Chalk mimics painting 


in tender horrors of our 


All kinds of toil, save for our country’s 
gzood— 

Which grows no better, though ’t is time 
it should, 


His afternoons he pass’d in visits, lunch- 
eons, 
Lounging, and boxing; and the twi- 
light hour 
In riding round those vegetable punch- 
eons 
Call’d ** Parks,” where there is neither 
fruit nor flower 
Knough to gratify a bee’s slight munch- 
ings ; 
But after all it is the only ‘‘ bower’ 
(In Moore’s phrase) where the eenion® 
able fair 
Can form a slight acquaintance with 
fresh air. 


Then dress, then dinner, then awakes the 
world! 
Then glare the lamps, then whirl the 
wheels, then roar 
Through street and square fast flashing 
chariots hurl’d 
Like harness’d meteors 
the floor 


; then along 


; then festoons 
are twirl’d ; 
Then roll the brazen thunders of the 
door, 
Which opens to the thousand happy few 
An earthly Paradise of ‘‘ Or Molu.” 


There stands the noble hostess, nor shall 
sink 
With the three-thousandth curtsy ; 
there the waltz, 
The only dance w hich teaches girls to 
think, 
Makes one in love even with its very 
faults. 
Saloon, room, hall, o’erflow beyond their 
brink, 
And long the latest of arrivals halts, 
*Midst royal dukes and dames condemn’d 
to climb, 
And gain an inch of staircase at a time. 


Thrice happy he who, after a survey 
Of the good company, can win a corner, 
A door that’s in or boudoir out of the 
way, 
Where he may fix himself like small 
** Jack Horner,’ 
And let the Babel round run as it may, 
And look on asa mourner, or a scorner, 


256 


Or anapprover, or a mere spectator, 
Yawning a little as the night grows later. 


But this won’t do, save by and by ; and he 
Who, like Don Juan, takes an active 
share, 
Must steer with care through all that 
glittering sea 
Of gems and plumes and pearls and 
silks, to where 
He deems itis his proper place to be ; 
Dissolving in the waltz to some soft 


air, 

Or proudlier prancing with mercurial 
skill, 

Where Science marshals forth her own 
quadrille. 

Or, if he dance not, but hath higher 
views 

Upon an heiress or his neighbor’s 

bride, 

Let him take care that that which he 
pursues 


Is not at once too palpably descried. 
Full many aneager gentleman oft rues 
His haste ; impatience is a blundering 
guide, 
Amongst a people famous for reflection, 
Who like to play the fool with circum- 
spection. 


But, if you can contrive, get next at 
supper ; 
Or if forestall’d, get opposite and 
ogle :— 
Oh, ye ambrosial moments! always 
upper 
In mind, a sort of sentimental bogle, 
Which sits for ever upon memory’s 
crupper, 
The ghost of vanish’d pleasures once in 
vogue ! Til 
Can tender souls relate the rise and fall 
Of hopes and fears which shake a single 
ball. 


But these precautionary hints can touch 
Only the common run, who must 
pursue, 
And watch, and ward; whose plans a 
word too much 
Or little overturns ; and not the few 
Or many (for the number ’s sometimes 
such) 
Whom a good mien, especially if new, 
Or fame, or name, for wit, war, sense, 
or nonsense, | 
Permits whate’er they please, or did not 
long since. 


BRITISHPPOETS 





Our hero, asa hero, young and hand- 
some, 

Noble, rich, celebrated, and a stranger, 

Like other slaves of course must pay his 


ransom, 

Before he can escape from so much 
danger 

As will environ a conspicuous man. 
Some 


Talk about poetry, and ‘‘rack and 

manger,” . 

ugliness, 

trouble ;— 

I wish they knew the life of a young 
noble. 


And disease, as toil and 


They are young, but know not youth— 
it is anticipated ; 
Handsome but wasted, rich without 
a sou ; 
vigor in a thousand arms is 
dissipated ; 
Their cash comes from, their weaith 
goes to a Jew; 
Both senates see their nightly votes par- 
ticipated 
Between the tyrant’s and the tribunes’ 
crew ; 
And having voted, dined, drank, gamed, 
and whored, 
The family vault receives another lord. 


Their 


But ‘‘ carpe diem,” Juan, ‘‘ carpe, carpe !’’ 
To-morrow sees another race as gay 
And transient and devour’d by the same 

harpy. 
‘‘ Life’s a poor player,”—then ‘‘ play 
out the play, 
Ye villains !” and above all keep a sharp 
eye 
Machen: on what you do than what 
you say : 
Be hypocritical, be cautious, be 
Not what you seem, but always what 
you see, 


But how shall I relate in other cantos 
Of what befell our hero in the land, 
Which ’tis the common cry and le to 
vaunt as 
A moral country ? 
hand— 
For I disdain to write an Atalantis ; 
But ’tis as well at once to understand 
You are notamoral people, and you 
know it 
Without the aid of too sincere a poet. 


But I hold my 


BYRON 





What Juan saw and underwent shall be 
My topic, with of course the due re- 
striction . 
Which is required by proper courtesy ; 
And recollect the work is only fiction, 
And that I sing of neither mine nor me, 
Though every scribe, in some slight 
turn of diction, [doubt 
Will hint allusions never meant. Ne’er 
This—when I speak, I don’t hint, but 
speak out. 


Whether he married with the third or 
fourth 
Offspring of some sage husband-hunt- 
ing countess, [worth 
Or whether with some virgin of more 
(I mean in Fortune’s matrimonial 
bounties) 
He took to regularly peopling Earth 
Of which your lawful, awful wedlock 


fount is,— 
‘Or whether he was takenin for dam- 
ages, ages,— 


For being too excursive in his hom- 


Is yet within the unread events of time. 
Thus far, go forth, thou lay, which I 
will back 
Against the same given quantity of 
rhyme, {tack 
For being as much the subject of at- 
As ever yet was any work sublime, 
By those who love to say that white is 
black. 
So much the better !—I may stand alone, 
But would not change my free thoughts 
for a throne. : 
Canto XI. 1822-1823. August 29, 1823. 


THE VISION OF JUDGMENT,!. 
BY 
QUEVEDO REDIVIVUS 
SUGGESTED BY THE COMPOSITION SO EN- 


TITLED BY THE AUTHOR OF ‘‘ WAT 
TYLER ” 





** A Daniel come to judgment! yea, a Daniel ! 
I thank thee, Jew, for teaching me that word.” 


1Southey published in 1821 a poem called “ A 
Vision of Judgment,’’ in which he extolled 
George III. for his personal virtues, and de- 
scribed his reception into heaven. In the Pref- 
ace of this poem he bitterly attacked Byron for 
immorality in his writings. See full accounts 
of the affair in the biographies of Byron and 
Southey. The briefest and best treatment of it 
is in Nichol’s Life of Byron, toward the end of 
Chapter VIII. 


17 


aoe 


PREFACE 


It hath been wisely said, that ‘‘One foo] makes 
many ;’’ and it hath been poetically observed— 


**That fools rush in where angels fear to tread.””—POPE. 


If Mr. Southey had not rushed in where he 
had no business, and where he never was before, 
and never will be again, the following poem 
would not have been written. It is not impossi- 
ble that it may be as good as his own, seeing 
that it cannot, by any species of stupidity, natu- 
ral or acquired, be worse. The gross flattery, 
the dull impudence, the renegado intolerance, 
and impious cant, of the poem by the author of 
‘Wat Tyler,’’ are something so stupendous as to 
form the sublime of himself—containing the 
quintessence of his own attributes. 

So much for his poem—a word on his preface. 
In this preface it has pleased the magnanimous 
Laureate to draw the picture of a supposed 
‘Satanic School,’? the which he doth recom- 
mend to the notice of the legislature; thereby 
adding to his other laurels the ambition of those 
of aninformer. If there exists’ anywhere ex- 
cept in his imagination, such a School, is he not 
sufficiently armed against it by his own intense 
vanity ? The truth is, that there are certain 
writers whom Mr. S. imagines, like Scrub, to 
have ‘“‘talked of him; for they laughed con- 
sumedly.”’ 

I think I know enough of most of the writers 
to whom he is supposed to allude, to assert, that 
they, in their individual capacities, have done 
more good, in the charities of life, to their fel- 
low-creatures, in any one year, than Mr. Southey 
has done harm to himself by his absurdities in 
his whole life ; and this is saying a great deal. 
But I have a few questions to ask. 

Istly, Is Mr. Southey the author of “ Wat 
Tyler’? 

2ndly, Was he not refused a remedy at law by 
the highest judge of his beloved England, be- 
cause it was a blasphemous and seditious publi- 
cation ? 

3dly, Was he not entitled by William Smith, 
in full parliament, ‘‘ a rancorous renegado ? ”’ 

4thly, Is he not poet laureate, with his own 
nee on Martin the regicide staring him in the 
ace ? 

And, 5thly, Putting the four preceding items 
together, with what conscience dare he call the 
attention of the laws to the publications of 
others, be they what they may ? 

I say nothing of the cowardice of such a pro- 
ceeding, its meanness speaks for itself; but I 
wish to touch upon the motive, which is neither 
more nor less than that Mr. 8. has been laughed 
at a little in some recent publications, as he was 
of yore in the ‘‘ Anti-Jacobin,’’ by his present 
patrons. Hence all this ‘‘ skimble-scamble 
stuff’? about ‘‘ Satanic,’? and so forth. How- 
ever, it is worthy of him—‘“ qualis ab incepto.” 

If there is anything obnoxious to the political 
opinions of a portion of the public in the follow- 
ing poem, they may thank Mr. Southey. He 
might have written hexameters, as he has writ- 
ten everything else, for aught that the writer 
cared—had they been upon another subject. 
But to attempt to canonize a monarch, who, 
whatever were his household virtues, was 
neither a successful nor a patriot king,—inas- 
much as several years of his reign passed in war 
with America and Ireland, to say nothing of the 
aggression upon France,—-like all other exagger- 
ation, necessarily begets opposition. In what- 
ever manner he may be spoken of in this new 


258 


BRITISH) POETS 





‘* Vision,” his public career will not be more 
favorably transmitted by history. Of his pri- 
vate virtues (although a little expensive to the 
nation) there can be no doubt. 

With regard to the supernatural personages 
treated of, I can only say that I know as much 
about them, and (as an honest man) have a bet- 
ter right to talk of them than Robert Southey. 
I have also treated them more tolerantly. The 
way in which that poor insane creature, the 
Laureate, deals about his judgments in the next 
world, is like his own judgment in this. If it 
was not completely ludicrous, it would be some- 
thing worse. I don’t think that there is much 
more tosay at present. 

QUEVEDO REDIVIVUS. 


SAINT PETER sat by the celestial gate : 
His keys were rusty, and the lock was 
dull, 
So little trouble had been given of late ; 
Not et the place by any means was 
ull, 
But since the Gallic era ‘“‘ eighty-eight ” 
The devils had ta’en a longer, stronger 
pull, 
And ‘‘a pull altogether,” as they say 
At sea—which drew most souls another 
way. 


The angels all were singing out of tune, 
And hoarse with having little else to 
do, 
Excepting to wind up the sun and moon, 
Or curb a runaway young star or two, 
Or wild colt of acomet, which too soon 
Broke out of bounds o’er the ethereal 


blue, 

Splitting some planet with its playful 
tail, 

As boats are sometimes by a wanton 
whale. ; 


The guardian seraphs had retired on 
high, 
Finding their charges past all care be- 
low ; 
Terrestrial business fill’d nought in the 
sky 
Save the 
bureau ; 
Who found, indeed, the facts to multi- 
ply 
With such rapidity of vice and woe, 
That he had stripp’d off both his wings 
in quills, 
And yet was in arrear of human ills. 


recording angel’s black 


His business so augmented of late years, 
That he was forced, against his will 
no doubt, 
(Just like those cherubs, earthly minis- 
ters, ) 





For some resource to turn himself 
about, 
And claim the help of his celestial peers, 
To aid him ere he should be quite worn 
out 
By the increased demand for his re- 
marks : 
Six angels and twelve saints were named 
his clerks. 


This was a handsome board—at least 
for heaven ; 
And yet they had even then enough 
to do, 
So many conquerors’ cars were daily 
driven, 
So many kingdoms fitted up anew ; 
Each day too slew its thousands six or 
seven, 
Till ee the crowning carnage, Water- 
00, 
They threw their pens down in divine 
disgust— 
The page was so besmear’d with blood 
and dust. 


This by the way ; tis not mine to record 
What angels shrink from: even the 
very devil 
On this occasion his own work abhorr’d, 
So surfeited with the infernal revel : 
Though he himself had sharpen’d every 
sword, 
It almost quench’d his innate thirst 
of evil. 
(Here Satan’s sole good work deserves 
insertion— 
’T is, that he has both generals in re- 
.version. ) 


Let’s skip a few short years of hollow 


peace, 
Which peopled earth no better, hell 
as wont, 
And heaven none—they form the tyrant’s 
lease, 


With nothing but new names sub- 
scribed upon ’t ; 
’T will one day finish: meantime they 
increase, 
‘“With seven heads and ten horns,” 
and all in front, 
Like Saint John’s foretold beast; but 
ours are born 
Less formidable in the head than horn, 


In the first year of freedom’s second 
dawn 
Died George the Third; although no 
tyrant, one 


BYRON 





Who shielded tyrants, till each sense 
withdrawn 
Left him nor mental nor external sun ; 
A better farmer ne’er brush’d dew from 
lawn, 
A worse king never left a realm un- 
done ! 
He died—but left his subjects still be- 
hind, 
One half as mad—and t’other no less 
blind. 


He died! his death made no great stir 
on earth : 
His burial made some pomp; there 
was profusion 
Of velvet, gilding, brass, and no great 
dearth 
Of aught but tears—save those shed 
by collusion. 
For these things may be bought at their 
true worth ; 
Of elegy there was the due infusion— 
Bought also; and the torches, cloaks, 
and banners, 
Heralds, and relics of old Gothic man- 
ners, 


Form’d a sepulchral melodrame. Of all 
The fools who flock’d to swell or see 


the show, 
Who cared about the corpse? The 
funeral 
Made the attraction, and the black 
the woe. 


There throbb’d not there a thought 
which pierced the- pall ; 
And when the gorgeous coffin was 
laid low, 
It seem’d the mockery of hell to fold 
The rottenness of eighty years in gold. 


So mix his body with the dust! It might 
Return to what it must far sooner, were 
The natural compound left alone to fight 
Its way back into earth, and fire, and 


air; 
But the unnatural balsams merely blight 
What nature made him at his birth, 
as bare 
As the mere million’s base unmummied 
clay— 
Yet all his spices but prolong decay. 


He’s dead—and upper earth with him 
has done ; 
He’s buried; save the undertaker’s bill, 
Or lapidary scrawl, the world is gone 
For him, unless he left a German will ; 








290 
But where’s the proctor who will ask 
his son ? 
In whom his qualities are reigning 
still, 
Except that household virtue, most un- 
common, 


Of constancy to a bad, ugly woman. 


‘‘God save the king!” 
eccnomy 
In God to save the like ; but if he will 
Besaving, all the better; for notone am I 
Of paees who think damnation better 
still : 
I hardly know too if not quite alone am I 
Inthis small hope of bettering future ill 
By circumscribing, with some slight re- 
striction, 
The eternity of hell’s hot jurisdiction. 


It is a large 


I know this is unpopular ; I know 
"Tis blasphemous ; I know one may be 
damn’d 
For hoping no one else may e’er be so; 
I know my catechism; I know we’re 
cramm/’d 
With the best doctrines till we quite 
o’erflow; 
I know that all save England’s church 
have shamm/’d, 
And that the other twice two hundred 
churches 
And synagogues have made a damn’d 
bad purchase. 


God help us all! God help me too! I am, 

God knows, as helplessas the devil can 
wish, 

And not a whit more difficult to damn, 

ee is to bring to land a late-hook’d 
sh, 

Or to the butcher to purvey the lamb ; 
Not that I’m fit for such a noble dish, 

As one day will be that immortal fry 

Of almost everybody born to die. 


Saint Peter sat by the celestial gate, 
And nodded o’er his keys; when, lo! 
there came 
A wondrous noise he had not heard of 
late— 
A rushing sound of wind, and stream, 
and flame ; 
In short, a roar of things extremely 
great, 
Which would have made aught save a 
saint exclaim; 
But he, with first a start and then a 
wink, [think ! 
Said, ‘‘ There’s another star gone out, I 


260 





BRITISH | POETS 





But ere he could return to his repose. 
A cherub flapp’d his right wing o’er 
his eyes— 
At which St. Peter yawn’d, and rubb’d 
his nose: 
‘* Saint porter,” said the angel, ‘‘ pri- 
thee rise!” 
Waving a goodly wing, which glow’d, 
as glows 
An earthly peacock’s tail, with heav- 
enly dyes: 
To which the saint replied, 
what’s the matter ? 
‘** Is Lucifer come back with all this 
clatter ?” 


** Well, 


‘“ No,” quoth the cherub; ‘‘ George the 
Third is dead.” 
** And who is George the Third ? ” re- 
plied the apostle: 
‘* What George? what Third?” ‘* The 
king of England,” said 
The angel. ‘‘ Well! he won’t find 
kings to jostle 
Him on his way; but does he wear his 
head ? 
Because the last we saw here had a 
tustle, 
And ne’er would have got into heaven’s 
good graces, 
Had he not flung his head in all our faces. 


‘* He was, if I remember, king of France ; 
That head of his, which could not 
keep a crown 
On earth, yet ventured in my face to 
advance 
A claim to those of martyrs—like my 
own: 
If I had had my sword, as I had once 
When I cut ears off, I had cut him 


down; 

But having but my keys, and not my 
brand, 

I only knock’d his head from out his 
hand. 


‘* And then he set up such a headless 
howl, 
That all the saints came out and took 
him in; 
And there he sits by St. Paul, cheek by 


jowl ; 
That fellow Paul—the parvenu! The 
skin 
Of St. Bartholomew, which makes his 
cowl 


In heaven, and upon earth redeem’d 
his sin, 


So as to make a martyr, never sped 
Better than did this weak and wooden 
head. 


‘‘ But had it come up here upon its 
shoulders, — 
There would have been a different tale 
to tell: 
The fellow-feeling in the saints’ beholders 
Seems to have acted on them like a 
spell, 
And so this very foolish head heaven 
solders i sm 
Back on its trunk : it may be very well, 
And seems the custom here, to overthrow 
Whatever has been wisely done below.” 


The angel answer’d, ‘‘ Peter! do not 
pout: 
The king who comes has head and all 
entire, 
And never knew much what 
about— 
He didas doth the puppet—by its wire, 
And will be judged like all the rest, no 
doubt : 
My business and your own is not to 
inquire 
Into such matters, but to mind our cue— 
Which is to act as we are bid to do.” 


it was 


While thus they spake, the angelic cara- 
van, 
Arriving like a rush of mighty wind, 
Cleaving the fields of space, as doth the 
swan , 
Some silver stream (say Ganges, Nile 
or Inde, 
Or Thames, or Tweed), and ’midst them 
an old man. 
With an old soul, and both extremely 
blind, 
Halted before the gate, and in his shroud 
Seated their fellow traveller on a cloud. 


But bringing up the rear of this bright 
host 
A Spirit of a different aspect waved 
His wings, like thunder-clouds above 
some coast 
Whose barren beach with frequent 
wrecks is paved ; 
His brow was like the deep when tem- 
pest-toss’d ; 
Fierce and unfathomable thoughts 
engraved 
Eternal wrath on his immortal face, 
And where he gazed a gloom pervaded 
space, 


BYRON 


As he drew near, he gazed upon the gate 
Ne’er to be enter’d more by him or Sin, 
Withsucha glance of supernatural hate, 
As made Saint Peter wish himself 
within ; 
He patter’d with his keys ate great rate, 
And sweated through his apostolic 
skin : 
Of course his perspiration was but ichor, 
Or some such other spiritual liquor. 


The very cherubs huddled all together, 
Like birds when soars the falcon ; and 
they felt 
A tingling to the tip of every feather, 
And form’d a circle like Orion’s belt 
Around their poor old charge; who 
scarce knew whither 
His guards had led him, though they 
gently dealt 
With royal manes (for by many stories, 
And true, we learn the angels all are 
Tories). 


Asthings were in this posture, the gate 
flew 
Asunder, and the flashing of its hinges 
Flung over space an universal hue 
Of many-color’d flame, until its tinges 
Reach’d even our speck of earth, and 
made a new 
Aurora borealis spread its fringes 
O’er the North Pole; the same seen, 
when ice-bound, 
By Captain Parry’s crew, in ‘‘ Melville’s 


Sound.” 
And from the gate thrown open issued 
beaming 
A beautiful and mighty Thing of 
Light, 
Radiant with glory, like a banner stream- 
ing 
Victorious from some world- o’erthrow- 
ing fight : 
My poor comparisons must needs be 
teeming 
With earthly likenesses, for here the 
night 
Of clay obscures our best conceptions, 
saving 
Johanna Southcote, or Bob Southey 
raving. 
"Twas the archangel Michael ; all men 
know 
The make of angels and archangels, 


since 
There's scarce a scribbler has not one to 
show, 


261 


From the fiends’ leader to the angels’ 
prince ; 
There also are some altar-pieces, though 
Treally can’t say that they much evince 
One’s inner notions of immortal spirits ; 
But let the connoisseurs explain their 
merits. 


Michael flew forth in glory and in good ; 
A goodly work of him from whom all 
glory 
And good arise; the portal past—he 
stood ; 
Before him the young cherubs and 
saints hoary— 
(I say young, begging to be understood 
By looks, not years ; and should be 


very sorry 

To state, they were not older than St. 
Peter, 

But merely that they seem’d a little 
sweeter). 


The cherubs and the saints bow’d down 
before 
That arch-angelic hierarch, the first 
Of essences angelical, who wore 
The aspect of a god; but this ne’er 
nursed 
Pride in his heavenly bosom, in whose 
core 
No thought, save for 
service, durst 
Intrude, however glorified and high ; 
He knew him but the viceroy of the sky. 


his Master’s 


He and the sombre, silent Spirit met— 
They knew each other both for good 
and ill ; 
Such was their power, that neither could 
forget 
His former friend and future foe ; but 
still 
There was a_ high, immortal, 
regret 
In either’s eye, as if ’t were less their 
will 
Than destiny to make the eternal years 
Their date of war, and their ‘‘champ 
clos ” the spheres. 


proud 


But here they were in neutral space: we 
know 
From Job, that Satan hath the power 
to pay 
A heavenly visit thrice a year or so ; 
And that the ‘‘ sons of God,” like those 
of clay, 
Must keep him company ; and we might 
show 


262 


From the same book, in how polite a 


way 

The dialogue is held between the Powers 

Of Good and Evil—but ’twould take up 
hours. 


And this is not a theologic tract, 
To prove with Hebrew and _ with 
Arabic, 
If Job be allegory or a fact, 
But a true narrative ; and thus I pick 
From out the whole but such and such 
an act 
As sets aside the slightest thought of 
trick. 
Tis every tittle true, beyond suspicion, 
And accurate as any other vision. 


The spirits were in neutral space, before 
The gate of heaven; like eastern 
thresholds is 
The place where Death’s grand cause is 
argued o’er, 
And souls despatch’d to that world or 
to this ; 
And therefore Michael and the other 
wore 
A civil aspect : though they did not 
kiss, 
Yet still between his Darkness and his 
Brightness 
There pass’d a mutual glance of great 
politeness. 


The Archangel bow’d, not like a modern 
beau, 
But with a graceful Oriental bend, 
Pressing one radiant arm just where be- 
low 
The heart in good men is supposed to 
tend ; 
He turn’d as to an equal, not too low, 
But kindly; Satan met his ancient 


friend 

With more hauteur, as might an old 
Castilian 

Poor noble meet a mushroom rich 
Civilian. 


He merely bent his diabolic brow 
An instant; and then raising it, he 
stood 
In act to assert his right or wrong, and 
show 
Cause why King George by no means 
could or should 
Make out a case to be exempt from woe 
Eternal, more than other’ kings, 
endued 


BRITISH POETS 


With better sense and hearts, whom his- 
tory mentions, 

Who long have ‘‘ paved hell with their 
good intentions.” 


Michael began: ‘‘ What wouldst thou 
with this man, 
Now dead, and brought before the 
Lord? What ill 
Hath he wrought since his mortal race 
began, 
That thou canst claim him? Speak ! 
and do thy will, 
If it be just : if in this earthly span 
He hath been greatly failing to fulfil 
His duties as a king and mortal, say, 
And he is thine; if not, let him have 
way.” 


‘‘Michael!” replied the Prince of Air, 
‘‘even here, 
Before the Gate of him thou servest, 
must 
I claim my subject : 
appear 
That as he was my worshipper in dust, 
So shall he be in spirit, although dear 
To thee and thine, because nor wine 


and will make 


nor lust 

Were of his weaknesses; yet on the 
throne 

He reign’d o’er millions to serve me 
alone. 


‘¢ Look to our earth, or rather mine ; it 
was, 
Once, more thy Master’s : but I triumph 
not 
In this poor planet’s conquest ; nor, alas ! 
Need he thou servest envy me my lot: 
With all the myriads of bright worlds 
which pass 
In worship round him, he may have 
forgot 
Yon weak creation of such paltry things: 
I think few worth damnation save their 
kings,— 


‘¢ And these but as a kind of quit-rent, to 
Assert my right as lord: and even had 
I such an inclination, it were (as you 
Well know) superfluous ; they are 
grown so bad, 
That hell has nothing better left to do 
Than leave them to themselves : so 
much more mad 
And evil by their own internal curse, 
Heaven cannot make them better, nor I 
worse. 


BYRON 


** Look to the earth, I said, and say again: 
When this old, blind, mad, helpless, 
weak, poor worm 
Began in youth’s first bloom and flush 
to reign, 
The world and he both wore a dif- 
ferent form, 
And much of earth and all the watery 
plain 
Of ocean call’d him king: through 
many a storm 
His isles had floated on the abyss of time; 
For the rough virtues chose them for 
their clime. 


‘“‘He came to his sceptre young ; he 
leaves it old : 
Look to the state in which he found 
his realm, 
And left it; and his annals too behold, 
How to a minion first he gave the helm; 
How grew upon his heart a thirst for gold, 
The beggar’s vice, which can but over- 
whelm 
The meanest hearts ; and for the rest, 
but glance 
Thine eye along America and France. 


‘<°Tis true, he wasa tool from first to last 
(I have the workmen safe :) but asa tool 
So let him be consumed. From out the 
past 
Of ages, since mankind have known 
the rule 
Of monarchs—from the bloody rolls 
amass’d 
Of sin and slaughter—from the Ceesar’s 
school, 
Take the worst pupil; and produce a 
reign 
More drench’d with gore, more cum- 
ber’d with the slain. 


“*He ever warr’d with freedom and the 
free : 
Nations as men, home subjects, foreign 
foes, 
So that they utter’d the word ‘ Liberty !’ 
Found George the Third their first 
opponent. Whose 
History was ever stain’d as his will be 
With national and individual woes? 
I grant his household abstinence ; I grant 
His neutral virtues, which most mon- 
archs want ; 


‘“T know he was aconstant consort ; own 
He was a decent sire, and middling 
lord. 


263 


All this is much, and most upon a throne ; 
As temperance, if at Apicius’ board, 
Is more than at an anchorite’s supper 

shown. 
I grant him all the kindest can accord ; 
And this was well for him, but not for 
those 
Millions who found him what oppres- 
sion chose. 


“The New World shook him off ; the 
Old yet groans 
Beneath what he and his prepared, if 
not 
Completed : he leaves heirs on many 
thrones 
To all his vices, without what begot 
Compassion for him—his tame virtues ; 
drones ; 
Who sleep, or despots who have now 
forgot 
A lesson which 
them, wake 
Upon the thrones of earth ; but let them 
quake ! 


shall be re-taught 


** Five millions of the primitive, who hold 
The faith which makes ye great on 
earth, implored 
A part of that vast all they held of old,— 
Freedom to worship—not alone your 
Lord, 
Michael, but you, and you, Saint Peter! 
cold 
Must be your souls, if you have not 
abhor’d 
The foe to Catholic participation 
In all the license of a Christian nation. 


‘*True! he allow’d them to pray God ; 
but as 
A consequence of prayer, refused the 
law 
Which would have placed them upon 
the same base 
With those who did 
saints in awe.” 
But here Saint .Peter started from his 
place, 
And cried, ‘You may the prisoner 
withdraw : 
Ere heaven shall ope her portals to this 
Guelph, 
While Iam guard, may I be damn’d my- 
self ! 


not hold the 


** Sooner will I with Cerberus exchange 
My office (and his is no sinecure) 
Than see this royal Bedlam bigot range 


BRITISH POETS 





264 
The azure fields of heaven, of that be 
sure !” 
‘‘Saint !” replied Satan, ‘‘ you do well to 
avenge 
The wrongs he made your satellites 
endure ; 
And if to this exchange you should be 
given, 
Tll try to coax our Cerberus up to 
heaven !” 


Here Michael interposed : 
and devil! 
Pray, not so fast ; you both outrun dis- 
cretion. 
Saint Peter! you were wont to be more 
civil! 
Satan, excuse this warmth of his ex- 
pression, 
And condescension to the vulgar’s level: 
Even saints sometimes for: get them- 
selves in session. 
Have you got more to say ?”—‘‘ No.”— 
‘* Tf you please, 
I'll trouble you to call your witnesses.” 


‘**Good saint ! 


Satan turn’d and waved his 
swarthy hand, 
Which stirr’d with its electric quali- 
ties 
Clouds farther off than we can under- 
stand, 
Although’ we find him sometimes in 
our skies ; 

Infernal thunder shook both sea and land 
In all the planets, and hell’s batteries 
Let off the artillery, which Milton men- 

tions 
As one of Satan’s most sublime inven- 
tions. 


Then 


This was a signal unto such damned souls 
As have the privilege of their damna- 
tion 
Extended far beyond the mere controls 
Of worlds past, present, or to come; 
no station 
Is theirs particularly in the rolls 
Of hell assign’d ; but where their incli- 
nation 
Or business carries them in search of 
game, 
They may range Soe am damn’d 
the same. 


They're proud of this—as very well they 
may, 

It being a sort of knighthood; or gilt 
key 


Stuck in their loins; or like to an 
‘‘entre” 
Up the back stairs, or such free- 
masonry. 
I borrow my comparisons from clay, 
Being clay myself. Let not those ~ 
spirits be 
Offended with such base low likenesses ; 
We know their posts are nobler far than 
these. 


When the great signal ran from heaven 
to hell— 
About ten million times the distance 
reckon’d 
From our sun to its earth, as we can tell 
How much time it takes up, even toa 
second, 
For every ray that travels to dispel 
The fogs of London, through which, 
dimly beacon’d 
The weathercocks are gilt some thrice a 
year, 
If that the swmmer is not too severe : 


I say that I can tell—’twas half a min- 
ute ; 
I know the solar beams take up more 
time 
Ere, pack’d up for their journey, they 
begin it ; 
But then their telegraph is less sub- 
blime, 
And if they ran a race, they would not 
win it 
’Gainst Satan’s courier’s bound for 
their own clime. 
The sun takes up some years for every 
ray 
To reach its goal--the devil not half a 
day. 


Upon the verge of space, about the size 
Of half-a-crown, a little speck appear’d 
(’ve seen a something like it in the skies 
In the Augean, ere a squall); it near’d, 
And, growing bigger, took another euise: 
Like an aérial ship it tack’d, and 
steer’d, 
Or was steer’d (I am doubtful of the 
grammar 
Of the last phrase, which makes the 
stanza stammer ;—- 


But take your choice): and then it grew 
a cloud 
And so it was—a cloud of witnesses. 
But such acloud! No land e’er sawa 
crowd 


BYRON 


265 





Of locusts numerous as the heavens 
saw these ; 
They shadowed with their 
space; their loud 
And varied cries were like those of 
wild geese 
(If nations may be liken’d to a goose), 
And realized the phrase of ‘‘ hell broke 
loose.” 


myriads 


Here crashed a sturdy oath of stout John 
Bull, : 
Who damned away his eyes as hereto- 
fore : 
There Paddy brogued ‘‘ By Jasus !”— 
* What’s your wull?” 
The temperate Scot exclaimed: the 
French ghost swore 
In certain terms I shan’t translate in 
full, 
As the first coachman will ; and ’midst 
the war, 
The voice of Jonathan was heard to ex- 
press, 
‘“‘Our president is going to war, I guess.” 


Besides there were the Spaniard, Dutch, 
and Dane ; 
In short, an universal shoal of shades, 
From Otaheite’s isle to Salisbury Plain, 
Of all climes and professions, years 
and trades, 
Ready to swear against the good king’s 
reign, 
Bitter as clubs in cards are against 
spades : 
Allsummon’d by this grand ‘“ subpoena,” 
to 
Try if kings mayn’t be damn’d like me 
or you. 


When Michael saw this host, he first 
grew pale, 
As angels can; next, 
twilight, 


like Italian 


He turn’d all colors—as a peacock’s tail, — 


Or sunset streaming through a Gothic 
skylight 
In some old abbey, or a trout not stale, 
Or distant lightning on the horizon by 
night, 
Or a fresh rainbow, or a grand review 
Of thirty regiments in red, green and 
blue. 


Then he address’d himself to Satan: 
ce Why— 
My good old friend, for such I deem 
you, though 


Our eee parties make us fight so 
shy, 
I ne’er mistake you fora personal foe ; 
Our difference is political, and I 
Trust that, whatever may occur below, 
You know my great respect for you: 
and this 
Makes me regret whate’er you do amiss— 


‘“Why, my dear Lucifer, would you 
abuse 
My call for witnesses ? I did not mean 
That you should half of earth and hell 
produce ; 
"Tis even superfluous, since two hon- 
est, clean, 
True testimonies are enough: we lose 
Our time, nay, our eternity, between 
The accusation and defence: if we 
Hear both, ’twill stretch our immor- 
tality.” 


Satan replied, ‘‘To me the matter is 
Indifferent, in a personal point of 
view : 
I can have fifty better souls than this 
With far less trouble than we have 
gone through 
Already ; and I merely argued his 
Late Majesty of Britain’s case with 
you 
Upon a point of form : you may dispose 
Of him; I’ve kings enough below, God 
knows!” 


Thus spoke the Demon (late call’d 
‘* multi-faced ” 
By multo-scribbling Southey). ‘‘ Then 
we'll call 
One or two persons of the myriads placed 
Around our congress, and dispense 
with all 
The rest,’ quoth Michael: ‘‘ Who may 
be so graced 
As to speak first? 
enough—who shall 
It be?” Then Satan answer’d, ‘‘ There 
are many ; 
But you may choose Jack Wilkes as well 


there’s choice 


as any.” 
A merry, cock-eyed, curious-looking 
sprite 
Upon the instant started from the 
throng, 


Dress’d in a fashion now forgotten quite ; 

For all the fashions of the flesh stick 
long 

By people in the next world; where 
unite 


266 


All the costumes since Adam/’s, right 
or wrong, 
From Eve’s fig-leaf down to the petti- 
coat, 
Almost as scanty, of days less remote. 


The spirit look’d around upon the crowds 
Assembled, and exclaim’d, ‘‘ My 
friends of all 
The spheres, we shall catch cold amongst 
these clouds ; 
So let’s to business: why this general 
4) Uxep lly, 
If those are freeholders I see in shrouds, 
And ’tis for an election that they baw, 
Behold a candidate with unturn’d coat! 
Saint Peter, may I count upon your 
vote?” 


“Sir,” replied Michael, ‘‘ you mistake ; 
these things 
Are of a former life, and what we do 
Above is more august ; to judge of kings 
Is the tribunal met: so now you 
know.” 
‘Then I presume those gentlemen with 
wings,” 
Said Wilkes, ‘‘are cherubs ; 
soul below 
Looks much like George the Third, but 
to my mind 
A good deal older—Bless me! is he 


and that 


blind?” 
“He is what you behold him, and his 
doom 
Depends upon his deeds,” the Angel 
said ; 


“Tf you have aught to arraign in him, 

the tomb 
Gives license to the humblest beggar’s 

head 

To lift itself against the loftiest.”— 
‘‘Some,” 

Said: Wilkes, ‘‘ don’t wait to see them 
laid in lead, 

For such a liberty—and I, for one, 

Have told them what I thought beneath 


the sun.” 
‘* Above the sun repeat, then, what thou 
hast 
To urge against him, ” said the Arch- 
angel. ‘‘ Why,” 
Replied the spirit, ‘‘since old scores are 
past, 


Must I turn evidence? In faith, not I. 
Besides, I beat him hollow at the last, 
With all his Lords and Commons: in 
the sky 


BRITISH POETS 


I don’t like ripping up old stories, since 
His conduct was but natural in a prince. 


‘“Foolish, no doubt, 
oppress 
A poor unlucky devil without a shilling ; 
But then I blame the man himself much 
less 
Than Bute and Grafton, and shall be 
unwilling 
To see him punish’d here for their excess, 
Since they were both damn’d long 
ago, and still in 
Their place below : for me, I have for- 
given, 
vote his 
heaven.” 


and wicked, to 


And ‘habeas corpus’ into 


‘* Wilkes,” said the Devil, ‘‘ lunderstand 
all this ; 
You turn’d to half a courtier ere you 
died, 
And seem to think it would not be amiss 
To grow a whole one on the,other side 
Of Charon’s ferry ; you forget that his 
Reign is concluded ; whatsoe’er betide, 
He won’t be sovereign more: you’ve lost 
your labor, 
For at eee best he will but be your neigh- 
or. 


‘*‘ However, I knew what to think of it, 
When I beheld you in your jesting way, 
Flitting and whispering round about the 
spit 
Where Belial, upon duty for the day, 
With Fox’s lard was basting William Pitt, 
His pupil; I knew what to think, I say: 
That fellow even in hell breeds farther 
ills ; 
Tll have him gagg’d—twas one of his 
own bills. 


“Call Junius!” From the crowd a 
shadow stalk’d, 
And at the name there was a general 
squeeze, 

So that the very ghosts no longer walk’d 
In comfort, at their own aérial ease, 
But were all ramm/’d, and jamm’d (but 

to be balk’d, 
As we shall see), and jostled hands 
and knees, 
Like wind compress’d and pent within a 
bladder, 
Or like a human colic, which is sadder. 


The shadow came—a, tall, 
hair’d figure, 


thin, gray- 


BYRON 


That look’d as it had been a shade on 
earth ; 

Quick in its motions, with an air of vigor, 

But naught to mark its breeding or its 


birth ; 
Now it wax’d little, then again grew 
bigger, 
With now an air of gloom, or savage 
mirth : 


But as you gazed upon its features, they 
Changed every instant—to what, none 
could say. 


The more intently the ghosts gazed, the 
less 
Could they distinguish whose the 
features were ; 
The Devil himself seem’d puzzled even 
to guess ; 
They varied like a dream—now here, 
now there ; 
And several people swore from out the 
press, 
They knew him perfectly ; 
could swear 
He was his father : upon which another 
Was sure he was his mother’s cousin’s 
brother : 


and one 


Another, that he was a duke, or knight, 
An orator, a lawyer, or a priest, 

A nabob, a man-midwife ; but the wight 
Mysterious changed his countenance 


at least 
As oft as they their minds; though in 
full sight 
He stood, the puzzle only was in- 
creased ; 


The man was a phantasmagoria in 
Himself—he was so volatile and thin. 


The moment that you had pronounced 
him one, 
Presto! his face changed, and he 
was another ; 
And when that change was hardly well 
put on, 
It varied, till I don’t think his own 
mother 
(If that he had a mother) would her son 
Have known, he shifted so from one to 
Vother : 
Till guessing from a pleasure grew a task, 
At this epistolary ‘‘ Iron Mask.” 


For sometimes he like Cerberus would 
seem— 
‘“‘Three gentlemen at once ” (as sagely 
says 


267 


Good Mrs. Malaprop); then you might 
deem 
That he was not even one ; now many 
rays 
Were flashing round him; and now a 
thick steam 
Hid him from sight—like fogs on Lon- 
don days: 
Now Burke, now Tooke, he 
people’s fancies, 
And certes often like Sir Philip Francis. 


grew to 


I’ve an hypothesis—’tis quite my own ; 
I never let it out till now, for fear 
Of doing people harm about the throne, 
And injuring some minister or peer, 
On whom the stigma might perhaps be 
blown ; 
It is—my gentle public, lend thine ear ! 
‘Tis that what Junius we are wont to 
call 
Was really, truly, nobody at all. 


I don’t see wherefore letters should not 
be 
Written without hands, since we daily 
view 
Them written without heads ; and books, 
we see, 
Are fill’d as well without the latter too: 
And really till we fix on somebody 
For certain sure to claim them as his 
due, 
Their author, like the Niger’s mouth, 
will bother 
The world to say if there be mouth or 
author. 


“And who and what art thou?” the 
Archangel said. 
‘For that you may consult my title- 
page,” 
Replied this mighty shadow of a shade: 
“If [have kept my secret half an age, 
I scarce shall tell it now.”—‘‘ Canst thou 
upbraid,” 
Continued Michael, ‘‘ George Rex, or 
allege 
Aught further ?” Junius answer’d, ‘“‘ You 
had better 
First ask him for his answer to my letter : 


‘¢My charges upon record will outlast 
The brass of both his epitaph and 
tomb.” 
‘* Repent’st thou not,” said Michael, ‘‘ of 
some past 
Exaggeration ? something which may 
doom 


268 


BRITISHEPOETS 





Thyself if false, as him if true? Thou | At least a quarter it can hardly be: 


wast. 
Too bitter—is it not so?—in thy gloom 
Of passion ?”-—*‘ Passion!” cried the 
phantom dim, 
‘*T loved my country, and I hated him. 


‘What I have written, I have written: 
let 
The rest be on his head or mine!” so 
spoke 
‘‘Nominis Umbra;” and 
speaking yet. 
Away he melted in celestial smoke. 
Then Satan said to Michael, ‘‘ Don’t 
forget 
To call George Washington, and John 
Horne Tooke, 
And Franklin ; ”—but at this time there 
was heard 
A cry for room, though not a phantom 
stirr’d. 


Old while 


At length with jostling, elbowing, and 
the aid 
Of cherubim appointed to that post, 
The devil Asmodeus to the circle made 
His way, and look’d as if his journey 
cost 
Some trouble. 
he laid, 
‘* What’s this ?” cried Michael ; ‘‘ why, 
’tis not a ghost ?” 
“‘T know it,” quoth the incubus ; ‘‘ but he 
Shall be one, if you leave the affair to me. 


When his burden down 


**Confound the renegado! I have sprain’d 
My left wing, he’sso heavy ; one would 
think 
Some of his works about his neck were 
chain’d. 
But to the point ; while hovering o’er 
the brink 
Of Skiddaw (where as usual it still 
rain’d), 
I saw a taper, far below me, wink, 
And stooping, caught this fellow at a 
libel— 
No less on history than the Holy Bible. 


**The former is the devil’s scripture, and 
The latter yours, good Michael: so the 
affair 
Belongs to all of us, you understand. 
I snatch’d him up just as you see him 
there, 
And brought him off for sentence out of 
hand : 
I’ve scarcely been ten minutes in the 
alr— 


I dare say that his wife is still at tea.” 


Here Aer said, ‘‘ I know this man of 
old, 
oe have expected him for some time 
1ere ; 
A sillier fellow you will scarce behold, 
Or more conceited in his petty sphere : 
But surely it was not worth while to fold 
Such trash below your wing, Asmodeus 
dear : 
We had the poor wretch safe (without 
being bored 
With carriage) coming of his own accord. 


‘‘But since he’s here, let’s see what he 
has done.” 
** Done!” cried Asmodeus, ‘‘ he antici- 
pates 
The very business you are now upon, 
And scribbles as if head clerk to the 
Fates. 
Who knows to what his ribaldry may 
run, 
Whensuch anass as this, like Balaam’s, 
prates ?” 
‘* Let’s hear,” quoth Michael, ‘‘ what he 
has to say : 
You know we’re bound to that in every 
way.” 


Now the bard, glad to get an audience, 
which 
By no means often was his case below, 
Began to cough, and hawk, and hem, 
and pitch 
His voice into that.awful note of woe 
To all unhappy hearers within reach 
Of poets when the tide of rhyme’s in 
flow ; 
But stuck fast with his first hexameter, 
Not one of all whose gouty feet would 
stir. 


But ere the spavin’d dactyls could be 
spurr’d 
Into recitative, in great dismay 
Both cherubim and seraphim were heard 
To murmur loudly through their long 
array ; 
And Michael rose ere he could get a word 
Of all his founder’d verses under way, 
And cried, ‘‘ For God’s sake stop, my 
friend! ’twere best— 
Non Di, non homines—you know the 
rest.” 


A general bustle spread throughout the 
throng, 


BYRON 


Which seem’d to hold all verse in detes- 
tation : 
The angels had of course enough of song 
When upon service ; and the generation 
Of ghosts had heard too much in life, not 
long 
Before, to profit by a new occasion : 
The monarch, mute till then, exclaim’d, 
‘¢ What! what ! 
Pye come again? No more—no more of 
that!” 


The tumult grew ; an universal cough 
Convulsed the skies, as during a de- 
bate, 
When Castlereagh has been up long 
enough 
(Before he was first minister of state, 
I mean—the slaves hear now) ; some cried 
© Off off 1” 
As at a farce; till, grown quite des- 
perate, 
The bard Saint Peter pray’d to interpose 
(Himself an author) only for his prose. 


The varlet was not anill-favor’d knave : 
A good deal like a vulture in the face, 
With a hook nose and a hawk’s eye, 
which gave 
A smart and sharper-looking sort of 
grace 
To his whole aspect, which, 
rather grave, 
Was by no means so ugly as his case ; 
But that, indeed, was hopeless as can be, 
Quite a poetic felony ‘‘ de se.” 


though 


Then Michael blew his trump, and still’d 
the noise 
With one still greater, as is yet the mode 
On earth besides; except some grum- 
bling voice, 
Which now and then will make a slight 
inroad 
Upon decorous silence, few will twice 
Lift up their lungs when fairly over- 
crow’d ; 
And now the bard could plead his own 
bad cause, 
With all the attitudes of self-applause. 


He said—(I only give the heads)—he 


said, 
He meant no harm in scribbling ; ’twas 
his way 
Upon all topics; ’*twas, besides, his 
bread, 
Of which he _ butter’d both sides; 


*twould delay 


269 


Too long the assembly (he was pleased 
to dread), 
And take up rather more time than a 
day, 
To name his works—he would but cite a 
few— 
“Wat Tyler ”"—‘‘ Rhymes on Blen- 
heim ”—‘‘ Waterloo.” 


He had written praises of a regicide ; 
He had written praises of all kings 
whatever ; 
He had written for republics far and 
wide, 
And then against them bitterer than 
ever ; 
For pantisocracy he once had cried 
Aloud, a scheme less moral than ’twas 
clever ; 
Then grew a hearty anti-Jacobin— 
Had turn’d his coat—and would have 
turn’d his skin. 


He had sung against all battles, and 
again 
In their high praise and glory; he had 
call’d 
Reviewing ‘‘ the ungentle craft,” and 
then 
Become as base a critic as e’er crawl’d— 
Fed, paid, and pamper’d by the very men 
By whom his muse and morals had 
been maul’d : 
He had written much blank verse, and 
blanker prose, 
And more of both than anybody knows. 


He had written Wesley’s life: here 
turning round 
To Satan, ‘‘ Sir, ['m ready to write 
yours, 
In two octavo volumes, nicely bound, 
With notes and preface, all that most 
allures 
The pious purchaser ; and there’s no 
ground 
For fear, for I can choose my own re- 
viewers : 
So let me have the proper documents, 
That I may add you to my other saints.” 


Satan bow’d, and was silent. 
if you, 
With amiable modesty, decline 
My offer, what says Michael? 
are few 
Whose memoirs could be 
more divine. 
Mine is a pen of all work; not so new 


‘Well, 


There 


render’d 


270 


BRITISH POETS 





As it was once, but I would make you 


shine 

Like your own trumpet. By the way, 
my own 

Has more of brass in it, and is as well 
blown. 


‘* But talking about trumpets, here’s my 
Vision ! © 
Now you shall judge, all people ; yes, 
) you shall 
Judge with my judgment, and by my 
decision 
Be guided who shall enter heaven or 
fall. ; 
I settle all these things by intuition, 
Times present, past, to come, heaven, 
hell, and all, 
Like King Alfonso. 
double, 
I save the Deity some worlds of trouble.” 


When I thus see 


He ceased, and drew forth an MS.; and 
no 
Persuasion on the part of devils, saints, 
Or angels, now could stop the torrent ; 
SO 
He read the first three lines of the 
contents ; 
But at the fourth, the whole spiritual 
show 
Had vanish’d, with variety of scents, 
Ambrosial and sulphureous, as they 
sprang, 
Like lightning, off from his ‘‘ melodious 
twang.” 


Those grand heroics acted as a spell : 
The angels stopp’d their ears and 
plied their pinions ; 
The devils ran howling, deafen’d, down 
to hell; 
The ghosts fled, gibbering, for their 
own dominions— 
(For ’tis not yet decided where they 
dwell, 
And [leave every man to his opinions); 
Michael took refuge in his trump—but, 
lo! 
His teeth were set on edge, he could not 
blow! 


Saint Peter, hitherto been 
known 
For an impetuous saint, unpraised his 
keys, 
And at the fifth line knock’d the poet 
down ; 


who has 


Who fell like Phaéton, but more at 
ease, 
Into his lake, for there he did not drown; 
A different web being by the Destinies 
Woven for the Laureate’s final wreath, 
whene’er 
Reform shall happen either here or there. 


He first sank to the bottom—like his 


works, 
But soon rose to the surface—like him- 
self ; 
For all corrupted things are buoy’d like 
corks, 


By their own rottenness, like as an elf, 
Or wisp that flits o’er a morass: he 
lurks, 
It may be, still, like dull books on a 
shelf, 
In his own den, to scrawl some ‘‘ Life ” 
or ‘* Vision,”’- 
As Welborn says—‘‘ the devil turn’d pre- 
cisian.” 


As for the rest, to come to the conclu- 


sion 
Of this true dream, the telescope is 
gone 
Which kept my optics free from all 
delusion, 


And show’d me what I in my turn 
have shown; 
All I saw farther, in the last confusion, 
Was, that King George slipp’d into 
heaven for one;. 
And when the tumult dwindled to a 
calm, 
I left him practising the hundredth 
psalm. 
May 7-—October 4, 1821. October 15, 1822. 


IMPROMPTUS1! 


STRAHAN, Tonson, Lintot of the times, 

Patron and publisher of rhymes, 

For thee the bard up Pindus climbs, 
My Murray. 


To thee, with hope and terror dumb, 

The unfledged MS. authors come ; 

Thou printest all—and sellest some— 
My Murray. 


Upon thy table’s baize so green 
The last new Quarterly is seen,— 
But where is thy new Magazine, 
My Murray? 


1 From letters addressed to Mr. Murray, or to 
Thomas Moore. 


BYRON 


Along thy sprucest bookshelves shine 
The works thou deemest most divine— 
The “ Art of Cookery,” and mine, 

My Murray. 


Tours, Travels, Essays, too, I wist, 

And Sermons, to thy mill bring grist ; 

And then thou hast the ‘‘ Navy List,” 
My Murray. 


And Heaven forbid I should conclude 
Without “ the Board of Longitude,” 
Although this narrow paper would, 

My Murray. 

April 11, 1818. 1830. 





WHEN aman hath no freedom to fight 
for at home, 
Let him combat for that of his neigh- 
bors ; 
Let him think of the glories of Greece 
and of Rome, 
And get knock’d on the head for his 
labors. 


To do good to mankind is the chivalrous 
plan, 
And is always as nobly requited ; 
Then battle for freedom wherever you 
can, 
And, if not shot or hang’d, you'll get 
knighted. | 


November 5, 1820. 1824. 





So we'll go no more a roving 
So late into the night, 

Though the heart be still as loving, 
-And the moon be still as bright. 


For the sword outwears its sheath, 
And the soul wears out the breast, 
And the heart must pause to breathe, 

And love itself have rest. 


Though the night was made for loving, 
And the day returns too soon, 
Yet we'll go no more a roving 
By the light of the moon. 
February 28, 1817. 1830. 


THE world is a bundle of hay, 
Mankind are the asses who pull ; 
Each tugs it a different way. 
And the greatest of all is John Bull. 


November 5, 1820. 1880. 


271 


Woo kill’d John Keats? 
‘*T,” says the Quarterly.! 
So savage and Tartarly ; 

“°T was one of my feats.” 


Who shot the arrow ? 
‘‘The poet-priest Milman 
(So ready to kill man), 

Or Southey, or Barrow.” 


July 30, 1821. 1830. 





For Orford and for Waldegrave 
You give much more than me you gave; 
Which is not fairly to behave. 

My Murray. 


Because if a live dog, ’tis said, 

Be worth a lion fairly sped, 

A live lord must be worth two dead, 
My Murray. 


And if, as the opinion goes, 

Verse hath a better sale than prose,— 

Certes, I should have more than those, 
My Murray. 


But now this sheet is nearly cramm’d, 
So, if you will, I shan’t be shamm/’d, 

And if you won't, you may be damn’d, 
My Murray. 

August 23, 1821. 1880. 


STANZAS WRITTEN ON THE ROAD 
BETWEEN FLORENCE AND PISA 


On, talk not to me of a name great in 
story ; 

The days of our youth are the days of 
our glory ; 

And the myrtle and ivy of sweet two- 
and-twenty 

Are worth all your laurels, though ever 
so plenty. 


What are garlands and crowns to the 
brow that is wrinkled ? 

Tis but as a dead flower with May-dew 
be-sprinkled. 

Then away with all such from the head 
that is hoary ! 

What care I for the wreaths that can 
only give glory ! 


Oh, Fame !-—if I e’er took delight in thy 
praises, 


1 See the note on page 254, 


242 


"Twas less for the sake of thy high-sound- 
ing phrases, 

Than to see the bright eyes of the dear 
one discover, 

She thought that I was not unworthy t 
love her. 


There chiefly I sought thee, there only I 
found thee ; 
Her glance was the best of the rays that 
surround thee ; 
When it sparkled o’er aught that was 
bright in my story, 
I knew it was love, and I felt it was 


glory. 
November, 1821. 1880. 


ON THIS DAY I COMPLETE MY 
THIRTY-SIXTH YEAR 


Tis time this heart should be unmoved, 
Since others it hath ceased to move: 
Yet, though I cannot be beloved, 
Still let me love! 


My days are in the yellow leaf ; 
The flowers and fruits of love are 
gone ; 
The worm, the canker, and the grief 
Are mine alone! 


The fire that on my bosom preys 
Is lone as some voleanic isle ; 
No torch is kindled at its blaze— 

A funeral pile. 


BRITISH POETS 


The hope, the fear, the jealous care, 
The exalted portion of the pain 
And power of love, I cannot share, 
But wear the chain. 


But ’tis not thus—-and ’t is not here— 
Such thoughts should shake my soul, 
nor now, 
Where glory decks the hero’s bier, 
Or binds his brow. 


The sword, the banner, and the field, 
Glory and Greece, around me see ! 
The Spartan, borne upon his shield, 
Was not more free. 


Awake! (not Greece—-she 7s awake !) 
Awake, my spirit! Think through , 
whom 
Thy life-blood tracks its parent lake, 
And then strike home! 


Tread those reviving passions down, 
Unworthy manhood !—unto'thee 
Indifferent should the smile or frown 

Of beauty be, 


If thou regrett’st thy youth, why live ? 
The land of honorable death 
Is here :—up to the field, and give 
Away thy breath! 


Seek out—less often sought than found— 
A soldier’s grave, for thee the best ; 
Then look around, and choose thy ground, 
And take thy rest. 

At Missolonghi, January 22, 
October 29, 1824. 


1824. 


_ 


SHELLEY 


List oF REFERENCES 


** Complete Works, edited by H. Buxton Forman, 8 volumes. Works, 
edited by R. H. Shepherd, 4 volumes. * Complete Poetical Works, edited 
by G. E. Woodberry, 4 volumes, Houghton, Mifflin & Co. Aldine Poets, 
5) volumes, The Macmillan Co. Riverside Edition, 2 volumes, Hough- 
ton, Mifflin & Co. * Globe Edition, edited by Edward Dowden, 1 volume, 
The Macmillan Co. * Cambridge Edition, edited by G. E. Woodberry, 
1 volume, Houghton, Mifflin & Co. 


BroGRAPHY 


Merpwin (Thomas), Life of Shelley, 1847. Hoae (T. J.), Life of Shel- 
ley, 1858. Mippirtron (C. S.), Shelley and his Writings, 1858. S#Het- 
LEY Memoriats, edited by Lady Shelley, 1859. Garnerr (Richard), 
Relics of Shelley, 1862. Rossrrrr (W. M.), Life of Shelley (prefixed to 
his edition of Shelley’s Works), 1870. Smiru (G. B.), Shelley, A Critical 
Biography, 1877. ** Symonps (J. A.), Shelley (English Men of Letters 
Series), 1878. Junarrreson (J. C.), The Real Shelley, 1885. DowpEn 
(Edward), Life of Shelley (The standard biography, but not altogether 
satisfactory. Lacking both in frankness and sympathy.), 1886. Rapper 
(Félix), Shelley, sa Vie et ses Oeuvres, 1887. Suarpe (William), Shelley 
(Great Writers Series), 1887. Sarr (H. 8.), Shelley, A Biographical 
Study. (See also Mrs. Shelley’s Notes to the Poems, Moore’s Life of 
Byron, C. Kegan Paul’s William Godwin, his Friends and Contempor- 
aries ; etc.) 


REMINISCENCES AND EARLY CRITICISM 


* 'TRELAWNEY (EH. J.), Recollections of Shelley and Byron. Hunt 
(Leigh), Byron and some of his Contemporaries. Hunt (Leigh), Autobi- 
ography. Merpwin (Thomas), Shelley Papers. Mirrorn (Mary Russell), 
Recollections of a Literary Life. Der Quincey (T.), Essays on Poets. 
* Peacock (Thomas Love), Memoirs of Percy Bysshe Shelley. 


LATER Criticism 


* Browninc (Robert), Complete Works: An Essay on, Shelley. 
* Bacrenor (Walter), Literary Studies. * Bourcrer (Paul), Etudes et 
Portraits. Branprs (S. M.C.), Shelley und Lord Byron : Zwei litterarische 
Charakterbilder. Catvrerr (G. H.), Coleridge, Shelley, Goethe. Dow- 
DEN (Edward), French Revolution and English Literature; Essay VI. 

18 273 


274 BRITISH POETS 


Dowven (Edward), Studies in Literature: Transcendental Movement and 
Literature ; French Revolution and Literature. Garner (Richard), Essays 
of an Ex-Librarian: Shelley and Lord Beaconsfield. Gossx (E.), Questions 
at Issue. Hurron (R. H.), Literary Essays. Lane (Andrew), Letters to 
Dead Authors. Macponaip (George), Imagination and Other Essays. 
Masson (David), Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats, and Other Essays. NeEn- 
ciont (E.), Letteratura inglese. Rossrerr1 (W. M.), In Encyclopedia 
Britannica. Rosserri (W.M.), Lives of Famous Poets. ScuppEr (V. D.), 
The Greek Spirit in Shelley and Browning. Snairp (J. C.), Aspects of 
Poetry. SrerpHen (Leslie), Hours in a Library, Vol. IIL: Shelley and 
Godwin. THomson (James), Biographical and Critical Studies. Top- 
HUNTER (John), A Study of Shelley. * Trenr (W. P.), Authority of 
Criticism: A propos of Shelley. Woopsrrry (G. E.), Studies in Letters 
Life. * Woopserry (G. E.), Makers of Literature. 

ARNOLD (M.), Essays in Criticism. Apams (Francis), Essays in Mo- 
dernity. Brooxs (8. W.), English Poets. Cuoritey (H. F.), Authors of 
England. Caine (T. Hall), Cobwebs of Criticism. Crrarrini (Giuseppe), 
Ombre e Figure. Courtnore (William J.), The Liberal Movement in 
English Literature. Dawson (W.J.), Makers of Modern English. DErvry 
(J. A.), Comparative Estimate of Modern English Poetry. Ds Vere (Au- 
brey), Essays, chiefly on Poetry. Dixon (W. M.), English Poetry. Havn- 
cock (A. E,), The French Revolution and the English Poets. Jonunson 
(C. F.), Three Americans and Three Englishmen. Morr (D.M.), Sketches 
of the Poetical Literature of the Past Half Century, 1851. Nox (R.), 
Essays on Poetry and Poets. Parmore (C.), Principle in Art. ScHuyLer 
(K.), Italian Influences. Snarp (R. F.), Architects of English Literature. 
TuckEerMAN (H. T.), Thoughts on the Poets. 


TRIBUTES IN VERSE 


* Browninc, Memorabilia; Pauline, etc. Bourerr (Paul), Sur un 
Volume de Shelley. AGanoor, Leggenda Eterna. Forman (Alfred), 
Sonnets: Two Sonnets to Shelley. Japp (A. H.), in Stedman’s Victorian 
Anthology. Lane (A.), Lines on the Inaugural Meeting of the Shelley 
Society. Tnomson (James), Shelley,a Poem. * Rossertt, (D. G.), Five 
English Poets: Percy Bysshe Shelley. * Rosserr1 (W. M.), Shelley’s 
Heart. Dr Vere (Aubrey), Lines composed at Lerici. Hunr (Leigh), 
Sonnet to Shelley. Lanearorp (J. A.), Shelley. * Tans (J. B.) Shelley, 
a Sonnet. * WoopsBerry (G. E.), Poems: Shelley, a Sonnet; Shelley’s 
House. * Warson (William), * Shelley’s Centenary; To Edward Dow- 
den on his Life of Shelley; Quatrain to Harriet Shelley. 


BripLioGRAPHY 


* Forman (H. B.), The Shelley Library; an Essay in Bibliography. 
SaLteM Pusric Liprary, Special Reading List. AnpERson (J. P.), Ap- 
pendix to Sharp’s Life of Shelley. 






STANZAS—Aptil, 18141 





Away! the moor is dark beneath the 
‘moon, 
Rapid clouds have drank the last pale 
beam of even: 
Away! the gathering winds will call 
the darkness soon, 
And profoundest midnight shroud the 
serene lights of heaven. 


Pause not! The time is past! Every 
voice cries, Away ! 


Tempt not with one last tear thy 


friend’s ungentle mood : 
Thy lover's eye, so glazed and cold, dares 
not entreat thy stay : 
Duty and dereliction guide thee back 
to solitude. 


Away, away! to thy sad and _ silent 
home ; 
Pour bitter tears on 
hearth ; 
Watch the dim shades as like ghosts 
they go and come, 
And complicate strange webs of mel- 
ancholy mirth. 


its desolated 


The leaves of wasted autumn woods 
shall float around thine head : 
The blooms of dewy spring shall gleam 
beneath thy feet: 
But thy soul or this world must fade in 
the frost that binds the dead, 
Ere midnight’s frown and morning’s 
smile, ere thou and peace may 
meet. 


The cloud shadows of midnight possess 
their own repose, 

For the weary winds are silent, or the 

¥ moon is in the deep: 

ome respite to its turbulence unresting 
ocean knows; 


1See Dowden’s Life of Shelley, Vol. 


Eeemyo 1: 
410-411, a 


separ LEY 


Whatever moves, or toils, or grieves, 
hath its appointed sleep. 


Thou’ in the grave shalt rest—yet till 
the phantoms flee 
Which that house and heath and gar- 
den made dear to thee erewhile, 
Thy remembrance, and repentance, and 
deep musings are not free 
From the music of two voices and 
the light of one sweet smile. 
1814. 1816. 


TO.COLERIDGE } 
AAKPY3I AIOIZQ ILOTMON ’AIIOTMON 


OH! THERE are spirits of the air, 
And genii of the evening breeze, 
And gentle ghosts, with eyes as fair 
Asstar-beams among twilight trees :— 
Such lovely ministers to meet 
Oft hast thou turned from men thy 
lonely feet. 


With mountain winds, 
springs, 
And moonlight seas, that are the voice 
Of these inexplicable things 
Thou didst hold commune, and rejoice 
When they did answer thee ; but they 
Cast, like a worthless boon, thy love 
away. 


and babbling 


And thou hast sought in starry eyes 
Beams that were never meant for 
thine, 


1The poem beginning ‘‘ Oh, there are spirits in 
the air’? was addressed in idea to Coleridge, 
whom he never knew; and at whose character 
he could only guess ‘imperfectly, through his 
writings, and accounts he heard of him from 
some who knew him well. He regarded his 
change of opinions as rather an act of will than 
conviction, and believed that in his inner heart 
he would be haunted by what Shelley considered 
the better and holier aspirations of his youth. 
(From Mrs. Shelley’s Note on the Karly Poems.) 
See also Dowden’s Life of Shelley, Vol. L., p. 472 
and note. 


215 


276 


BRITISH POETS 





Another’s wealth :—tame sacrifice 
To a fond faith! still dost thou pine ? 
Still dost thou hope that greeting hands, 
Voice, looks, or lips, may answer thy 
demands? 


Ah! wherefore didst thou build thine 
hope 
On the false earth’s inconstancy ? 
Did thine own mind afford no scope 
Of love, or moving thoughts to thee ? 
That natural scenes or human smiles 
Could steal the power to wind thee in 
their wiles. 
* 
Yes, all the faithless smiles are fled 
Whose falsehood left thee broken- 
hearted ; 
The glory of the moon is dead ; 
Night’s ghosts and dreams have now 
departed ; 
Thine own soul still is true to thee, 
But changed toa foul fiend through 
misery. 


This fiend, whose ghastly presence ever 
Beside thee like thy shadow hangs, 
Dream not to chase ;—the mad endea- 

vor 
Would scourge thee to severer pangs. 
Be as thou art. Thy settled fate, 
Dark as it is, all change would aggra- 
vate. 1815. 1816. 


ALASTOR, 
OR 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE 
PREFACE 


THE poem entitled Alastor may be considered 
as allegorical of one of the most interesting 
situations of the human mind. It represents a 
youth of uncorrupted feelings and adventurous 
genius led forth by an imagination inflamed and 
purified through familiarity with all that is ex- 
cellent and majestic, tothe contemplation of the 
universe. Hedrinks deep of the fountains of 
knowledge, and is still insatiate. The magnifi- 
cence and beauty of the external world sinks 
profoundly into the frame of his conceptions, and 
affords to their modifications a variety not to be 
exhausted. Solong asit is possible for his de- 
sires to point towards objects thus infinite and 
unmeasured, he is joyous, and tranquil, and self- 
possessed. But the period arrives when these 
objects cease to suffice. His mindis at length 
suddenly awakened and thirsts for intercourse 
with an intelligence similar to itself. He im- 
ages to himself the Being whom he loves. Con- 
versant with speculations of the sublimest and 
most perfect natures, the vision in which he 
embodies his own imaginations: unites all of 
wonderful, or wise, or beautiful, which the poet, 


the philosopher, or the lover could depicture. 
The intellectual faculties, the imagination, the 
functions of sense, have their respective requisi- 
tions on the sympathy of corresponding powers 
in other human beings. The Poet is represented 
as uniting these requisitions, and attaching them 
toa single image. He seeks in vain for a proto- 
type of his conception. Blasted by his disap- 
pointment, he descends to an untimely grave. 

The picture is not barren of instruction to ac- 
tuaimen. The Poet’s self-centred seclusion was 
avenged by the furies of an irresistible passion 
pursuing him to speedy ruin. But that Power 
which strikes the luminaries of the world with 
sudden darkness and extinction, by awakening 
them to too exquisite a perception of its influ- 
ences, dooms to a slow and poisonous decay those 
meaner spirits that dare to abjure its dominion. 
Their destiny is more abject and inglorious as 
their delinquency is more contemptible and per- 
nicious. They who, deluded by no generous 
error, instigated by no sacred thirst of doubtful 
knowledge, Uuped by no illustrious superstition, 
loving nothing on this earth, and cherishing no 
hopes beyond, yet keep aloof from sympathies 
with their kind, rejoicing neither in human joy 
nor mourning with human grief; these, and 
such as they, have their apportioned curse. 
They languish, because none feel with them their 
common nature. They are morally dead. They 
are neither friends, nor lovers, nor fathers, nor 
citizens of the world, nor benefactors of their 
country. Among those who attempt to exist 
without human sympathy, the pure and tender- 
hearted perish through the intensity and passion 
of their search after its communities, when the 
vacancy of their spirit suddenly makes itself 
felt. All else, selfish, blind, and torpid, are those 
unforeseeing multitudes who constitute, to- 
gether with their own, the lasting misery and 
loneliness of the world. Those who love not 
their fellow-beings live unfruitful lives, and pre- 
pare for their old age a miserable grave. 


“The good die first, 
And those whose hearts are dry as summer dust, 
Burn to the socket !”’ 


December 1}, 1815. 





Nondum amabam, et amare amabam, quere- 
bam quid amarem, amans amare.—Confess. St. 
August. 


EARTH, ocean, air, beloved brotherhood ! 

If our great Mother has imbued my soul 

With aught of natural piety to feel 

Your love, and recompense the boon 
with mine ; 

If dewy morn, and odorous noon, and 
even, 

With sunset and its gorgeous ministers, 

And solemn midnight tingling silent- 


Ness 5 

If autumn’s hollow sighs in the gere 
wood, 

And winter robing with pure snow and 
Crowns 

Of starry ice the gray grass and bare 
boughs ; ; 





SHELLEY 


If spring’s voluptuous pantings when she 
breathes 
Her first sweet kisses, have been dear to 


me ; 
If no bright bird, insect, or gentle beast 
I consciously have injured, but still 


ove 

And cherished these my kindred ; then 
forgive 

This boast, beloved brethren, and with- 
draw 

No portion of your wonted favor now! 


Mother of this unfathomable world! 
Favor my solemn song, for I have loved 
Thee ever, and thee only; I have 
watched 

Thy shadow, and the darkness of thy 
steps, 

And my heart ever gazes on the depth 

Of thy deep mysteries. I have made 
my bed 

In charnels and on coffins, where black 
death 

Keeps record of the trophies won from 
thee, 

Hoping to still these obstinate ques- 
tionings 

Of thee and thine, by forcing some lone 
ghost, 

Thy messenger, to render up the tale 

Of what we are. In lone and silent 

~ hours, 

When night makes a weird sound of its 
own stillness, 

Like an inspired and desperate alchy- 
mist. 

Staking his very life on some dark hope, 

Have I mixed awful talk and asking 
looks 

With my most innocent love, until 
strange tears 

Uniting with those breathless kisses, 
made 

Such magic as compels the charméd 
night 

To render up thy charge:... 
though ne’er yet 

Thou hast unveiled thy inmost sanc- 
tuary, 

Enough from incommunicable dream, 

And twilight phantasms, and deep noon- 
day thought, 

Has shone within me, that serenely now 

And moveless, asa long-forgotten lyre 

Suspended in the solitary dome 

Of some mysterious and deserted fane, 

Iwait thy breath, Great Parent, that 
my strain 


and, 


217 


May modulate with murmurs of the air, 

And motions of the forests and the sea, 

And voice of living beings, and woven 
hymns 

Of night and day, and the deep heart of 
THs 

There was a Poet whose untimely 

tomb 

No human hands with pious reverence 
reared, 

But the charmed eddies of autumnal 
winds 

Built o’er his mouldering bones a pyra- 
mid 

Of mouldering leaves in the waste 
wilderness :— 

A lovely youth,—no mourning maiden 
decked 

With weeping flowers, or votive cypress 
wreath, 

The lone couch of his 
sleep :— 

Gentle, and brave, and generous,—no 
lorn bard 

Breathed o’er his dark fate one melo- 
dious sigh : 

He lived, he died, he sung, in solitude. 

Strangers have wept tohear his passion- 
ate notes, 

And virgins, as unknown he passed, have 
pined 

And wasted for fond love of his wild 
eyes, 

The fire of those soft orbs has ceased to 
burn, 

And Silence, too enamored of that voice, 

Locks its mute music in her rugged cell. 


everlasting 


By solemn vision, and bright silver 

dream, 

His infancy was nurtured. Every sight 

And sound from the vast earth and 
ambient air 

Sent to his heart its choicest impulses, 

The fountains of divine philosophy 

Fled not his thirsting lips, and all of 
great, 

Or good, or lovely, which the sacred past 

In truth or fable consecrates, he felt 

And knew. When early youth had 
pass‘d, he left 

His cold fireside and alienated home 

To seek strange truths in undiscovered 
lands. 

Many a wide waste and tangled wilder- 
ness 

Has lured his fearless steps ; and he has 
bought 


278 


BRITISH POETS 





With his sweet voice and eyes, from 
Savage men, 

His rest and food. Nature’s most secret 
steps / 

He like her shadow has pursued, where’er 

The red volcano overcanopies 

Its fields of snow and pinnacles of ice 

With burning smoke, or where bitumen 
lakes 

On black bare pointed islets ever beat 

With sluggish surge, or where the secret 
caves 

Rugged and dark, winding among the 
springs 

Of fire and poison, inaccessible 

To avarice or pride, their starry domes 

Of diamond and of gold expand above 

Numberless and immeasurable halls, 

Frequent with crystal column, and clear 
shrines 

Of pearl, and thrones radiant with chrys- 
olite. 

Nor had that scene of ampler majesty 

Than gems or gold, the varying roof of 


heaven 

And the green earth lost in his heart its 
claims 

To love and wonder; he would linger 
long 

In Jonesome vales, making the wild his 
home, 

Until the doves and squirrels would 
partake 

From his innocuous hand his bloodless 
food, 

Lured by the gentle meaning of his 
looks, 

And the wild antelope, that starts 
whene’er 


The dry leaf rustles in the brake, suspend 
Her timid steps to gaze upon a form 
More graceful than her own. 
His wandering step 
Obedient to high thoughts, has visited 
The awful ruins of the days of old: 
Athens, and Tyre, and Balbec, and the 
waste 
Where stood Jerusalem, the fallen towers 
Of Babylon, the eternal pyramids, 
Memphis and Thebes, and whatsoe’er of 
strange 
Sculptured on alabaster obelisk, 
Or jasper tomb, or mutilated sphynx, 
Dark Aithiopia in her desert hills 
Conceals. Among the ruined temples 
there, 
Stupendous columns, and wild images 
Of more than man, where marble 
demons watch 


The Zodiac’s brazen mystery, and dead 
men 

Hang their mute thoughts on the mute 
walls around, 

He lingered, poring on memorials 

Of the world’s youth, through the long 
burning day 

Gazed on those speechless shapes, nor, 
when the moon 

Filled the mysterious halls with floating 
shades 

Suspended he that task, but ever gazed 

And gazed, till meaning on his vacant 
mind 

Flashed like strong inspiration, and he 
saw 

The thrilling secrets of the birth of 
time. 

Meanwhile an Arab maiden brought his 
food, 

Her daily portion, from her father’s tent, 

And spread her matting for his couch, 
and stole 

From duties and repose to tend his 
steps :—— 

Enamored, yet not daring for deep awe 

To speak her love :--and watched his 
nightly sleep, 

Sleepless herself, to gaze uponhis lips 

Parted in slumber, whence the regular 


breath 

Of innocent dreams arose: then, when 
red morn 

Made paler the pale moon, to her cold 
home 

Wildered, and wan, and panting, she 
returned. 

The Poet wandering on, through 

Arabie 

And Persia, and the wild Carmanian 
waste, 


And o’er the aérial mountains which 
pour down 

Indus and Oxus from their icy caves, 

In joy and exultation held his way ; 
Till in the vale of Cashmire, far within 
Its loneliest dell, where odorous plants 
entwine 
Beneath the hollow 
bower, 

Beside a sparkling rivulet he stretched 

His languid limbs. A vision on his sleep 

There came, a dream of hopes that never 
yet 

Had flushed his cheek. 
veiléd maid 

Sate near him, talking in low solemn 
tones, r 


rocks a «natural 


He dreamed a 


SHELLEY 279 


Her voice was like the voice of his own 
soul 

Heard in the calm of thought ; its music 
long, 

Like woven sounds of streams and 
breezes, held 

His inmost sense suspended in its web 

Of many-colored woof and _ shifting 
hues. 

Knowledge and truth and virtue were 
her theme, 

And lofty hopes of divine liberty, 

Thoughts the most dear to him, and 
poesy 


> 
‘Herself a poet. Soon the solemn mood 


Of her pure mind kindled through all her 
frame 

A permeating fire: wild numbers then 

She raised, with voice stifled in tremu- 
lous sobs 

Subdued by its own pathos: her fair 
hands 

Were bare alone, sweeping from some 
strange harp 

Strange symphony, and in their branch- 
ing veins 

The eloquent blood told an ineffable tale. 

The beating of her heart was heard to fill 

The pauses of her music, and her breath 

Tumultuously accorded with those fits 

Of intermitted song. Sudden she rose, 

As if her heart impatiently endured 

Its bursting burthen : at the sound he 
turned, 

Andsaw by the warm light of their own 
life 

Her glowing limbs beneath the sinuous 
veil 

Of woven wind, her outspread arms now 


are, 

Her dark locks floating in the breath of 
night, 

Her beamy bending eyes, her parted lips 

Outstretched, and pale, and quivering 
eagerly. 

His strong heart sunk and sickened with 
excess 

Of love. He reared his shuddering limbs 
and quelled 

His gasping breath, and spread his arms 
to meet 

Her panting bosom: ... 
a while, 

Then, yielding to the irresistible joy, 

With frantic gesture and short breath- 
less cry 

Folded his frame in her dissolving arms. 

Now blackness v@iled his dizzy eyes, and 
night 


she drew back 


Involved and swallowed up the vision ; 
sleep, 

Like a dark flood suspended in its course, 

Rolled back its impulse on his vacant 
brain. 


Roused by the shock he started from 

his trance— 

The cold white light of morning, the 
blue moon 

Low in the west, the clear and garish 
hills, 

The distinct valley and the vacant woods, 

Spread round him where he stood. 
Whither have fled 

The hues of heaven that canopied his 
bower 

Of yesternight? The 
soothed his sleep, 

The mystery and the majesty of Earth, 

The joy, the exultation? His wan eyes 

Gaze on the empty scene as vacantly 

As ocean’s moon looks on the moon in 
heaven. 

The spirit of sweet human love has sent 

A vision to the sleep of him who spurned 

Her choicest gifts. He eagerly pursues 

Beyond the realms of dream that fleet- 
ing shade ; 

He overleaps the bounds. Alas! alas! 

Were limbs, and breath, and being in- 
tertwined 

Thus treacherously ? Lost, lost, for ever 
lost, 

In the wide pathless desert of dim sleep, 

That beautiful shape! Does the dark 
gate of death 

Conduct to thy mysterious paradise, 

O Sleep? Does the bright arch of rain- 
bow clouds, 

And pendent mountains seen in the calm 
lake, 

Lead only to a black and watery depth, 

While death’s blue vault, with loathliest 
vapors hung, 

Where every shade which the foul grave 
exhales 

Hides its dead eye from the detested day, 

Conduct, O Sleep, to thy delightful 
realms ? 

This doubt with sudden tide flowed on 
his heart ; 

The insatiate hope which it awakened 
stung 

His brain even like despair. 

While daylight held 

The sky, the Poet kept mute conference 

With his still soul. At night the pas- 
sion came, 


sounds that 


280 


Like the fierce fiend of a distempered 
dream 

And shook him from his rest, and led 
him forth 

Into the darkness.—As an eagle, grasped 

In folds of the green serpent, feels her 
breast 

Burn with the poison, and precipitates 

Through night and day, tempest, and 
calm, and cloud, 

Frantic with dizzying anguish, her blind 


flight 

O’er the wide aéry wilderness: thus 
driven 

By the bright shadow of that lovely 
dream, 

Beneath the cold glare of the desolate 
night, 


Through tangled swamps and deep pre- 
cipitous dels, 

Startling with careless step the moon- 
light snake, 

He fled. Red morning dawned upon his 
flight, 

Shedding the mockery of its vital hues 

Upon his cheek of death. He wandered 
on 

Till vast Aornos seen 
steep, 

Hung o’er the low horizon like a cloud ; 

Through Balk, and where the desolated 
tombs 

Of Parthian kings scatter to every wind 

Their wasting dust, wildly he wandered 
on, 

Day after day, a weary waste of hours, 

Bearing within his life the brooding care 

That ever fed on its decaying flame. 

And now his limbs were lean; his scat- 
tered hair 

Sered by the autumn of strange suffer- 
in 

Sung dirges in. the wind: his listless 
hand 

Hung like dead bone within its withered 
skin ; 

Life, and the lustre that consumed it, 
shone 

As in a furnace burning secretly 

From his dark eyes alone. The cot- 
tagers, 

Who ministered with human charity 

His human wants, beheld with wonder- 

ing awe 

fleeting 

taineer, 

Encountering on some dizzy precipice 

That spectral form, deemed. that the 
Spirit of wind 


from Petra’s 


Their visitant. The moun- 





BRITISH POETS 


hs 


With lightning eyes, and eager breath, 
and feet 

Disturbing not the drifted snow, had 
paused 

In its career: the infant would conceal 

His troubled visage in his mother’s robe 

In terror at the glare of those wild eyes, 

To remember their strange light in 
many a dream 

Of after-times ; but youthful maidens, 
taught 

By nature, would interpret half the woe 

That wasted him, would call: him with 
false names 

Brother, and friend, would press his * 
pallid hand 

At parting, and watch, dim through 
tears, the path 

Of his departure from their father’s 
door. 


At length upon the lone Chorasmian 

shore 

He paused, a wide and melancholy waste 

Of putrid marshes. A strong impulse 
urged 

His steps to the sea-shore. 
there, 

Beside a sluggish stream among the 
reeds. 

It rose as he approached, and with strong 
wings 

Scaling the upward sky, bent its bright | 
course 

High over the immeasurable main. 

His eyes pursued its flight. —‘‘ Thou 
hast a home, 

Beautiful bird ; thou voyagest to thine 
home, 

Where thy sweet mate will twine her 
downy neck 

With thine, and welcome thy return 
with eyes 

Bright in the lustre of their own fond 


A swan was. 


oy. 

And hat am I that I should linger 
here, 

With voice far sweeter than thy dying 
notes, 

Spirit more vast than thine, frame more 
attuned 

To beauty, wasting these surpassing 
powers 

In the deaf air, to the blind earth, and 
heaven 

That echoes not my thoughts?” A 
gloomy smile 

Of desperate hope wrinkled his quiver- 
ing lips. 


SHELLEY 


For sleep, he knew, kept most relent- 
lessly 

Its precious charge, and silent death 
exposed, 

Faithless perhaps as sleep, a shadowy 
lure, 

With doubtful smile mocking its own 
strange charms. 


Startled by his own 
looked around. 
There was no fair fiend near him, not a 
sight 
Or sound of awe but in his own deep 
mind. 
A little shallop floating near the shore 
Caught the impatient wandering of his 
gaze. 
It had been long abandoned, for its sides 
Gaped wide with many a rift, and its 
frail joints 
Swayed with the undulations of the tide. 
A restless impulse urged him toembark 
And meet Jone Death on the drear 
ocean’s waste ; 
For well he knew that mighty Shadow 
loves 
The slimy caverns of the populous deep. 


thoughts he 


The day was fair and sunny, sea and 
sky 
Drank its inspiring radiance, and the 
wind 
Swept strongly from the shore, blacken- 
ing the waves. 
Following his eager soul, the wanderer 
Leaped in the boat, he spread his cioak 
aloft 
On the bare mast, and took his lonely 
. seat, 
And felt the boat speed o’er the tran- 
quil sea 
Like a torn cloud before the hurricane. 


As one that in a silver vision floats 
Obedient to the sweep of odorous winds 
Upon resplendent clouds, so rapidly 
Along the dark and ruffled waters fled 
The straining boat.—A whirlwind swept 
it on, 

With fierce gusts and precipitating force, 

Through the white ridges of the chaféd 
sea, 

The waves arose. 
still 

Their fierce necks writhed beneath the 
tempest’s scourge 

Like serpents struggling in a vulture’s 
grasp. 


Higher and higher 


281 





Calm and rejoicing in the fearful war 

Of wave ruining on wave, and blast on 
blast 

Descending, and black flood on whirl- 
pool driven 

With dark obliterating course, he sate : 

As if their genii were the ministers 

Appointed to conduct him to the light 

Of those beloved eyes, the Poet sate 

Holding the steady helm. Evening 
came on, 

The beams of sunset hung their rain- 
bow hues 

High ’mid the shifting domes of sheeted 
spray 

That canopied his path o’er thé waste 
deep ; 

Twilight, ascending slowly from 
east, 

Entwined in duskier wreaths her braided 
locks 

O’er the fair front and radiant eyes of 
day ; 

Night followed, clad with stars. On 
every side 

More horribly the multitudinous streams 

Of ocean’s mountainous waste to mutual 
war 

Rushed in dark tumult thundering, as 
to mock 

The calm and spangled sky. The little 
boat 

Still fled before the storm; still fled, 
like foam 

Down the steep cataract of a wintry 


the 


river ; 

Now pausing on the edge of the riven 
wave; _ 

Now leaving far behind the bursting 
mass 

That fell, convulsing ocean.’ Safely 


fled— 

As if that frai] and wasted human form, 

Had been an elemental god. 

At midnight 

The moon arose: and lo! the ethereal 
cliffs 

Of Caucasus, whose icy summits shone 

Among the stars like sunlight, and 
around 

Whose caverned base the whirlpools 
and the waves 

Bursting and eddying irresistibly 

Rage and resound for ever.—Who shall 
save ?— 

The boat fled on,—the boiling torrent 
drove,— 

The crags closed round with black and 
jagged arms, 


282 


BRITISH POETS 





The shattered mountains overhung the 
sea, 

And faster still, beyond all human speed, 

Suspended on the sw eep of the smooth 
wave, 

The little boat was driven. 
there 

Yawned, and amid its slant and wind- 
ing depths 

Ingulfed the rushing sea. The boat fled 
on 

With unrelaxing speed.—‘‘ Vision and 
Love!” 

The Poet cried aloud, 

The path of thy departure. 
death 

Shall not divide us long!” 

The boat pursued 

The windings of the cavern. Daylight 
shone 

At length upon that gloomy river’s flow ; 

Now, where the fiercest war among the 
waves 

Is caln, on the unfathomable stream 

The boat moved slowly. Where the 
mountain, riven, 

Exposed those black depths to the azure 
sky, 

Ere yet the flood’s enormous volume fell 

Even to the base of Caucasus, with sound 

That shook the everlasting rocks, the 
mass 

Filled with one whirlpool all that ample 
chasm ; 

Stair above stair the eddying water rose, 

Circling immeasurably fast, and laved 

With alternating dash the gnarled roots 

Of mighty trees, that stretched their 
giant arms 

In darkness over it. DT’ the midst was left, 

Reflecting, yet distorting every cloud, 

A pool of treacherous and tremendous 
calm. 

Seized by the sway of the ascending 
stream, 

With dizzy swiftness, round, and round, 
and round, 

Ridge after ridge the straining boat 
arose, 

Till on the verge of the extremest curve, 

Where, through an opening of the rocky 
bank, 

The waters overflow, and a smooth spot 

Of glassy quiet mid those battling tides 

Is left, the boat paused shuddering.— 
Shall it sink 

Down the abyss? 
stress 

Of that resistless gulf embosom it ? 


a cavern 


‘‘T have beheld 
Sleep and 


Shall the reverting 








Now shall it fall ?—A wandering stream 
of wind, 

Breathed from the west, has caught the 
expanded sail, 

And, lo! with gentle motion, between 
banks 

Of mossy slope, and on a placid stream, 

Beneath a woven grove it sails, and hark ! 

The ghastly torrent mingles its far roar, 

With the breeze murmuring in the 
musical woods. 

Where the embowering trees recede, 
and leave | 

A little space of green expanse, the cove 

Is closed by meeting banks, whose 
yellow flowers 

Forever gaze on their own drooping eyes, 

Reflected in the crystalcalm. The wave 

Of the boat’s motion marred their pen- 
sive task, 

Which nought but vagrant bird, or 
wanton wind, 


Or falling spear-grass, or their own 
decay 

Had e’er detntoed before. The Poet 
longed 


To deck with their bright hues his with- 
ered hair, 

But on his heart its solitude returned, 

And he forebore. Not the strong impulse 
hid 

In those flushed cheeks, bent eyes, 
shadowy frame 

Had yet performed its ministry : it hung 

Upon his life, as lightning in a cloud 

Gleams, hovering ere it vanish, ere the 
floods 

Of night close over it. 


and 


The noonday sun 
Now shone upon the forest, one vast 


mass 

Of mingling shade, whose brown mag- 
nificence 

A narrow vale embosoms. There, huge 
Caves, 

Scooped in the dark base of their aéry 
rocks 

Mocking its moans, respond and roar for 
ever, 

The meeting boughs and implicated 
leaves 


Wove twilight o’er ‘the Poet’s path, as led 

By love, or “dream, or god, or mightier 
Death, 

He sought in Nature’s dearest haunt, 
some bank, 

Her cradle, and his sepulchre. More dark 

And dark the shades accumulate. The 
oak, 


SHELLEY 


Expanding its immense and knotty arms, 

Embraces the light beech. The pyra- 
mids 

Of the tall cedar overarching frame 

Most solemn domes within, and far 
below, 

Like clouds suspended in an emerald sky, 

The ash and the acacia floating hang 

Tremulous and pale. Like restless ser- 
pents, clothed 

In rainbow and in fire, the parasites, 

Starred with ten thousand blossoms, 
flow around 

The gray trunks, and, as gamesome in- 
fants’ eyes. 

With gentle meanings, and most in- 
nocent wiles, 

Fold their beams round the hearts of 
those that love, 

These twine their tendrils with 
wedded boughs 

Uniting their close union; the woven 


the 


leaves 

Make network of the dark blue light of 
day, 

And the night’s noontide clearness, 
mutable 


As shapes in the weird clouds. Soft 
mossy lawns 

Beneath these canopies extend their 
swells, 

Fragrant with perfumed herbs, and 
eyed with blooms 

Minute yet beautiful. One darkest glen 

Sends from its woods of musk-rose, 
twined with jasmine, 

A soul-dissolving odor, to invite 

To some more lovely mystery. Through 
the dell, 

Silence and Twilight here, twin-sisters, 
keep ' 

Their noonday watch, and sail among 
the shades, 

Like vaporous shapes half seen ; beyond, 
a well, 

Dark, gleaming, and of most translucent 
wave, 

Images all the woven boughs above, 

And each depending leaf, and every 
speck 

Of azure sky, darting between their 
chasms ; 

Nor aught else in the liquid mirror laves 

Its portraiture, but some inconstant star 

Between one foliaged lattice twinkling 
fair, 

Or painted bird, sleeping beneath the 
moon, 

Or gorgeous insect floating motionless, 


283 


Unconscious of the day, ere yet his wings 
Have spread their glories to the gaze of 
noon. 


Hither the Poet came. 

held 

Their own wan light through the re- 
flected lines 

Of his thin hair, distinct in the dark 
depth 

Of that still fountain; as the human 
heart, 

Gazing in dreams over the gloomy grave, 

Sees its own treacherous likeness there. 


His eyes be- 


He heard 

The motion of the leaves, the grass that 
sprung 

Startled and glanced and trembled even 
to feel 

An unaccustomed presence, and the 
sound ; 

Of the sweet brook that from the secret 
springs 

Of that dark fountain rose. <A Spirit 
seemed 

To stand beside him—clothed in no bright 
robes 


Of shadowy silver or enshrining light, 

Borrowed from aught the visible world 
affords 

Of grace, or majesty, or mystery ;— 

But undulating woods, and silent well, 

And leaping rivulet, and evening gloom 

Now deepening the dark shades, for 
speech assuming, 

Held commune with him, as if he and it 

Were all that was,—only . .. when his 
regard 

Was raised by intense pensiveness, . . . 
two eyes, 

Two starry eyes, hung in the gloom of 
thought, 

And seemed with their serene and azure 
smiles 

To beckon him. 


Obedient to the light 
That shone within his soul, he went, 
pursuing 
The windings of the dell.—The rivulet 
Wanton and wild, through many a green 
ravine 
Beneath the forest flowed. 
it fell 
Among the moss with hollow harmony 
Dark and profound. Now on the polished 


Sometimes 


stones 
It danced ; like childhood laughing as it 
went: 


284 


Then through the plain 
wanderings crept, 

Reflecting every herb and drooping bud 

That overhung its quietness.—‘‘O stream ! 

Whose source is inaccessibly profound, 

Whither do thy mysterious waters tend ? 

Thou imagest my life. Thy darksome 
stillness, 

Thy dazzling waves, thy loud and hollow 
gulfs, 

Thy searchless fountain, and invisible 
course 

Have each their type in me: and the 
wide sky, 

And measureless ocean may declare as 
soon 

What oozy cavern or what wandering 
cloud 

Contains thy waters, as the universe 

Tell where these living thoughts reside, 
when stretched 

Upon thy flowers my bloodless limbs 
shall waste 

TI the passing wind 


in tranquil 


” 
! 


Beside the grassy shore 

Of the small stream he went; he did 
impress 

On the green moss his tremulous step, 
that caught 

Strong shuddering from his burning 
limbs. As one 

Roused by some joyous madness from 
the couch 

Of fever, he did move; yet not like him 

Forgetful of the grave, where, when 
the flame 

Of his frail exultation shall be spent, 

He must descend. With rapid steps he 
went 

Beneath the shade of trees, beside the 
flow 

Of the wild babbling rivulet ; and now 


The forest’s solemn canopies were 
changed 

For the uniform and lightsome evening 
sky. 


Gray rocks did peep from the spare moss, 
and stemmed 

The struggling brook: tall spires of 
windlestrae 

Threw their thin 
rugged slope, 

And nought but gnarled roots of ancient 
pines 

Branchless and blasted, clenched with 
grasping roots 

The unwilling: soil. 
was here, 


shadows down the 


A gradual change 


BRITISH POETS 


Yet ghastly. 
away, 

The smooth brow gathers, and the hair 
grows thin 

And white, and where irradiate dewy 
eyes 

Had shone, gleam stony orbs :—so from 
his steps 

Bright flowers departed, and the beauti- 
ful shade 

Of the green groves, with all their odor- 
ous winds 

And musical motions. 
pursued 

The stream, that with a larger volume 
now 

Rolled through the labyrinthine dell, 
and there 

Fretted a path through its descending 
curves . } 

With its wintry speed. On every side 
now rose 

Rocks, which, in unimaginable forms, 

Lifted their black and barren pinnacles 

In the light of evening, and, its precipice 

Obscuring the ravine, disclosed above, 

Mid toppling stones, black gulfs and 
yawning caves, _ 

Whose windings gave ten thousand 
various tongues 

To the loud stream. Lo! where the pass 
expands 

Its stony jaws, the abrupt mountain 
breaks, 

And seems, with its accumulated crags, 

To overhang the world : for wide expand 

Beneath the wan stars and descending 


For, as fast years flow 


Calm, he still 


moon 

Islanded seas, blue mountains, mighty 
streams, 

Dim tracts and vast, robed in the 


lustrous gloom 
Of leaden-colored even, and fiery hills 
Mingling their flames with twilight, on 
the verge 
Of the remote horizon. The nearscene, 
In naked and severe simplicity, 
Made contrast with the universe. <A 


pine, 

Rock-rooted, stretched athwart the 
vacancy 

Its swinging boughs, to each inconstant 
blast 


Yielding one only response, at each pause 

In most familiar cadence, with the howl 

The thunder and the hiss of homeless 
streams 

Mingling its solemn song, whilst the 
broad river, 


SHELLEY 


Foaming and hurrying o’er its rugged 
path, 

Fell into that immeasurable void 

Scattering its waters to the passing 
winds. : 


Yet the gray precipice and solemn 


pine 

And torrent were not all ;—one silent 
nook 

Was there. Even on the edge of that 


vast mountain, 

Upheld by knotty rootsand fallen rocks, 

It overlooked in its serenity 

The dark earth, and the bending vault 
of stars. 

It was a tranquil spot, that seemed to 
smile 


Even in the lap of horror. Ivy clasped 


The fissured stones with its entwining . 


arms, 
And did embower with leaves for ever 


green, 

And berries dark, the smooth and even 
space 

Of its inviolated floor, and here 

The eran of the autumnal whirlwind 

ore, 

In wanton sport, those bright leaves, 
whose decay, 

Red, yellow, or ethereally pale, 


Rivals the pride of summer. ’Tis the 
haunt 

Of every gentle wind, whose breath can 
- teach 

The wilds to love tranquillity. One 
step, 


One human step alone, has ever broken 
The stillness of its solitude :—one voice 
Alone inspired its echoes ;—even that 


voice 

Which hither came, floating among the 
winds, 

And led the loveliest among human 
forms 

To make their wild haunts the deposi- 


tory 
Of all the grace and beauty that endued 
Its motions, render up its majesty, 


Scatter its music on the unfeeling 
, storm, 
And to the damp leaves and blue cavern 
mould, 
Nurses of rainbow flowers and branch- 
ing moss, 
Commit the colors of that varying 
cheek, 


That snowy breast, those dark and 


drooping eyes. 


285 


The dim and horned moon hung low, 
and poured 
A sea of lustre on the horizon’s verge 


That overflowed its mountains. Yellow 
mist 

Filled the unbounded atmosphere, and 
drank 

Wan moonlight even to fulness: not a 
star 

Shone, not a sound was heard ; the very 
winds, 

Danger’s grim playmates, on that preci- 
pice 


Slept, clasped in his embrace.—O, storm 
of death! 

Whose sightless speed divides this sullen 
night: 

And thou, colossal Skeleton, that, still 

Guiding its irresistible career 

In thy devastating omnipotence, 

Art king of this frail world, from the 


red field 

Of slaughter, from the reeking hos- 
pital, 

The pe ote sacred couch, the snowy 
eC 

Of innocence, the scaffold and _ the 
throne, 

A mighty voice invokes thee. Ruin 
calls 

His brother Death. A rare and regal 
prey 

He hath prepared, prowling around the 
world ; 


Glutted with which thou mayst repose, 
and men 

Go to their graves like flowers or creep- 
ing worms, 

Nor ever more offer at thy dark shrine 

The unheeded tribute of a broken heart. 


When on the threshold of the green 

recess 

The wanderer’s footsteps fell, he knew 
that death 

Was onhim. Yet a little, ere it fled, 

Did he resign his high and holy soul 

To images of the majestic past, 

That paused within his passive being 
now, 

Like winds that bear sweet music, when 
they breathe 

Througa some dim latticed chamber. 
He did place 

His pale lean hand upon the rugged 
trunk 

Of the old pine. Upon an ivied stone 

Reclined his languid head, his limbs did 
rest, 


286 





Diffused and motionless, on the smooth 
brink 

Of that obscurest chasm ;—and thus he 
lay, 

Surrendering to their final impulses 


The hovering powers of life. Hope and 
despair, 

The torturers, slept; no mortal pain or 
fear 


Marred his repose, the influxes of sense, 

And his own being unalloyed by pain, 

Yet feebler and more feeble, calmly fed 

The stream of thought, till he lay breath- 
ing there 

At peace, and faintly smiling :—his last 
sight 

Was the great moon, which o’er the 
western line 

Of the wide world her mighty horn sus- 
pended, 

With whose dun beams inwoven dark- 
ness seemed 

To mingle. Now upon the jaggéd hills 

It rests, and still as the divided frame 

Of the vast meteor sunk, the Poet’s blood, 

That ever beat in mystic sympathy 

With nature’s ebb and flow, grew feebler 
still : 

And when two lessening points of light 
alone 

Gleamed through the darkness, the alter- 
nate gasp 

Of his faint respiration scarce did stir 

The stagnate night :—till the minutest 
ray 

Was quenched, the pulse yet lingered in 
his heart. 

It paused—it fluttered. 
heaven remained 

Utterly black, the murky shades in- 
volved 

An image, silent, cold, and motionless, 

As their own voiceless earth and vacant 
air. 

Kven as a vapor fed with golden beams 

That ministered on sunlight, ere the west 

Eclipses it, was now that wondrous 
frame— 

No sense, no motion, no divinity— 

A fragile lute, on whose harmonious 
strings 

The breath of heaven did wander—a 
bright stream 

Once fed with many-voicéd waves—a 
dream 

Of youth, which night and time have 
quenched forever, 

Still, dark, and dry, and unremembered 
now. 


But when 


BRITISH POETS 


O, for Medea’s wondrous alchemy, 
Which wheresoe’er it fell made the earth 
leam 

With bright flowers, and the wintry 
boughs exhale 

From vernal blooms fresh fragrance! 
O, that God, 

Profuse of poisons, would concede the 
chalice 

Which but one living man has drained, 
who now 

Vessel of deathless wrath, a slave that 
feels 

No proud exemption in the blighting 
curse 

He bears, over the world wanders for 
ever, 

Lone as incarnate death! O, that the 
dream 


‘Of dark magician in his visioned cave, 


Raking the cinders of a crucible 

For life and power, even when his feeble 
hand 

Shakes in its last decay, were the ‘true 
law 

Of this so lovely world ! 
fled 

Like some frail exhalation; which the 
dawn ; 

Robes in its golden beams,—ah! thou 
hast fled ! 

The brave, the gentle, and the beautiful, 

The child of grace and genius. Heart- 
less things 

Are done and said i’ the world, and 
many worms 

And beasts and men live on, and mighty 
Earth 

From sea and mountain, city and wilder- 
ness, 

In vesper low or joyous orison, 

Lifts still its solemn voice :—but thou 


But thou art 


art fled— 

Thou canst no longer know or love the 
shapes 

Of this phantasmal scene, who have to 
thee 


Been purest ministers, who are, alas! 

Now thouart not. Upon those pallid 
lips 

So sweet even in their silence, on those ° 
eyes 

That image sleep in death, upon that 
form 

Yet safe from the worm’s outrage, let 
no tear 

Be shed—not even in thought. 
when those hues 

Are gone, and those divinest lineaments, 


Nor, 


SHELLEY 


287 





Worn by the senseless. wind, shall live 
alone 

In the frail pauses of this simple strain, 

Let not high verse, mourning the 
memory 

Of that which is no more, or painting’s 
woe 

Or sculpture, speak in feeble imagery 

Their own cold powers. Art and elo- 
quence, 

And all the shows o’ the world are frail 
and vain 

To weep a loss that turns their lights to 
shade. 

It isa woe too ‘ deep for tears,” when 
all 

Is reft at once, when some surpassing 
Spirit, 

Whose light adorned the world around 
it, leaves 

Those who remain behind, not sobs or 
groans, 

The passionatetumult of a clinging hope ; 

But pale despair and cold tranquillity, 

Nature’s vast frame, the web of human 
things, 

Birth and the grave, that are not as they 
were. } 1815. March, 1816. 


1 None of Shelley’s poems is more character- 
istic than this. The solemn spirit that reigns 
throughout, the worship of the majesty of na- 
ture, the broodings of a poet’s heart in solitude 
—the mingling of the exulting joy which the 
various aspects of the visible universe inspires 
with the sad and struggling pangs which human 
passion imparts—give a touching interest to the 
whole. The death which he had often contem- 
plated during the last months as certain and 
near he here represented in such colors as had, 
in his lonely musings, soothed his soul to peace. 
The versification sustains the solemn spirit 
which breathes throughout: it is peculiarly 
melodious. The poem ought rather to be con- 
sidered didactic than narrative; it was the out- 
pouring of his own emotions, embodied in the 
purest form he could conceive, painted in the 
ideal hues which his brilliant imagination in- 
spired, and softened by the recent anticipation 
of death. (Mrs. Shelley’s note.) 

The deeper meaning of Alastor is to be found, 
not in the thought of death nor in the poet’s 
recent communings with nature, but in the 
motto from St. Augustine placed upon its title- 
page, andin the Hymn to Intellectual Beauty, 
composed about a year later. Enamored of 
ideal loveliness, the poet pursues his vision 
through the universe, vainly hoping to assuage 
the thirst which has been stimulated in his 
spirit, and vainly longing for some mortal real- 
ization of his love. Alastor, like Epipsychidion, 
reveals the mistake which Shelley made in 
thinking that the idea of beauty could become 
incarnate for him in any earthly form: while 
the Hymn to Intellectual Beauty recognizes the 
truth that such realization of the ideal is im- 
possible. The very last letter written by Shelley 
sets the misconception in its proper light: ‘' I 
think one is always in love with something or 


HYMN TO INTELLECTUAL 
BEAUTY 


I 


THE awful shadow of some unseen Power 


Floats tho’ unseen amongst us,— 
visiting 
This various world with as inconstant 
wing 
As summer winds that creep from flower 
to flower,— 


Like moonbeams that behind some piny 
mountain shower, 
It visits with inconstant glance 
Each human heartand countenance; 
Like hues and harmonies of evening,— 
Like clouds in starlight widely 
spread,— 
Like memory of music fled,— 
Like aught that for its grace may be 
Dear, and yet dearer for its mystery. 


i 


Spirit of BEAUTY, that dost consecrate 
With thine own hues all thou dost 
shine upon 
Of human thought or form,—where 
art thou gone? 
Why dost thou pass away and leave our 
state, 
This dim vast vale of tears, vacant and 
desolate ? 
Ask why the sunlight not for ever 
Weaves rainbows o’er yon mountain 
river, 
Why aught should fail and fade that 
once is shown, 
Why fear and dream and death and 
birth 
Cast on the daylight of this earth 
Such gloom,—why man has such a 


scope 
For love and hate, despondency and 
hope? 
III 
No voice from some sublimer world hath 
ever 
To sage or poet these responses 
given— 


Therefore the names of Demon, 


Ghost, and Heaven, 


other; the error, and I confess it is not easy for 
spirits cased in flesh and blood to avoid it, con- 
sists in seeking in a mortal image the likeness of 
what is, perhaps, eternal.’”’ But this Shelley 
discovered only with ‘‘ the years that bring the 
philosophic mind,” and when he was upon the 
very verge of his untimely death. (Symonds’ 
Life of Shelley.) 


288 


Remain the records of their vain en- 
deavor, 
Frail spells—whose uttered charm might 
not avail to sever, 
From all we hear and all we see, 
Doubt, chance, and mutability. 
Thy light alone—like mist o’er moun- 
tains driven, 
Or music by the night wind sent, 
Thro’ strings of some still instru- 
ment, 
Or moonlight on a midnight stream, 
Gives grace and truth to life’s unquiet 
dream. 


IV 


Love, Hope, and Self-esteem, like clouds 
depart 
And come, for 
moments lent. 
Man were immortal, and omnipotent, 
Didst thou, unknown and awful as thou 
art, 
Keep with thy glorious train firm state 
within his heart. 
Thou messenger of sympathies, 
That wax and wane in lovers’ eyes— 
Thou--that to human thought art 
nourishment, 
Like darkness to a dying flame ! 
Depart not as thy shadow came, 
Depart not—lest the grave should be, 
Like life and fear, a dark reality. 


some uncertain 


Vv 


While yet a boy I sought for ghosts, and 
sped 
Thro’ many a listening chamber, cave 
and ruin, 
And starlight wood, with fearful steps 
pursuing. 
Hopes of high talk with the departed 
dead. 
I called on poisonous names with which 
our youth is fed ; 
I was not heard—I saw them not— 
When musing deeply on the lot 
Of life, at the sweet time when winds 
are Wooing 
All vital things that wake to bring 
News of birds and blossoming,—— 
Sudden, thy shadow fell on me ; 
I shrieked, and clasped my hands in 
ecstasy ! 
vI 


I vowed that I would dedicate my powers 
To thee and thine—have {not kept the 
vow? 


BRITISH POETS 





With beating heart and streaming 
eyes, even now 
I call the phantoms of a thousand hours 
Each from his voiceless grave: they . 
have in visioned bowers 
Of studious zeal or love’s delight 
Outwatched with me the envious 


night— 
They know that never joy illumed my 
brow 
Unlinked with hope that thou 


wouldst free 
This world from its dark slavery, 
That thou—O awful LOVELINEss, 
Wouldst give whate’er these words can- 
not express. 


VII 


The day becomes more solemn and serene 
When noon is past—there is a har- 
mony 
In autumn, and a lustre in its sky, 
Which thro’ the summer is not heard or 
seen, 
Asif it could not be, asif it had not been ! 
Thus let thy power, which like the 
truth 
Of nature on my passive youth 
Descended, to my onward life supply 
Its calm—to one who worships thee, 
And every form containing thee, 
Whom, Spirit fair, thy spells did 
bind 
To fear himself, and love all human kind. 
1816..\1819, 


MONT BLANC1 


LINES WRITTEN IN THE VALE OF 
CHAMOUNI 


THE everlasting universe of things 
Flows through the mind, and rolls its 
rapid waves, 


1 Mont Blane was inspired by a view of that 
mountain and its surrounding peaks and val- 
leys, as he lingered on the Bridge of Arve on his 
way through the Valley of Chamouni. Shelley 
makes the following mention of this poem in his 
publication of the History of a Six Weeks’ Tour, 
and Letters from Switzerland; ‘‘ The poem en- 
titled Mont Blanc is written by the author of 
the two letters from Chamouni and Vevai. It 
was composed under the immediate impression 
of the deep and powerful feelings excited by the 
objects which it attempts to describe ; and, as 
an undisciplined overflowing of the soul, rests 
its claim to approbation on an attempt to 
imitate the untamable wildness and inaccessible 
solemnity from which those feelings sprang.”’ 
(from Mrs. Shelley’s Note on the Poems of 1816.) 
Compare Coleridge’s Hymn before Sunrise in 


‘SHELLEY 


289 





Now dark—now glittering—now reflect- 


ing gloom— 
Now lending splendor, where from secret 
_ springs 
The source of human thought its tribute 
brings | 
Of waters,—with a sound but half its 


own, 

Such as a feeble brook will oft assume 

In the wild woods, among the mountains 
lone, 

Where waterfalls around it leap for ever, 

Where woods and winds contend, and a 
vast river 

Over its rocks ceaselessly bursts and 
raves. 


Thus thou, Ravine of Arve—dark, deep 
Ravine— 

Thou many-colored, many-voicéd vale, 

Over mpoee pines, and crags, and caverns 
sai 

Fast cloud shadows and sunbeams: 
awful scene, 

Where Power in likeness of the Arve 
comes down 

From the ice gulfs that gird his secret 
throne, 

Bursting through these dark mountains 
like the flame 

Of lightning thro’ the tempest ;—thou 
dost lie, 

Thy giant brood of pines around thee 
clinging, 

Children of elder time, in whose devotion 

The chainless winds still come and ever 
came 

To drink their odors, and their mighty 
swinging 

To hear—an old and solemn harmony ; 

Thine earthly rainbows stretched across 
the sweep 

Of the ethereal waterfall, whose veil 

Robes some unsculptured image; the 
strange sleep 

~ Which when the voices of the desert fail 

Wraps all in its own deep eternity ;— 

Thy caverns echoing to the Arve’s com- 
motion, 

A loud, lone sound no other sound can 
tame ; 

Thou art pervaded with that ceaseless 

motion, 

Thou art the path of that unresting 
sound— 


the Vale of Chamouni (p. 96). Coleridge had 
never been in the Vale of Chamouni, and drew 
the suggestion and part of the substance of his 
Hyman from a poem by Frederike Brun. 


-) 


sf 


Dizzy Ravine! and when I gaze on thee 

I seem as ina trance sublime and strange 

To muse on my own separate phantasy, 

My own, my human mind, which pas- 
sively 

Now renders and receives fast influenc- 
ings, 

Holding an unremitting interchange 

With the clear universe of things around ; 

One legion of wild thoughts, whose 
wandering wings 

Now float above thy darkness, and now 
rest 

Where that or thou art no unbidden 
guest, 

In the still cave of the witch Poesy, 

Seeking among the shadows that pass 


i 
Ghosts of all things that are, some shade 
of thee, 

Some phantom, some faint image ; till 
the breast 
From which they fled recalls them, thou 

art there ! 


Some say that gleams of a remoter world 

Visit the soul in sleep,—that death is 
slumber, 

And that its shapes the busy thoughts 


outnumber 

Of those who wake and live.—-I look on 
high ; 

Has some unknown omnipotence un- 
furled 


The veil of life and death? or do I lie 

In dream, and does the mightier world 
of sleep 

Spread far around and inaccessibly 

Its circles? For the very spirit fails, 

Driven like a homeless cloud from steep 
to steep 

That vanishes among the viewless gales ! 

Far, far above, piercing the infinite sky, 

Mont Blanc appears,—still, snowy, and 


serene— 

Its subject mountains their unearthly 
forms 

Pile around it, ice and rock; broad vales 
between 


Of frozen floods, unfathomable deeps, 
Blue as the overhanging heaven, that 
spread 
wind 
steeps ; 
A desert peopled by the storms alone, 
Save when the eagle brings some hunter’s 
bone, 

the wolf tracks her 
hideously 


And the accumulated 


among 


And there—how 


290 


Its shapes are heaped around! rude, 
bare, and high, 

Ghastly, and scarred, and riven.—Is this 
the scene 

Where the old Earthquake-demon 
taught her young 

Ruin? Were these their toys? or did 
a sea 

Of fire envelope once this silent snow ? 

None can reply—all seems eternal now. 

The wilderness has a mysterious tongue 

Which teaches awful doubt, or faith so 
mild, 

So solemn, so serene, that man may be 

But for such faith with nature re- 
conciled ; 

Thou hast a voice, great Mountain, to 


repeal 

Large codes of fraud and woe ; not 
understood 

By all, but which the wise, and great, 
and good 


Interpret, or make felt, or deeply feel. 


The fields, the lakes, the forests, and the 


streams, 

Ocean, and all the living things that 
dwell 

Within the dzedal earth ; lightning and 
rain, 

Earthquake, and fiery flood, and hurri- 
cane, 

The torpor of the year when feeble 
dreams 


Visit the hidden buds, or dreamless sleep 

Holds every future leaf and flower ;— 
the bound 

With which from that detested trance 
they leap ; 

The works and ways of man, their death 
and birth, 

And that of him and all that his may be ; 

All things that move and breathe with 
toil and sound 

Are born and die; revolve, subside and 
swell. 

Power dwells apart in its tranquillity 

Remote, serene, and inaccessible : 

And this, the naked countenance of 


earth, 

On which I gaze, even these primeval 
mountains 

Teach theadverting mind. The glaciers 


creep 

Like snakes that watch their prey, from 
their far fountains, 

Slow rolling on ; there, many a precipice, 

Frost and the Sun in scorn of mortal 
power 


BRITISH POETS 


Have piled: dome, pyramid, and pin- 
nacle, 

A city of death, distinct with many a 
tower 

And wall impregnable of beaming ice. 

Yet not a city, but a flood of ruin 

Is there, that from the boundaries of 
the sky 

Rolls its perpetual stream; vast pines 
are strewing 

Its destined path, or in the mangled soil 

Branchless and shattered stand; the 
rocks, drawn down 

From yon remotest waste, have over- 
thrown 

The limits of the dead and living world, 

Never to be reclaimed. The dwelling- 
place 

Of insects, beasts, and birds, becomes 
its spoil ; 

Their food and their retreat for ever 
gone, 

So much of life and joy is lost. Therace 

Of man, flies far in dread ; his work and 
dwelling 

Vanish, like smoke before the tempest’s 
stream, 

And their place is not known. 
vast caves 

Shine in the rushing torrents’ restless 
gleam, 

Which from those secret chasms in 
tumult welling 


Below, 


| Meet in the vale, and one majestic River, 


The breath and blood of distant lands, 
for ever 

Rolls its loud waters to the ocean waves, 

Breathes its swift vapors to the circ-. 
ling air. 


Mont Blanc yet gleams on high :—the 
power is there, 

The still and solemn power of many 
sights, 

And many sounds, and much of life and 
death. 

In the calm darkness of the moonless 
nights, 

In the lone glare of day, the snows 
descend 

Upon that Mountain ; 
them there, 

Nor when the flakes burn in the sinking 
sun, 

Or the star-beams dart through them : 
—Winds contend 

Silently there, and heap the snow with 
breath 

Rapid and strong, but silently ! Its home 


none beholds 


SHELLEY 


291 





The voiceless lightning in these solitudes 

Keeps innocently, and like vapor broods 

Over the snow. The secret strength of 
things 

Which governs thought, and to the in- 
finite dome 

Of heaven is as a law, inhabits thee ! 

And what were thou, and earth, and 
stars, and sea, 

If to the human mind’s imaginings 

Silence and solitude were vacancy ? 

July 23, 1816. 1817. 


TO MARY —— — 
DEDICATION OF THE REVOLT OF ISLAM 


So now my summer task is ended, Mary, 
And I return to thee, inine own heart’s 
home ; 
As to his Queen some victor Knight of 
Faéry, 
Earning bright spoils for her en- 
chanted dome ; 
Nor thou disdain that, ere my fame 
become . 
A star among the stars of mortal night, 
If it indeed may cleaveits natal gloom, 
Its doubtful promise thus I would unite 
With thy beloved name, thou Child of 
love and light. 


The toil which stole from thee so many 
an hour 
Is ended—and the fruit is at thy feet ! 
No longer where the woods to frame @ 
bower 
With interlacéd branches 
meet, 
Or where, with sound like many voices 
sweet, 
Waterfalls leap among wild 
green . 
Which framed for my lone boat a 
lone retreat 
Of moss-grown trees and weeds, shall I 
be seen : 
But beside thee, where still my heart 
has ever been. 


mix and 


islands 


Thoughts of great deeds were mine, 
dear Friend, when first 

The clouds which wrap this world 

from youth did pass. 


I do remember well the hour which 
burst 
My spirit’s sleep : a fresh Maydawn it 
was 


When I walked forth upon the glitter- 
ing grass, 


And wept, I knew not why: until there 

rose 
From the near schoolroom voices 

that, alas! 

Were but one echo from a world of 
woes— 

The harsh and grating strife of tyrants 
and of foes. 


And then I clasped my hands, and 
looked around, 
But none was near 
streaming eyes, 
Which poured their warm drops on 
the sunny ground— 
So, without shame, I spake :—‘‘ I will 
be wise, 
And just, and free, and mild, if in me 
lies 
Such power, for I grow weary to behold 
The selfish and the strong still tyran- 
nize 
Without reproach or check.” 
controlled 
My tears, my heart grew calm, and I 
was meek and bold. 


to mock my 


I then 


And from that hour did I with earnest 
thought 
Heap knowledge 
mines of lore, 
Yet nothing that my tyrants knew or 
taught 
I cared to learn, but from that secret 
store 
Wrought linkéd armor for my soul, 
before 
It might walk forth to war among man- 
kind ; 
Thus power and hope were strength- 
ened more and more 
Within me, till there came upon my 
mind 
A sense of loneliness, a thirst with which 
I pined. 


from forbidden 


Alas that love should be a blight and 
snare 
To those who seek all sympathies in 
one !— 
Such once I sought in vain ; then black 
despair, 
The shadow of a starless night, was 
thrown 
Over the world in 
alone : 
Yet never found I one not false to me, 
Hard hearts, and cold, like weights 
of icy stone 


which I moved 


292 


Which crushed and withered mine, 
that could not be 
Aught but a lifeless clog, until revived 


by thee. 


Thou Friend, whose presence on my 
wintry heart 
Fell, like bright Spring upon some 
herbless plain, 
How beautiful and calm and free thou 
wert 
In thy young wisdom, when 
mortal chain 
Of Custom thou didst burst and rend 
in twain, 
And walk as free as light the clouds 
among, 
Which many an envious slave then 
breathed in vain 
From his dim dungeon, and my spirit 
sprung 
To meet thee from the woes which had 
begirt it long! 


the 


No more alone through the world’s 
wilderness, 
Although I trod the paths: of high 
intent, 
I journeyed now: 
less, 
Where solitude 
went.— 
There is the wisdom of a stern content 
When Poverty can blight the just and 


no more compan ion- 


is like despair, I 


good, 
When Infamy dares mock the in- 
nocent, 
And cherished friends turn with the 
multitude 


To trample: this was ours, and we un- 
shaken stood ! 


Now has descended a serener hour, 
And, with inconstant fortune, friends 
return ; 
Though suffering leaves the knowledge 
and the power 
Which says ‘‘ Let scorn be not repaid 
with scorn.” 
And from thy side two gentle babes 
are born 
To fill our home with smiles, and thus 
are we 
Most fortunate beneath life’s beaming 
morn: 
And these delights, and thou, have been 
to me 
The parents of the Song I consecrate to 
thee. 


BRITISH (POETS 


Ig it that now my inexperienced fingers 
But strike the prelude of a loftier 
strain ? 
Or must the lyre on which my spirit 
lingers 
Soon pause in silence, ne’er to sound 
again, 
Though it might shake the Anarch 
Custom’s reign, 
And charm the minds of men to Tr uth’ 8 
own sway. 
Holier than was Amphion’s? I would 
fain 
Reply in hope—but I am worn away, 
And Death and Love are yet contending 
for their prey. 


And what art thou? I know, but dare 
not speak : 
Time may interpret to his silent years. 
Yet in the paleness of thy thoughtful 
cheek, 
And in the light thine ample fore- 
head wears, 
And in thy sweetest smiles, and in 
thy tears, 
And in thy gentle speech, a prophecy 
Is whispered, to subdue my fondest 
fears : 
And, through thine eyes, even in thy 
soul I see 
A lamp of vestal fire burning internally. 


They say that thou wert lovely from 
thy birth, 
Of glorious parents, 
Child. 
I wonder not—for One then left this 
earth 
Whose life was like a setting planet 
mild, 
Which clothed thee in the radiance 
undefiled 
Of its departing glory; still her fame 
Shines on thee, through the tempests 
dark and wild 
Which shake these latter 
thou canst claim 
The shelter, from thy Sire, of an im- 
mortal name. 


thou aspiring 


days; and 


One voice came forth from many a 
mighty spirit 
Which was the echo of three-thousand 


years ; 
And the tumultuous world stood mute 
to hear it, 
As some lone man who in a desert 
hears 


SHELLEY 


The music of his home :—unwonted 
fears 
Fell on the pale oppressors of our race, 
And Faith and Custom and_ low- 
thoughted cares, 
Like thunder-stricken dragons, for a 
space 
Left the torn human heart, their food 
and dwelling-place. 


Truth’s deathless voice pauses among 
mankind ! 
If there must be no response to my 
cry— 
If men must rise and stamp, with fury 
blind, 
On his pure name who loves them— 
thou and I, 
Sweet friend! 
tranquillity 
Like lamps into the world’s tempestuous 
night,— 
Two tranquil stars, while clouds are 
passing by 
Which wrap them from the foundering 
seaman’s sight, 
That burn from year to year with unex- 
tinguished light. 


can look from our 


1817. 1818. 


OZYMANDIAS 

I MET a traveller from an. 

land 

_ Who said: Two vast and trunkless legs 
of stone 

Stand in the desert. 
the sand, 

Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose 
frown, 

And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold 
command, 

Tell that its sculptor well those passions 
read 

Which yet survive, stamped on these 
lifeless things, 

The hand that mocked them and the 
heart that fed : 

And on the pedestal these words appear : 

‘“My name is Ozymandias, king of 
kings : 

Look on my works, ye Mighty, and 

’ despair!” 


antique 


Near them, on 


Nothing beside remains. Round the 
decay 

Of that BOISE wreck, boundless and 
bare 


The lone and level sands stretch far 
away. LOL TT ree. 


ooo 
ON A FADED VIOLET 


THE odor from the flower is gone 
Which like thy kisses breathed on me ; 

The color from the flower is flown 
Which glowed of thee and only thee! 


A shrivelled, lifeless, vacant form, 
It lies on my abandoned br east, 

And mocks the heart which yet is warm, 
With cold and silent rest. 


I weep,—my tears revive it not ! 
I sigh,—it breathes no more on me ; 
Its mute and uncomplaining lot 
Is such as mine should be. 
1818. 1824. 


LINES WRITTEN AMONG THE 
EUGANEAN HILLS 


MANY a green isle needs must be 

In the deep wide sea of misery, 

Or the mariner, worn and wan, 
Never thus could voyage on 

Day and night, and night and day, 
Drifting on his dreary way. 

With the solid darkness black 
Closing round his vessel’s track ; 
Whilst above the sunless sky, 

Big with clouds, hangs heavily, 
And behind the tempest fleet 
Hurries on with lightning feet, 
Riving sail, and cord, and plank, 
Till the ship has almost drank 
Death from the o’er-brimming deep ; 
And sinks down, down, like that sleep 
When the dreamer seems to be 
Weltering through eternity ; 

And the dim low line before 

Of a dark and distant shore 

Still recedes, ag ever still 

Longing with divided will, 

But no power to seek or shun, 

He is ever drifted on 

O’er the unreposing wave 

To the haven of the grave. 

What, if there no friends will greet ; 
What, if there no heart will meet 
His with love’s impatient beat ; 
Wander wheresoe’er he may, 

Can he dream before that day 

To find refuge from distress 

In friendship’s smile, in love’s caress? 
Then ’twill wreak him little woe 
Whether such there be or no: 
Senseless is the breast, and cold, 
Which relenting love would fold ; 
Bloodless are the veins and chill 


294 


BRITISH POETS 








Which the pulse of pain did fill ; 
Every little living nerve 

That from bitter words did swerve 
Round the tortured lips and brow, 
Are like sapless leaflets now 

Frozen upon December’s bough. 

On the beach of a northern sea 
Which tempests shake eternally, 

As once the wretch there lay to sleep, 
Lies a solitary heap, 

One white skull and seven dry bones, 
On the margin of the stones, 

Where a few gray rushes stand, 
Boundaries of the sea and land : 

Nor is heard one voice of wail 

But the sea-mews, as they sail 

O’er the billows of the gale ; 

Or the whirlwind up and down 
Howling, like a slaughtered town, 
When a king in glory rides 

Through the pomp of fratricides : 
Those unburied bones around 

There is many a mournful sound ; 
There is no lament for him, 

Like a sunless vapor, dim, 

Who once clothed with life and thought 
What now moves nor murmurs not. 


Ay, many flowering islands lie 

In the waters of wide Agony : 

To such a one this morn was led, 

My bark by soft winds piloted : 

’Mid the mountains Euganean 

I stood listening to the peean, 

With which the legioned rooks did hail 
The sun’s uprise majestical ; 

Gathering round with wings all hoar, 
Thro’ the dewy mist they soar 

Like gray shades, till the eastern heaven 
Bursts, and then, as clouds of even, 
Flecked with fire and azure, lie 

In the unfathomable sky, 

So their plumes of purple grain, 

Starred with drops of golden rain, 
Gleam above the sunlight woods, 

As in silent multitudes 

On the morning’s fitful gale 

Thro’ the broken mist they sail, 

And the vapors cloven and gleaming 
Follow down the dark steep streaming, 
Till all is bright, and clear, and still, 
Round the solitary hill. 


Beneath is spread like a green sea 
The waveless plain of Lombardy, 
Bounded by the vaporous air, 
Islanded by cities fair ; 
Underneath day’s azure eyes 
Ocean’s nursling, Venice lies, 


A peopled labyrinth of walls, 
Amphitrite’s destined halls, 
Which her hoary sire now paves 
With his blue and beaming waves. 
Lo! the sun upsprings behind, 
Broad, red, radiant, half reclined 
On the level quivering line 

Of the waters crystalline ; 

And before that chasm of light, 
As within a furnace bright, 
Column, tower, and dome, and spire, 
Shine like obelisks of fire, 
Pointing with inconstant motion 
From the altar of dark ocean 

To the sapphire-tinted skies ; 

As the flames of sacrifice 

From the marble shrines did rise, 
As to pierce the dome of gold 
Where Apollo spoke of old. 


Sun-girt City, thou has been 
Ocean’s child, and then his queen ; 
Now is come a darker day, 

And thou soon must be his prey, 

If the power that raised thee here 
Hallow so thy watery bier. 

A less drear ruin then than now, 
With thy conquest-branded brow 
Stooping to the slave of slaves 
From thy throne, among the waves 
Wilt thou be, when the sea-mew 
Flies, as once before it flew, 

O’er thine isles depopulate, 

And all is in its ancient state, 

Save where many a palace gate 
With green sea-flowers overgrown 
Like a rock of ocean’s own, 

Topples o’er the abandoned sea 

As the tides change sullenly. 

The fisher on his watery way, 
Wandering at the close of day, 
Will spread his sail and seize his oar 
Till he pass the gloomy shore, 

Lest thy dead should, from their sleep 
Bursting o’er the starlight deep, 
Lead a rapid masque of death 

O’er the waters of his path. 


Those who alone thy towers behold 
Quivering through aérial gold, 
As I now behold them here, 
Would imagine not they were 
Sepulchres, where human forms, 
Like pollution-nourished worms 
To the corpse of greatness cling, 
Murdered, and now mouldering : 
But if Freedom should awake 

In her omnipotence, and shake 
From the Celtic Anarch’s hold 


SHELLEY 295 





All the keys of dungeons cold, 
Where a hundred cities lie 

Chained like thee, ingloriously, 
Thou and all thy sister band 

Might adorn this sunny land, 
Twining memories of old time 

With new virtues more sublime ; 

If not, perish thou and they, 

Clouds which stain truth’s rising day 
By her sun consumed away, 

Earth can spare ye: while like flowers, 
In the waste of years and hours, 
From your dust new nations spring 
With more kindly blossoming. 
Perish—let there only be 

Floating o’er thy hearthless sea 

As the garment of thy sky 

Clothes the world immortally, 

One remembrance, more sublime 
Than the tattered pall of time, 
Which scarce hides thy visage wan ;— 
That a tempest-cleaving Swan ! 

Of the songs of Albion, 

Driven from his ancestral streams 
By the might of evil dreams, 

Found a nest in thee; and Ocean 
Welcomed him with such emotion 
That its joy grew his, and sprung 
From his lips like music flung 

O’er a mighty thunder-fit 
Chastening terror :—what though yet 
Poesy’s unfailing River, 

Which thro’ Albion winds for ever 
Lashing with melodious wave 

Many a sacred Poet’s grave, 

Mourn its latest nursling fled ? 

What though thou with all thy dead 
Scarce can for this fame repay 
Aught thine own? oh, rather say, 
Though thy sins and slaveries foul 
Overcloud a sunlike soul ?— 

As the ghost of Homer clings 

Round Scamander’s wasting springs ; 
As divinest Shakespere’s might 

Fills Avon and the world with light 
Like omniscient power which he 
Imaged ’mid mortality ; 

As the love from Petrarch’s urn, 

Yet amid yon hills doth burn, 

A quenchless lamp by which the heart 
Sees things unearthly ;—so thou art 
Mighty spirit—so shall be 

The City that did refuge thee. 


Lo, the sun floats up the sky 
Like thought-wingeéd Liberty, 
Till the universal light 

Seems to level plain and height ; 


1 Byron. 


From the sea a mist has spread, 
And the beams of morn lie dead 
On the towers of Venice now, 

Like its glory long ago. 

By the skirts of that gray cloud 
Many-domeéd Padua proud 

Stands, a peopled solitude, 

*Mid the harvest-shining plain, 
Where the peasant heaps his grain 
In the garner of his foe, 

And the milk-white oxen slow 
With the purple vintage strain, 
Heaped upon the creaking wain, 
That the brutal Celt may swill 
Drunken sleep with savage will; 
And the sickle to the sword 

Lies unchanged, though many a lord, 
Like a weed whose shade is poison, 
Overgrows this region’s foison, 
Sheaves of whom are ripe to come 
To destruction’s harvest home : 

Men must reap the things they sow, 
Force from force must ever flow, 

Or worse; but ’tis a bitter woe 
That love or reason cannot change 
The despot’s rage, the slave’s revenge. 


Padua, thou within whose walls 
Those mute guests at festivals, 

Son and Mother, Death and Sin, 
Played at dice for Ezzelin, 

Till Death cried, ‘‘I win, I win!” 
And Sin cursed to lose the wager, 
But Death promised, to assuage her, 
That he would petition for 

Her to be made Vice-Emperor, 
When the destined years were o’er, 
Over all between the Po 

And the eastern Alpine snow, 
Under the mighty Austrian. 

Sin smiled so as Sin only can, 

And since that time, ay, long before, 
Both have ruled from shore to shore, 
That incestuous pair, who follow 
Tyrants as the sun the swallow, 

As Repentance follows Crime, 

And as changes follow Time. 


In thine halls the lamp of learning, 
Padua, now no more is burning ; 
Like a meteor, whose wild way 

Is lost over the grave of day, 

It gleams betrayed and to betray : 
Once remotest nations came 

To adore that sacred flame, 

When it lit not many a hearth 

On this cold and gloomy earth : 
Now new fires from antique light 
Spring beneath the wide world’s might ; 


296 BRITISH POETS 


But their spark lies dead in thee, 
Trampled out by tyranny. 

As the Norway woodman quells, 

In the depth of piny dells, 

One light flame among the brakes, 
While the boundless forest shakes, 
And its mighty trunks are torn 

By the fire thus lowly born: 

The spark beneath his feet is dead, 
He starts to see the flames it fed 
Howling through the darkened sky 
With a myriad tongues victoriously, 
And sinks down in fear: so thou, 

O Tyranny, beholdest now 

Light around thee, and thou hearest 
The loud flames ascend, and fearest: 
Grovel on the earth; ay, hide 

In the dust thy purple pride ! 


Noon descends around me now: 
Tis the noon of autumn’s glow, 
When a soft and purple mist 

Like a vaporous amethyst, ~ 

Or an air-dissolvéd star 

Mingling light and fragrance, far 
From the curved horizon’s bound 
To the point of heaven’s profound, 
Fills the overflowing sky ; 

And the plains that silent lie 
Underneath, the leaves unsodden 
Where the infant frost has trodden 
With his morning-wingéd feet, 
Whose bright print is gleaming yet ; 
And the red and golden vines, 
Piercing with their trellised lines 
The rough, dark-skirted wilderness ; 
The dun and bladed grass no less, 
Pointing from this hoary tower 

In the windless air: the flower 
Glimmering at my feet; the line 
Of the olive-sandalled Apennine, 

In the south dimly islanded ; 

And the Alps, whose snows are spread 
High between the clouds and sun ; 
And of living things each one ; 

And my spirit which so long 
Darkened this swift stream of song, 
Interpenetrated lie 

By the glory of the sky: 

Be it love, light, harmony, 

Odor or the soul of all 

Which from heaven like dew doth fall, 
Or the mind which feeds this verse 
Peopling the lone universe. 


Noon descends, and after noon 
Autumn’s evening meets me soon, 
Leading the infantine moon, 

And that one star, which to her 


Almost seems to minister 

Half the crimson light she brings 
From the sunset’s radiant springs: 
And the soft dreams of the morn 
(Which like wingéd winds had borne. 
To that silent isle, which lies 

*Mid remembered agonies, 

The frail bark of this lone being) 
Pass, to other sufferers fleeing, 
And its ancient pilot, Pain, 

Sits beside the helm again. 


Other flowering isles must be 

In the sea of life and agony : 

Other spirits float and flee 

O’er that gulf : even now, perhaps, 

On some rock the wild wave wraps, 

With folded wings they waiting sit 

For my bark, to pilot it 

To some calm and blooming cove, 

Where for me, and those I love, 

May a windless bower be built, 

Far from passion, pain, and guilt, 

In a dell ’mid lawny hills, 

Which the wild sea-murmur fills, 

And soft sunshine, and the sound 

Of old forests echoing round, 

And the light and smell divine 

Of all flowers that breathe and shine: 

We may live so happy there, 

That the spirits of the air, 

Envying us, may even entice 

To our healing paradise 

The polluting multitude ; 

But their rage would be subdued 

By that clime divine and calm, 

And the winds whose wings rain balm 

On the uplifted soul, and leaves 

Under which the bright sea heaves ; 

While each breathless interval 

In their whisperings musical 

The inspired soul supplies 

With its own deep melodies, 

And the love which heals all strife 

Circling, like the breath of life, 

All things in that sweet abode 

With its own mild brotherhood : 

They, not it, would change; and soon 

Every sprite beneath the moon 

Would repent its envy vain, 

And the earth grow young again. 
October, 1818. 1819. 


STANZAS 


WRITTEN IN DEJECTION, NEAR NAPLES 


THE sun is warm, the sky is clear, 
The waves are dancing fast and bright, 


SHELLEY 


oe 





Blue isles and snowy mountains wear 
The purple noon’s transparent might, 
The breath of the moist earth is light, 

Around its unexpanded buds ; 

Like many a voice of one delight, 
The winds, the birds, the ocean floods, 
The City’s voice itself is soft like Soli- 

tude’s. 


I see the Deep’s untrampled floor 
With green and purple seaweeds 
strown ; 
I see the waves upon the shore, 
Like light dissolved in star-showers, 
thrown: 
I sit upon the sands alone, 
The lightning of the noontide ocean 
Is flashing round me, and a tone 
Arises from its measured motion, 
How sweet! did any heart now share in 
my emotion. 


Alas! I have nor hope nor health, 
Nor peace within nor calm around, 

Nor that content surpassing wealth 
The sage in meditation found, 


And walked with inward — glory 
crowned— 
Nor fame, nor power, nor love, nor leis- 
ure. 


Others I see whom these surround— 
Smiling they live, and call life pleas- 
ure ;— 
To me that cup has been dealt in another 
measure. 


Yet now despair itself is mild, 
Even as the winds and waters are ; 
I could lie down like a tired child, 
And weep away the life of care 
Which I have borne and yet must 
bear, 
Till death like sleep might steal on me, 
And I might feel in the warm air 
My cheek grow cold, and hear the sea 
Breathe o’er my dying brain its last 
monotony. 


Some might lament that I were cold, 
As I, when this sweet day is gone, 
Which my lost heart, too soon grown 
old, 
Insults with this untimely moan ; 
They might lament—for Iam one 





Unlike this day, Rie when the sun 
Shall on its stainless glory set, 
Will linger; though enjoyed, like joy in 
memory yet. 1818. 1842. 


SONNET: ENGLAND IN 1819 


AN old, mad, blind, despised, and dying 
king,— 

Princes, the dregs of their dull race, 
who flow 

Through public scorn,—mud from a 
muddy spring,— 

Rulers who neither see, nor feel, nor 
know, 

But pee to their fainting country 
cling, 

Till aed drop, blind in blood, without a 

ow,— 

A people starved and stabbed in the 
untilled field,— 

An army, which liberticide and prey 

Makes as a two-edged sword to all who 
wield 

Golden and sanguine laws which tempt 
and slay ; 

Religion Christless, 
sealed ; 

A Senate,—Time’s worst statute unre- 
pealed,— 

Are graves, from 
Phantom may 

Burst, to illumine our tempestuous day. 

1819. 1839. 


Godless—a _ book 


which a glorious 


ODE TO THE WEST WIND! 
I 


O wiLp West Wind, thou breath of 
Autumn’s being, 

Thou, from whose unseen presence the 
leaves dead 

Are driven, like ghosts from an en- 
chanter fleeing, 


Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic 
red, 

Pestilence-stricken multitudes : O thou, 

Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed 


The wingéd seeds, where they le cold 
and low, 


1This poem was conceived and chiefly written 
in a wood that skirts the Arno, near Florence, 
and on a day when that tempestuous wind, 
whose temperature is at once mild and animat- 
ing, was collecting the vapors which pour down 
the autumnal rains. They began, as I foresaw, 
at sunset with a violent tempest of hail and rain, 
attended by that magnificent thunder and light- 
ning peculiar to the Cisalpine regions. 

The phenomenon alluded to at the conclusion 
of the third stanza is well known to naturalists. 
The vegetation at the bottom of the sea, of 
rivers, and of lakes, sympathizes with that of 
the land in the change of seasons, and is conse- 
quently influenced by the winds which announce 
it. (Shelley's note.) 


298 


BRITISH POETS 





Each lke a corpse within its grave, until 
Thine azure sister of the spring shall blow 


Her clarion o’er the dreaming earth, 
and fill 

(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed 
in air) 

With ene hues and odors plain and 
rill ; 


Wild Spirit, which art moving every- 
where: 
Destroyer and preserver ; hear, Oh hear! 


II 


Thou on whose stream, ’mid the steep 
sky’s commotion, 

Loose clouds like earth’s decaying leaves 
are shed, 

Shook from the tangled boughs of 
Heaven and Ocean, 


Angels of rain and lightning: there are 
spread 

On the blue surface of thine airy surge, 

Like the bright hair uplifted from the 
head 


Of some fierce Meenad, even from the 
dim verge 

Of the horizon to the zenith’s height 

The locks of the approaching storm. 
Thou dirge 


Of the dying year, to which this closing 
night 

Will be the dome of a vast sepulchre, 

Vaulted with all thy congregated might 


Of vapors, from whose solid atmosphere 
Black rain, and fire, and hail will burst : 
Oh hear! 


III 


Thou who didst waken from his sum- 
mer dreams 

The blue Mediterranean, where he lay, 

Lulled by the coil of his crystalline 
streams, 


Beside a pumice isle in Baize’s bay, 

And saw in sleep old palaces and towers 

Quivering within the wave’s intenser 
day, 

All overgrown with and 
flowers 

So sweet, the sense faints picturing 
them! Thou | 


azure moss 


For whose path the Atlantic’s level 


powers 


Cleave themselves into chasms, while 
far below 

The sea-blooms and the oozy woods 
which wear. 

The sapless foliage of the ocean, know 


Thy voice, and suddenly grow gray with 


fear, 
And tremble and despoil themselves : 
Oh hear! 


IV 


If I werea dead leaf thou mightest bear ; 

If I were a swift cloud to fly with thee ; 

A wave to pant beneath thy power, and 
share 


The impulse of thy strength, only less free 
Than thou, O uncontrollable! If even 
I were as in my boyhood, and could be 


The comrade of thy wanderings over 
heaven, 

As then, when to outstrip thy skiey speed 

Scarce seemed a vision ; I would ne’er 
have striven 


As thus with thee in prayer in my sore 
need. 

Oh lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud ! 

I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed ! 


A heavy weight of hours has chained 
and bowed 

One too like thee: tameless, and swift, 
and proud. 


Vv 


Make me thy lyre, even as the forest is: 
What if my leaves are falling like its own! 
The tumult of thy mighty harmonies 


Will take from both a deep, autumnal 
tone, 

Sweet though in sadness. 
spirit fierce, 

My spirit ! Bethou me, impetuous one ! 


Be thou, 


Drive my dead thoughts over the universe 

Like withered leaves to quicken a new 
birth ! 

And, by the incantation of this verse, 


Seatter, as from an unextinguished 


hearth 
Ashes and sparks, my words among 
mankind ! Z 


Be through my lips to unawakened earth 


SHELLEY 


The trumpet of a prophecy! O, wind, 
If Winter comes, can Spring be far be- 
hind ? 1819. 1820. 


THE INDIAN SERENADE 


I ARISE from dreams of thee 

In the first sweet sleep of night, 
When the winds are breathing low, 
And the stars are shining bright : 

I arise from dreams of thee, 

And a spirit in my feet 

Hath led me—who knows how! 

To thy chamber window, Sweet ! 


The wandering airs they faint 
On the dark, the silent stream— 
And the Champak odors fail 
Like sweet thoughts in a dream ; 
The nightingale’s complaint, 

It dies upon her heart ;— 

As I must on thine, 

O! beloved as thou art ! 


Oh lift me from the grass! 


299 


Let thy love in kisses rain 
On my lips and eyelids pale. 
My cheek is cold and white, alas! 
‘Ly heart beats loud and fast ;— 
Oh! press it to thine own again, 
Where it will break at last. 

1891. 1822. 


LOVE'S PHILOSOPHY 


THE Fountains mingle with the River 
And the Rivers with the Ocean, 
The winds of Heaven mix for ever 
With a sweet emotion ; 
Nothing in the world is single ; 
All things bya law divine 
In one spirit meet and mingle. 
Why not I with thine ?— 


See the mountains kiss high Heaven 
And the waves clasp one another ; 

No sister-flower would be forgiven 
If it disdained its brother, 

And the sunlight clasps the earth 
And the moonbeams kiss the sea: 

What are all these kissings worth 


Idie! Ifaint! I fail! If thou kiss not me ? 1819. 
PROMETHEUS UNBOUND: 
A LYRICAL DRAMA IN FOUR ACTS 
AUDISNE HAEC AMPHIARAE, SUB TERRAM ABDITE ? 
DRAMATIS PERSON 4E Prometheus. Monarch of Gods and 
Demons, and all Spirits 
P z I ’ 3 
Deadatacon EERE But One, who throng those bright and 
é ri rolling worlds 
pee -_ . Which Thou and I alone of living things 
eo a Sepanides Behold with sleepless eyes ! regard this 


APOLLO THE PHANTASM OF JUPITER 
THE SPIRIT OF THE EARTH 
THE SPIRIT OF THE Moon 
SPIRITS OF THE Hours 
SPIRITS. EcHoES. FAUNS. 


ACT I 


ScENE—A. RAVINE OF Icy ROCKS IN THE 
INDIAN CAUCASUS. 


FURIES 


PROMETHEUS is discovered bound to the 
Precipice. PANTHEA and IONE are 
seated at his feet. Time, night. Dur- 
ing the Scene, morning slowly breaks. 


1 See note at the end of the poem. 


Earth 

Made multitudinous with thy slaves, 
whom thou 

Requitest for knee-worship, prayer, and 
praise, 


And toil, and hecatombs of broken 
hearts, 

With fear and self-contempt and barren 
hope. 

Whilst me, who am thy foe, eyeless in 
hate, 


Hast thou made reign and triumph, to 
thy scorn 

O’er mine own misery and thy vain 
revenge. 


309 


Three thousand years of sleep-unshel- 
tered hours, 

And moments aye divided by keen pangs 

Till they seemed years, torture and soli- 
tude, 

Scorn and despair, — these are mine 
empire ;— 

More glorious far than that which thou 
surveyest 

From thine unenvied throne, O, Mighty 
God! 

Almighty, had I deigned to share the 
shame 

Of thine ill tyranny, and hung not here 

Nailed to this wall of eagle-baffling 
mountain, 

Black, wintry, dead, unmeasured ; with- 
out herb, 

Insect, or beast, or shape or sound of 
life. 

Ah me! alas, pain, pain ever, for ever ! 


No change, no pause, no hope!. Yet I 
endure. 

Task the Earth, have not the mountains 
felt ? 

T ask yon Heaven, the all-beholding Sun, 

Has it not seen? ‘lhe Sea, in storm or 
calm, 

Heaven’s ever-changing Shadow, spread 
below, 

Have its deaf waves not heard my agony? 

Ah me! alas, pain, pain ever, for ever ! 


The crawling glaciers pierce me with 
the spears 

Of their moon-freezing crystals, 
bright chains 

Eat with their burning cold into my 
bones, 

Heaven’s wingéd hound, polluting from 
thy lips 

His beak in poison not his own, tears up 

My heart; and shapeless sights come 
wandering by, 

The ghastly people of the realm of 
dream, 

Mocking me: and the Earthquake-fiends 
are charged 

To wrench the rivets from my quivering 
wounds 

When the rocks split and close again be- 
hind: 

While from their loud abysses howling 
throng 

The genii of the storm, urging the rage 

Of whirlwind, and afflict me with keen 
hail. 

And yet tome welcome is day and night, 


the 





BRITISH “POETS 


Whether one breaks the hoar frost of 
the morn, 

Or starry, dim, and slow, the other 
climbs 

The leaden-colored east ; for then they 
lead | 

The wingless, crawling hours,one among 
whom 

—As some dark Priest hales the reluc- 
tant victim— 

Shall drag thee, cruel King, to kiss the 
blood 

From these pale feet, which then might 
trample thee 

If they disdained not such a prostrate 
slave. 

Disdain! Ahno! I pity thee. What 
ruin 

Will hunt thee undefended thro’ the 
wide Heaven ! 

How will thy soul, cloven to its depth 
with terror, 

Gape lke a hell within! 
grief, 

Not exultation, for I hate no more, 

As then ere misery made me wise. The 
curse 

Once breathed on thee I would recall. 
Ye Mountains, 

W hose many-voiced Echoes, through the 
mist 

Of cataracts, flung the thunder of that 
spell ! 

Ye icy Springs, stagnant with wrinkling 
frost, ‘ ; 

Which vibrated to hear me, and then 


I speak in 


crept 

Shuddering thro’ India! Thou serenest 
Air, 

Thro’ which the Sun walks burning 
without beams! 

And ye swift Whirlwinds, who on poiséd 
wings 

Hung mute and moveless o’er yon 
hushed abyss, 

As thunder, louder than your own, made 
rock 

The orbed world! 
had power, 

Though I am changed so that aught evil 
wish 

Is dead within : although no memory be 

Of what is hate, let them not lose it now! 

What was that curse? for ye all heard 
me speak. 


If then my words 


First Voice (from the Mountains) 


Thrice three hundred thousand years 


O’er the Earthquake’s couch we 
stood : 
Oft, as men convulsed with fears, 
We trembled in our multitude. 


Second Voice (from the Springs) 


Thunderbolts had parched our water, 
We had been stained with bitter 
blood, 
And had run mute, ’mid shrieks of 
slaughter, 
Thro’ a city and a solitude. 


Third Voice (from the Air) 


I had clothed, since Earth uprose, 
Its wastes in colors not their own, 
And oft had my serene. repose 
Been cloven by #*hany a rending 
' groan. : 


Fourth Voice (from the Whirlwinds) 


We had soared beneath these moun- 
tains 
Unresting ages; nor had thunder, 
Nor yon volcano’s flaming fountains, 
Nor any power above or under 
Ever made us mute with wonder. 


First Voice 


But never bowed our snowy crest 
As at the voice of thine unrest. 


Second Voice 


Never such a sound before 

To the Indian waves we bore. 

A pilot asleep on the howling sea 
Leaped up from the deck in agony, 

And heard, and cried, ‘‘Ah, woe is me! ” 
And died as mad as the wild waves be. 


Third Voice 


By such dread words from Earth to 
Heaven 

My still realm was never riven ; 

When its wound was closed, there stood 

Darkness o’er the day like blood. 


Fourth Voice 


And we shrank back; for dreams of ruin 
To frozen caves our flight pursuing 
Made us keep silence—thus—and thus— 
Though silence is a hell to us. 


The Earth. The tongueless Caverns 
of the craggy hills 


SHELLEY 


301 


Cried ‘‘Misery!” then; the hollow 
Heaven replied, 

‘*Misery!” and the 
waves, ' 

Climbing the land, howled to the lash- 

ing winds, 

And the pale nations heard it, ‘‘ Misery! ” 
Prometheus. I hear asound of voices: 

not the voice 

Which I gave forth. 

and thou ! 

Scorn him, without whose all-enduring 

will 

Beneath the fierce omnipotence of Jove, 

Both they and thou had vanished, like 

thin mist 

Unrolled on the morning wind. Know 

ye not me, 

The Titan? He who made his agony 

The barrier to your else all-conquering 

foe? 

Oh, rock-embosomed lawns, and snow- 

fed streams, 

Now seen athwart frore vapors, deep 

below, 

Thro’ whose _ o’ershadowing 

wandered once 

With Asia, drinking life from her loved 

eyes ; 

Why scorns the spirit which informs ye, 

now 

To commune with me? me alone, who 

checked, 

As one who checks 

charioteer, 

The falsehood and the force of him who 

reigns 

Supreme, and with the groans of pining 

slaves 

Fills your dim glens and liquid wilder- 

nesses : 

Why answer ye not, still? Brethren! 
The Earth. They dare not. 
Prometheus. Who dares? for I would 

hear that curse again. 

Ha, what an awful whisper rises up ! 

Tis scarce like sound; it tingles thro’ 

the frame 

As lightning tingles, hovering ere it 

strike. 

Speak, Spirit! 

voice 

I only know that thou art moving near 

And love. How cursed I him? 

The Earth. How canst thou hear 

Who knowest not the language of the 

dead ? 
Prometheus. Thou art a living spirit : 
speak as they. 


Ocean’s purple 


Mother, thy sons 


woods I 


a fiend-drawn 


from thine inorganic 


302 





The Earth. I dare not speak like life, 
lest Heaven's fell King 
Should hear, and link me to some wheel 


of pain 

More torturing than the one whereon I 
roll. 

Subtle thou art and good, and tho’ the 
Gods 


Hear not this voice, yet thou art more 
than God 
Being wise and kind: earnestly hearken 
now. 
Prometheus. Obscurely thro’ 
brain, like shadows dim, 
Sweep awful thoughts, rapid and thick. 
I feel 
se like one mingled in entwining 
ove ; 
Yet ’tis not pleasure. 
The Earth. No, thou canst not hear ; 
Thou art immortal, and this tongue is 


my 


known 
Only to those who die. 
Prometheus. And what art thou, 


O, melancholy Voice? 
The Earth. Jam the Earth, 

Thy mother; she within whose stony 
veins, 

To the last fibre of the loftiest tree 

Whose thin leaves trembled in the 
frozen air, 

Joy ran, as blood within a living frame, 

When thou didst from her bosom, like a 
cloud, 

Of glory, arise, a spirit of keen joy! 

And at thy voice her pining sons uplifted 

Their prostrate brows from the polluting 
dust, 

And our almighty Tyrant with fierce 
dread 

Grew pale, until his thunder chained 
thee here. 

Then, see those million worlds which 
burn and roll 

Around us: their inhabitants beheld 

My spheréd light wane in wide Heaven ; 
the sea 

Was lifted by strange tempest, and new 
fire 

From earthquake-rifted mountains of 

bright snow 

its portentous hair 

Heaven’s frown ; 

Lightning and Inundation vexed the 
plains ; 

Blue thistles bloomed in cities ; foodless 
toads 

Within voluptuous chambers panting 
crawled ; 


Shook beneath 


/ 


BRITISH POETS 


When Plague had fallen on man, and 
beast and worm, 

And Famine; and black blight on herb 
and tree ; 

And in the corn, and vines, and meadow- 
grass, . 

Teemed ineradicable poisonous weeds 

Draining their growth, for my wan 
breast was dry 

With grief ; and the thin air, my breath, 
was stained 

With the contagion of a mother’s hate 

Breathed on her child’s destroyer ; aye, 
I heard 

Thy curse, the which, if thou remem- 
berest not, 

Yet my innumerable seas and streams, 

Mountains, and caves, and winds, and 
yon wide ait, 

And the inarticulate people of the 
dead, 

Preserve, a treasured spell. We meditate 

In secret joy and hope those dreadful 


words 
But dare not speak them. 
Prometheus. Venerable mother ! 


All else who live and suffer take from 
thee 

Some comfort; flowers, and fruits, and 
happy sounds, 

And love, though fleeting; these may 
not be mine. 

But mine own words, I pray, deny me 
not. 

The Earth. They shall be told. Ere 

Babylon was dust, 

The Magus Zoroaster, my dead child, 

Met his own image walking in the gar- 
den. 

That apparition, sole of men, he saw. 

For know there are two worlds of life 
and death : 

One that which thou beholdest ; but the 
other 

Is underneath the grave, where do in- 
habit 

The shadows of all forms that think 
and live 

Till death unite them and they part 
no more ; 

Dreams and the light imaginings of 
men, 

And all that fate creates or love desires, 

Terrible, strange, sublime and beauteous 
shapes. 

There thou art, and dost hang, a writh- 
ing shade, 

’Mid whirlwind-peopled mountains ; all 
the gods 


SHELLEY 


Are there, and all the powers of name- 
less worlds, 

Vast, sceptred phantoms; heroes, men, 
and beasts ; 

And Demogorgon, a tremendous gloom ; 
And he, the supreme Tyrant, on his 
throne 
Of burning gold. 

shall utter 
The curse which all remember. 
at will 
Thine own ghost, or the ghost of Jupiter, 
Hades or Typhon, or what mightier Gods 
From all-prolific Evil, since thy ruin 
Have sprung, and trampled on my pros- 
trate sons. 
Ask, and they must reply : sothe revenge 
Of the Supreme may sweep thro’ vacant 
shades, 
As rainy wind thro’ the abandoned gate 
Of a fallen palace. 

Prometheus. Mother, let not aught 
Of that which may be evil, pass again 
My lips, or those of aught resembling me. 
Phantasm of Jupiter, arise, appear ! 


Son, one of these 


Call 


Ione 


My wings are folded o’er mine ears: 
My wings are crossed o’er mine eyes : 
Yet thro’ their silver shade appears, 
And thro’ their lulling plumes arise, 
A Shape, a throng of sounds ; 
May it be no ill to thee 
O thou of many wounds! 
Near whom, for our sweet sister’s sake, 
Ever thus we watch and wake. 


Panthea 


The sound is of whirlwind underground 
Earthquake, and fire, and mountains 
cloven ; 
The shape is awful like the sound, 
Clothed in dark purple, star-in woven. 
A sceptre of pale gold 
To stay steps proud, o’er the slow 
cloud 
His veined hand doth hold. 
Cruel he looks, but calm and strong, 
Like one who does, not suffers wrong. 
Phantasm of Jupiter. Why have 
the secret powers of this strange 


world 

Driven me, a frail and empty phantom, 
hither 

On direst storms? What unaccustomed 
sounds 


Are hovering on my lips, unlike the voice 
With which our pallid race hold ghastly 
talk 


oo 


In darkness? And, proud sufferer, who 
art thou? 
Prometheus. Tremendous Image, as 
thou art must be 
He whom thou shadowest forth. 
his foe, 
The Titan. Speak the words which I 
would hear, 
Although no thought inform thine 
empty voice. 
The Earth. Listen! And tho’ your 
echoes must be mute, 
Gray mountains, and old woods, and 
haunted springs, 
Prophetic caves, and isle-surrounding 
streams, 
Rejoice to hear what yet ye cannot speak. 
Phantasm. <A spirit seizes me and 
speaks within : 
It tears me as fire tears a thunder-cloud. 
Panthea. See, how he lifts his mighty 
looks, the Heaven 
Darkens above. 
Tone. He speaks! O shelter me! 
Prometheus. I see the curse on 
gestures proud and cold, 
And looks of firm defiance, and calm hate, 
And such despair as mocks itself with 
smiles, 
Written as on a scroll: 
Oh, speak ! 


IT am 


yet speak: 


Phantasm 

Fiend, I defy thee ! with a calm, fixed 
mind, 

All that thou canst inflict I bid thee 
do; 

Foul Tyrant both of Gods and Human- 
kind, 

One only being shalt thou not 

subdue. 


Rain then thy plagues upon me here, 
Ghastly disease, and frenzying fear ; 
And let alternate frost and fire 
Eat into me, and be thine ire 
Lightning, and cutting hail, and legioned 
forms 
Of furies, driving by upon the wounding 
storms. 


Ay, do thy worst. Thou art om- 
nipotent. 
O’er all things but thyself I gave 
thee power, 
And my own will. 
mischiefs sent 
To blast mankind, from yon ethereal 
tower. 
Let thy malignant spirit move 


Be thy swift 


304 


In darkness over those I love: 
On me and mine I imprecate 
The utmost torture of thy hate ; 
And thus devote to sleepless agony, 
This undeclining head, while thou must 
reign on high. 


But thou, who art the God and Lord : 
O, thou, 
Who fillest with thy soul this world 
of woe, 
To whom all things of Earth and 
Heaven do bow 
In fear and worship : all-prevailing 
foe! 
I curse thee! let a sufferer’s curse 
Clasp thee, his torturer, like remorse ; 
Till thine Infinity shall be 
A robe of envenomed agony ; 
And thine Omnipotence a crown of pain, 
To cling like burning gold round thy 
dissolving brain. 


Heap on thy soul, by virtue of this 
Curse 
Tll deeds, then be thou damned, 
beholding good ; 
Both infinite as is the universe, 
And thou, and thy self-torturing 
solitude. 
An awful image of calm power 
Though now thou sittest, let the hour 
Come, when thou must appear to be 
That which thou art internally. 
And after many a false and fruitless 
crime 
Scorn track thy lagging fall thro’ bound- 
less space and time. 


Prometheus. 

O, Parent ? 
The Earth. They were thine. 
Prometheus. It doth repent me: 

words are quick and vain ; 

Grief for awhile is blind, and so was 
mine. 
I wish no living thing to suffer pain. 


Were these my words, 


The Earth 


Misery, Oh misery to me, 

That Jove at length should vanquish 
thee. 

Wail, howl aloud, Land and Sea, 

The Earth’s rent heart shall answer 


ye. 
Howl, Spirits of the living and the dead, 
Your refuge, your defence lies fallen and 
vanquished. 


BRITISH 


POETS 








First Echo 
Lies fallen and vanquishéd ! 


Second Echo 
Fallen and vanquishéd ! 


Tone 


Fear not: ’tis but some passing spasm, 
The Titan is unvanquished still. 
But see, where thro’ the azure chasm 
Of yon forked and snowy hill 
Trampling the slant winds on high 
With golden-sandalled feet, that 
glow 
Under plumes of purple dye, 
Like rose-ensanguined ivory, 
A Shape comes now, 
Stretching on high from his right hand 
A. serpent-cinctured wand. 
Panthea. °Tis Jove’s world-wander- 
ing herald, Mercury. 


Tone 


And who are those with hydra tresses 
And iron wings that climb the wind, 

Whom the frowning God represses 
Like vapors steaming up behind, 

Clanging loud, an endless crowd— 


Panthea. 


These are Jove’s 
hounds, 
Whom he gluts with groans and blood, » 
When charioted on sulphurous cloud 

He bursts Heaven’s bounds. 


tempest-walking 


Tone 


Are they now led, from the thin dead 
On new pangs to be fed? 


Panthea 


The Titan looks as ever, firm, not 
proud. 
First Fury. Ha! Iscent life! 
Second Fury. Let me but look into 
his eyes! 
Third Fury. The hope of torturing 
him smells likea hea 
Of corpses, to a death-bird after battle. 
First Fury. Darest thou delay, O 
Herald! take cheer, Hounds 
Of Hell: what if the Son of Maia soon 
Should make us food and sport—who 
can please long 
The Omnipotent ? 
Mercury. Back to your towers of 
iron, 


SHELLEY 


And gnash, beside the streams of fire 
and wail, 
Your foodless_ teeth. 
and Gorgon, 
Chimera, and thou Sphinx, subtlest of 
fiends 
Who ministered to Thebes 
poisoned wine, 
Unnatural love, and 
hate : 
These shall perform your task. 
First Fury. Oh, mercy ! mercy ! 
We die with our desire: drive us 1ot 
back ! 
Mercury. Crouch then in silence. 
Awful Sufferer 
To thee unwilling, most unwillingly 
I come, by the great Father’s will driven 
down, 
To execute a doom of new revenge. 
Alas! I pity thee, and hate myself 
That I can do no more: aye from thy 


Geryon, arise! 


Heaven's 


more unnatural 


sight 

Returning, for a season, Heaven seems 
Hell, 

So thy worn form pursues me night and 
day, 

Smiling Bar daati. Wise art thou, firm 
and good, 

But vainly wouldst stand forth alone in 
strife 

Against the Omnipotent; as yon clear 
lamps 

That measure and divide the weary 
years 


From which there is no refuge, long 
have taught 

And long must teach. 
Torturer arms 

With the strange might of unimagined 


Even now thy 


pains 

The powers who scheme slow agonies in 
Hell, 

And my commission is to lead them 
here, 

Or what more subtle, foul, or savage 
fiends 


People the abyss, and leave them to 
their task. 

Be it not so! there is a secret known 

To thee, and to none else of living 
things, 

Which may transfer the sceptre of wide 
Heaven, 

The fear of which perplexes the Su- 
preme: 

Clothe it in words, and bid it clasp his 
throne 

In intercession ; bend thy soulin prayer, 

20 


a5 
And like a suppliant in some gorgeous 


fane, 
Let the will kneel within thy haughty 
heart : 
For benefits and meek submission tame 
The fiercest and the mightiest. 


Prometheus. Evil minds 
Change good to their own nature. I 
gave all 


He has; and in return he chains me here 

Years, ages, night and day: whether 
the Sun 

Spht my parched skin, or in the moony 
night 

The crystal-wingéd snow cling round 
my hair: 

Whilst my beloved race is trampled 
down 

By his thought-executing ministers. 

Such is the tyrant’s recompense: ’tis 
just : 

He who is evil can receive no good ; 

And for a world bestowed, ora friend 


lost, 

He can feel hate, fear, shame ; not gra- 
titude : 

Me but requites me for his own mis- 
deed. 

Kindness to such is keen reproach, which 
breaks 

With bitter stings the light sleep of 
Revenge. 

Submission, thou dost know I cannot 

. try: 


For what submission but that fatal word, 

The death-seal of mankind’s captivity, 

Like the Sicilian’s hair-suspended sword, 

Which trembles o’er his crown, would 
he accept, 

Or could I yield ? 
yield. 

Let others flatter Crime, where it sits 
throned 

In brief Omnipotence : secure are they : 


Which yet I will not 


For Justice, when triumphant, will 
weep down 

Pity, not punishment, on her own 
wrongs, 

Too much avenged by those who err. 
I wait, 


Enduring thus, the retributive hour 
Which since we spake is even nearer 
now 


But hark, the hell-hounds clamor : fear 
delay : 
Behold! Heaven lowers under thy 


Father’s frown. 
Mercury. Oh, that we might be 
spared : I to inflict 


306 
And thou to suffer! Once more answer 
me: 
Thou knowest not the period of Jove’s 
power? 
Prometheus. I know but this, that it 
must come. 
Mercury. Alas ! 
Thou canst not count thy years to come 
of pain? 
Prometheus. They last while Jove 


must reign : nor more, nor less 
Do I desire or fear. 
Mercury. Yet pause, and plunge 
Into Eternity, where recorded time, 
Even all that we imagine, age on age, 
Seems but a point, and the reluctant 
mind 

Flags wearily in its unending flight, 

Till it sink, dizzy, blind, lost, shelter- 
less ; 

Perchance it has not numbered the slow 
years 

Which thou must spend in torture, un- 
reprieved ? 

Prometheus. Perchance no thought 

can count them, yet they pass. 

Mercury. If thou might’st dwell 

among the Gods the while 
Lapped in voluptuous joy ? 


Prometheus. I would not quit 
This bleak ravine, these unrepentant 
pains. 
Mercury. Alas! I wonder at, yet 
pity thee. 
Prometheus. Pity the self-despising 


slaves of Heaven, 

Not me, within whose mind sits peace 
serene, 

As light in the sun, throned : how vain 
is talk ! 

Call up the fiends. 

Ione. O, sister, look ! White fire 

Has cloven to the roots yon huge snow- 
loaded cedar ; 

How fearfully God’s thunder howls be- 


hind! 
Mercury. YT must obey his words and 
thine : alas! 


Most heavily remorse hangs at my heart! 
Panthea. See where the child of 
Heaven, with winged feet, 
Runs down the slanted sunlight of the 
dawn. 
Ione. Dear sister, close thy plumes 
over thine eyes 
Lest thou behold and die: they come: 
they come 
Blackening the birth of day with count- 
less wings, 


BRITISH: POETS 


And hollow underneath, like death. 
First Fury. Prometheus ! 
Second Fury. Immortal Titan ! 
Third Fury. Champion of 

Heaven’s slaves ! 
Prometheus. He whom some dread- 
ful voice invokes is here, 

Prometheus, the chained Titan. Horrible 

forms, 

What and who are ye? Never yet there 

came 

Phantasms so foul thro’ monster-teem- 

ing Hell 

From the all-miscreative brain of Jove ; 

Whilst I behold such execrable shapes, 

Methinks I grow like what I contem- 

plate, 

And laugh and stare in loathsome sym- 

pathy. 
First Fury. We are the ministers of 
pain, and fear, 

And Sree pee and mistrust, and 

ate, 

And clinging crime; and as lean dogs 

pursue 

Thro’ wood and lake some struck and 

sobbing fawn, 

We track all things that weep, and 

bleed, and live, 

When the great King betrays them to 

our will. 
Prometheus. Oh! many fearful natures 
in one name, 

I know ye; and these lakes and echoes 

know 

The darkness and the clangor of your 

wings. 

But why more hideous than your loathed 

selves 

Gather ye up in legions from the deep? 
Second Fury. We knew not that: 

Sisters, rejoice, rejoice ! 
Prometheus. Can aught exult in its 
deformity ? 
Second Fury. The beauty of delight 
makes lovers glad, 

Gazing on one another: so are we. 

As from the rose which the pale priest- 

ess kneels 

To gather for her festal crown of flowers 

The aérial crimson falls, flushing her 

cheek, 

So from our victim’s destined agony 

The shade which is our form invests us 


round, 
Else we are shapeless as our mother 
Night. ’ 
Prometheus. I laugh your power, and 


his who sent you here, 


SHELLEY 


To lowest scorn. Pour forth the cup of 
ain. 

First Fury. Thou thinkest we will 

rend thee bone from bone, 
‘And nerve from nerve, working like fire 
within ? 

Prometheus. Pain is my element, as 

hate is thine ; 
Ye rend me now: I care not. 

Second Fury. Dost imagine 
We will but laugh into thy lidless eyes ? 

Prometheus. I weigh not what ye do, 

but what ye suffer, 

Being evil. Cruel was the power which 
called 

You, or aught else so wretched, into 
light. 

Third Fury. Thou think ’st we will 

live thro’ thee, one by one, 

Like animal life, and tho’ we can obscure 
not 

The soul which burns within, that we 
will dwell 

Beside it, like a vain loud multitude 

Vexing the self-content of wisest men : 

That we will be dread thought beneath 
thy brain, 

And foul desire round thine astonished 
heart, 

And blood within thy labyrinthine veins 

Crawling like agony. 

Prometheus. Why, ye are thus now ; 
Yet am [ king over myself, and rule 
The torturing and conflicting throngs 

within, 
As Jove rules you when Hell grows 
mutinous. 


Chorus of Furies 


From the ends of the earth, from the 
ends of the earth, 
Where the night has its grave and the 
morning its birth, 
Come, come, come! 
Oh, ye who shake hills with the scream 
of your mirth, 
When cities sink howling in ruin ; and 


ye 
Who with wingless footsteps trample 
the sea, 
And close upon Shipwreck and Famine’s 
track, 
Sit chattering with joy on the foodless 
wreck, 
Come, come, come! 
Leave the bed, low, cold and red, 
Strewed beneath a nation dead ; 
Leave the hatred, as in ashes 
Fire is left for future burning : 


397 


It will burst in bloodier fashion, 
When ye stir it, soon returning: 
Leave the self-contempt implanted 
In young spirits, sense-enchanted, 
Misery’s yet unkindled fuel: 
Leave Hell’s secrets half unchanted 
To the maniac dreamer; cruel 
More than ye can be with hate 
Is he with fear. 
Come, come, come ! 
We are steaming up from Hell’s wide 
gate, 
And we burthen the blast of the 
atmosphere, 
But vainly we toil till ye come here. 


Jone. Sister, I hear the thunder of 
new wings. 
Panthea. These solid mountains 


quiver with the sound 

Fven as the tremulous air: their shadows 
make 

The space within my plumes more black 
than night. 


First Fury 


Your call was as a wingéd car 
Driven on whirlwinds fast and far ; 
It rapt us from red gulf of war. 


Second Fury 
From wide cities, famine-wasted ; 


Third Fury 
Groans half heard, and blood untasted ; 
Fourth Fury 
Kingly conclaves stern and cold, 
Where blood with gold is bought and 
sold ; 
Fifth Fury 
From the furnace, white and hot, 


In which— 
A Fury 


Speak not: whisper not 
I know all that ye would tell, 
But to speak might break the spell 
Which must bend the Invincible, 

The stern of thought ; 
He yet defies the deepest power of 
Hell. 
Fury 
Tear the veil! 
Another Fury 


It is torn. 


Chorus 


The pale stars of the morn 
Shine on a misery, dire to be borne. 


308 

Dost thou faint, mighty Titan? We 
laugh thee to scorn, 

Dost thou boast the clear knowledge 


thou waken’dst for man? 
Then was kindled within him a thirst 
which outran 
Those perishing waters ; a thirst of fierce 
fever, 
love, doubt, desire, which con- 
sume him for ever. 
One came forth of gentle worth 
Smiling on the sanguine earth ; 
His words outlived him, like swift 
poison, 
Withering up truth, peace, and pity. 
Look! where round the wide horizon 
Many a million-peopled city 
Vomits smoke in the bright air. 
Mark that outcry of despair ! 

Tis his mild and gentle ghost 
Wailing for the faith he kindled : 
Look again, the flames almost 

LO pas elow-worm's lamp 
dwindled : 
The survivors round the embers 
Gather in dread. 
Joy, joy, joy! 
Past ages crowd on thee, but each one 
remembers, 
And the future is dark, and the pr esent 
is spread 
Like a pillow of thorns for thy slumber- 
less head. 


Hope, 


have 


Semichorus I 


Drops of bloody agony flow 

From his white and quivering brow. 
Grant a little respite now : 

See a disenchanted nation 

Springs like day from desolation ; 

To Truth its state is dedicate, 

And Freedom leads it forth, her mate; 
A legioned band of linkéd brothers 
Whom Love calls children— 


Semichorus II 


Tis another’s : 
See how kindred murder kin : 
Tis the vintage time for death and sin; 
Blood, like new wine, bubbles within ; 
Till Despair smothers 
The struggling world, which slaves and 
tyrants win. 
[ All the Furies vanish, except one. 
tone. Hark, sister! what a low yet 
dreadful groan. 
Quite Pee Ran is tearing up the 
1eart 


BRITISH POETS 





Of the good Titan, as storms tear the 


And beasts hear the sea moan in inland 
Caves. 
Darest thou observe how the fiends 
torture him? 
Panthea. Alas! I looked forth twice, 
but will no more. 
Ione. What didst thou see? 
Panthea. A woful sight: a youth 
With patient looks nailed to a crucifix. 
Ione. What next? 
Panthea. The heaven around, the 
earth below 
Was peopled with thick shapes of human 


death, 

All horrible, and wrought by human 
hands, 

And some appeared the work of human 
hearts, 


For men were slowly killed by frowns 
and smiles: 

And other sights too foul to speak and 
live 

Were wandering by. Let us not tempt 
worse fear 

By looking forth: 
enough. 

Fury. Behold an 

who do endure 

Deep wrongs for man, and scorn, and 
chains, but heap 

Thousandfold torment on themselves 
and him. 

Prometheus. Remit the anguish of 

that lighted stare ; 

Close those wan lips; 
wounded brow 

Stream not with blood ; 
thy tears ! 

Fix, fix those tortured orbs in peace and 
death, 

So thy sick throes shake not that cruci- 
fix, 

So those pale fingers play not with thy 
gore. 

O, horrible! Thy name I will not speak, 

It hath become a curse. I see, I see 

The wise, the mild, the lofty, and the 


those groans are grief 


emblem: those 


let that thorn- 


it ee with 


Just, 

Whom thy slaves hate for being like to 
thee, 

Some hunted by foul lies from their 
heart’s home, 

An early-chosen, late-lamented home ; 

As hooded ounces cling to the driven 
hind ; . 

Some linked to corpses in unwholesome 
cells: 


SHELLEY 


-Some—Hear I not the multitude laugh 
loud ?— 

Impaled in lingering fire: and mighty 
realms ~ 

Float by my feet, like sea-uprooted isles, 

Whose sons are kneaded down in com- 
mon blood 

By the red light of their own burning 
homes. 

Fury. Blood thou canst see, and fire; 

and canst hear groans ; 

Worse things, unheard, unseen, remain 


behind. 
Prometheus. Worse? 
Fury. In each human heart 


terror survives 
The ruin it has gorged: the loftiest fear 
All that they would disdain to think 
were true: 
Hypocrisy and custom make their minds 
The fanes of many a worship, now out- 


worn. 

They dare not devise good for man’s 
estate, 

And yet they ‘know not that they do not 
dare. 


The good want power, but to weep 
barren tears, 

The powerful goodness want: worse 
-need for them. 

The wise want love; and those who 
love want wisdom ; 

And all best things are thus confused to 


ill 

Many are strong and rich, and would 
be just, 

But live among their suffering fellow- 
men 


As if none felt: they know not what 
they do. 
Prometheus. Thy words are like a 
cloud of wingéd snakes ; 
And yet I pity those they torture not. 


Fury. Thou pitiest them? I speak 
no more ! [ Vanishes. 
Prometheus. Ah woe! 
Ah woe! Alas! pain, pain ever, for 
ever ! 
I close my tearless eyes, but see more 
clear 


Thy works within my woe-illumed mind, 
Thou subtle tyrant! Peace is in the 


grave. 
The grave hides all things beautiful and 
good : © 


Tama God and cannot find it there, 

Nor would I seek it: for, though dread 
revenge, 

This is defeat, fierce king, not victory. 





379 





The sights with which thou torturest 
gird my soul 

With new endurance, till the hour arrives 

When they shall be no types of things 
which are. 

Panthea. Alas! what sawest thou? 
Prometheus. There are two woes: 
To speak, and to behold; thou spare 

me one. 
Names are there, Nature’s sacred watch- 
words, they 
Were borne aloft in bright emblazonry ; 
The nations thronged around, and cried 


aloud, 

As with one voice, Truth, liberty, and 
love ! 

Suddenly fierce confusion fell from 
heaven 


Among them: there was strife, deceit, 
and fear : 
Tyrants rushed in, and did divide the 
spoil. 
This was the shadow of the truth I saw. 
The Earth. I felt thy torture, son, 
with such mixed joy 
As pain and virtue give. To cheer thy 
state 
I bid ascend those subtle and fair spirits, 
Whose homes are the dim caves of human 
thought,’ 
And who inhabit, as birds wing the wind, 
Its world-surrounding ether: they be- 
hold 
3eyond that twilight realm, asina glass, 
The future: may they speak comfort 
to thee ! 
Panthea. Look, sister, where a troop 
of spirits gather, 
Like flocks of clouds in spring’s delight- 
ful weather, 
Thronging in the blue air! 
Tone. And see! more come, 
Like fountain-vapors when the winds 
are dumb, 
That climb up the ravine in scattered 
lines. 
And, hark! is it the music of the pines ? 
Is it the lake? Is it the waterfall ? 
Panthea. °Tis something — sadder, 
sweeter far than all. 


Chorus of Spirits 


From unremembered ages we 
Gentle guides and guardians be 

Of heaven-oppressed mortality ; 
And we breathe, and sicken not, 
The atmosphere of human thought : 
Be it dim, and dank, and gray, 
Like a storm-extinguished day, 


310 


Travelled o’er by dying gleams ; 
Be it bright as all between 
Cloudless skies and windless streams, 
Silent, liquid, and serene ; 
As the birds within the wind, 
As the fish within the wave, 
As the thoughts of man’s own mind 
Float thro’ all above the grave ; 
We make there our liquid lair, 
Voyaging cloudlike and unpent 
Thro’ the boundless element : 
Thence we bear the prophecy 
Which begins and ends in thee ! 


Tone. 
the air around them 
Looks radiant as the air around a star. 


First Spirit 


On a battle-trumpet’s blast 

I fled hither, fast, fast, fast, 

*Mid the darkness upward cast. 
From the dust of creeds outworn, 
From the tyrant’s banner torn, 
Gathering ‘round me, onward borne, 
There was mingled many a cry— 
Freedom! Hope! Death! Victory ! 
Till they faded thro’ the sky ; 

And one sound, above, around, 

One sound beneath, around, above, 
Was moving; *twas the soul of love; 
"Twas the hope, the prophecy, 
Which begins and ends in thee. 


Second Spirit 


A rainbow’s arch stood on the sea, 
Which rocked beneath, immovably ; 
And the triumphant storm did flee, 
Like a conqueror, swift and proud, 
Between, with many a captive cloud, 
A shapeless, dark and rapid crowd, 
Each by lightning riven in half : 

I heard the thunder hoarsely laugh : 
Mighty fleets were strewn like chaff 
And spread beneath a hell of death 
O’er the white waters. J alit 

On a great ship lightning-sphit, 

And speeded hither on the sigh 

Of one who gave an enemy 

His plank, then plunged aside to die. 


Third Spirit 


I sate beside a sage’s bed, 

And the lamp was burning red 

Near the book where he had fed, 
When a Dream with plumes of flame, 
To his pillow hovering came, 

And I knew it was the same 


More yet come, one by one: 


BRITISH POETS 


Which had kindled long ago 
Pity, eloquence, and woe ; 

And the world awhile below 
Wore the shade its lustre made. 
It has borne me here as fleet 

As Desire’s lightning feet ; 

I must ride it back ere morrow, 
Or the sage will wake in sorrow. 


Fourth Spirit 


On a poet’s lips I slept 

Dreaming like a love-adept 

In the sound his breathing kept ; 

Nor seeks nor finds he mortal blisses, 

But feeds on the aérial kisses 

Of shapes that haunt thought’s wilder- 
nesses. 

He will watch from dawn to gloom 

The lake-reflected sun illume 

The yellow bees in the ivy-bloom, 

Nor heed nor see, what things they be ; 

But from these create he can 

Forms more real than living man, 

Nurslings of immortality !, 

One of these awakened me, 

And I sped to succor thee. 


Ione 


Behold’st thou not two shapes from the 
east and west 
Come, as two doves to one belovéd nest, 
Twin nurslings of the all-sustaining air 
On swift still wings glide down the 
atmosphere ? 
And, hark ! their sweet, sad voices! ‘tis 
despair 
Mingled with love and then dissolved 
in sound. 
Panthea. Canstthouspeak, sister? all 
my words are drowned. 
Tone. Their beauty gives me voice. 
See how they float 
On their sustaining wings of skiey grain, 
Orange and azure deepening into gold: 
Their soft smiles light the air like a 
star’s fire. 


Chorus of Spirits 


Hast thou beheld the form of love ? 
Fifth Spirit 
As over wide dominions 
I sped, like some swift cloud that wings 
the wide air’s wildernesses, 
That planet-crested shape swept by on 
lightning-braided pinions, 
Scattering the liquid joy of life from his 
ambrosial tresses : 


SHELLEY 


His footsteps paved the world with light ; 
but as I past ’ twas fading, 

And hollow Ruin yawned behind: great 
sages bound in madness, 

And headless patriots, aid pale youths 
who perished, unugbraiding, 
Gleamed in the night. Il wandered o’er, 
till thou, O King of sadness, 


Turned by thy smile the worst I saw to | 


recollected gladnuss. 
Siath Spirit 

Ah, sister ! Desolation is a delicate thing : 

It walks not on the earth, it Moats not on 
the air, 

But treads with killing footstep, and 
fans with silent wing | 

The tender hopes which in their hearts 
the best and gentlest bear: 

Who, soothed to false repose by the 
fanning plumes above 

And the music-stirring motion of its 
soft and busy feet, 

Dream visions of aérial joy, and call the 
monster, Love, 

And wake, and find the shadow Pain, 
as he whom now we greet. 


Chorus 


Tho’ Ruin now Love’s shadow be, 
Following him, destroyingly, 
On Death’s white and winged steed 
Which the fleetest cannot flee. 
Trampling down both flowerand weed, 
Man and beast, and foul and fair, 
Like a tempest thro’ the air; 
Thou shalt quell this horseman grim, 
Woundless though in heart or limb. 
Prometheus. Spirits! how know ye 
this shall be ? 


Chorus 


In the atmosphere we breathe, 

As buds grow red when the snow-storms 
flee, 

From spring gathering up beneath, 
Whose mild winds shake the elder brake, 
And the wandering herdsmen know 
That the white-thorn soon will blow: 
Wisdom, Justice, Love, and Peace, 
When they struggle to increase, 

Are to us as soft winds be 

To shepherd boys, the prophecy 

Which begins and ends in thee. 

Tone. Where are the Spirits fled ? 
Panthea. Only a sense 
Remains of them, like the omnipotence 
Of music, when the inspired voice and 

lute 


311 


Languish, ere yet the responses are mute, 
Which thro’ the deep and labyrinthine 


soul, 
Like echoes thro’ long caverns, wind 
and roll. 
Prometheus. How fair these airborn 


shapes! and yet I feel 
Most vain all hope but love; and thou 
art far, 


‘Asia ! who, when my being overflowed, 


Wert like a golden chalice to bright wine 

Which else had sunk into the thirsty 
dust. 

All things are still: alas! how heavily 

This quiet morning weighs upon my 
heart ; 

Tho’ Ishould dream Icould even sleep 
with grief 


‘Tf slumber were denied not. I would fain 


Be what it is my destiny to be, 
The savior and the strength of suffer- 
ing man, 
Or sink into the original gulf of things: 
There is no agony, and no solace left ; 
Earth can console, Heaven can torment 
no more. 
Panthea. Hast thou forgotten one 
who watches thee 
The cold dark night, and never sleeps 
but when 
The shadow of thy spirit falls on her? 
Prometheus. I said all hope was vain 
but 'ove: thou lovest. 
Panthea.. Deeply in truth; but the 
eastern star looks white, 
And Asia waits in that far Indian vale 
The scene of her sad exile ; rugged once 
And desolate and frozen, like this ravine ; 
But now invested with fair flowers and 
herbs, 
And haunted by sweet airs and sounds, 
which flow 
Among the woods and waters, from the 
ether 
Of her transforming presence, which 
would fade 
If it were mingled not with thine. 
Farewell! 


ACD TE 
SCENE I.—Mornina. A LOVELY VALE 
IN THE INDIAN Caucasus. ASIA 
alone. 


Asia. From all the blasts of heaven 
thou hast descended : 
Yes, like a spirit, like a thought, which 
makes 


312 


Unwonted tears throng to the horny 
eyes, 

And beatings haunt the desolated heart, 

Which should have learnt repose: thou 
hast descended 

Cradled in tempests ; 
Spring ! i 

O child of many winds! As suddenly 

Thou comest as the memory of a dream, 


thou dost wake, O 


Which now is sad because it hath beer 


sweet ; 
Like genius, or like joy which riseth u» 
As from the earth, clothing with golden 
clouds 
The desert of our life. 
This is the season, this the day, the hour ; 
At sunrise thou shouldst come, sweet 
sister mine. 


._ Too long desired, too long delaying,’ 


come ! 

How like death-worms the wingless 
moments crawl! 

The point of one white star is quivering 


still 

Deep in the orange light of widening 
morn 

Beyond the purple mountains: thro’a 
chasm 


Of wind-divided mist the darker lake 
Reflects it: now it wanes: it gl eams 
again 
As the waves fade, and as the burning 
threads 
Of woven cloud unravel in pale air 
’'Tis lost ! and thro’ yon peaks of Pyeaal” 
like snow 
The roseate sunlight quivers: hear I not 
The AZolian music of her sea- green 
plumes 
Winnowing the crimson dawn? 
| PANTHEA enters. 
I feel, I see 
Those eyes. which burn thro’ smiles that 
fade in tears, 
Like-stars half quenched i in mists of silver 
dew. 
Beloved and most beautiful, who wearest 
The shadow of that soul by which I}: ze, 
How late thou art! the spheréd sun bad 
climbed 
The sea: my heart was sick with hope, 
before 
The printless air felt thy belated plumes. 
Panthea. Pardon, great Sister! but 
my wings were faint 
the delight of a 
dream, 
As are the noontide plumes of. summer 
winds 


With remembered 


SS SE 8 a eae 
RSS SNS 


i, “tee 


BRITISH POETS 


Satiate with sweet flowers. I was wont 
to sleep . 

Peacefully, and awake refreshed and 
calm 

Before the sacred Titan’ s fall, and thy 

Unhappy love, had made, thro’ use and 
pity, 

Both love and woe familiar to my heart 

As they had grown to thine: erewhile I 
slept «. 

Under the glaucous caverns of old Ocean 

Within dim bowers of green and pur ple 
moss, 

Our young Tone’ s soft and milky arms 

Locked then, as now, behind my dark, 
moist hair, 

While my shut eyes and cheek were 
pressed within 

The folded depth of her life-breathing 


,00som : 

But not as now, since I am made the 
wind 

Which fails beneath the music that I 
bear 

Of thy most wordless converse ; since 
dissolved 

Into the sense with which love talks, my 
rest 

Was troubled and yet sweet ; my reune 
hours 

Too full of care and pain. 

Asia. Lift up thine eyes, 


And let me read thy dream. 

Panthea. As I have said 
With our sea-sister at his feet I slept. 
The mountain mists, condensing at our 


voice 

Under the moon, had spread their snowy 
flakes, 

From the keen ice shielding our linkéd 
sleep. 

Then two dreams came. One, I remem- 
ber not. 

But in the other his pale wound-worn 
limbs 

Fell from Prometheus, and the azure 
night 


Grew radiant with the glory of that form 

Which lives unchanged within, and his 
voice fell 

Like music which makes giddy the dim 
brain, 

Faint with intoxication of keen joy: 

‘* Sister of her whose footsteps pave the 
world 

With loveliness—more fair than aught 
but her, 

Whose shadow thou art—lift thine eyes 
on me.” 


SHELLEY 


——- 


I lifted them: the overpowering light 
Of that immortal shape was shadowed 
o’er 
By love ; which, from his soft and flow- 
ing limbs, 
And passion-parted lips, and keen, faint 


eyes, 

Steamed forth like vaporous fire; an 
atmosphere 

Which wrapt me in its all-dissolving 
power, 

As the warm ether of the morning sun 

Wraps ere it drinks some cloud of wan- 
dering dew. 

Isaw not, heard not, moved not, only felt 

His presence flow and mingle thro’ my 
blood 

Till it became his life, and his grew 
mine, 

And I was thus absorbed, until it passed, 

And like the vapors when the sun sinks 


down. 

Gathering again in drops upon the 
pines, 

And tremulous as they, in the deep 
night 


My being was condensed; and as the 


rays 
Of thought were slowly gathered, I could 


hear 

His voice, whose accents lingered ere 
they died 

Like footsteps of weak melody: thy 
name 


Among the many sounds alone I heard 

Of what might be articulate ; tho’ still 

I listened thro’ the night when sound 

was none. 

Ione wakened then, and said to me: 

‘*Canst thou divine what troubles me 
to-night ? 

I always knew what I desired before, 

Nor ever found delight to wish in vain. 

But now I cannot tell:thee what I seek : 

I know not; something sweet, since it 
is sweet 

Even to desire; it is thy sport, false 
sister ; 

Thou hast discovered some enchantment 
old, 

Whose spells have stolen my spirit as I 
slept 

And mingled it.with thine: for when 
just now 

We kissed, I felt within thy parted lips 

The sweet air that sustained me, and 
the warmth 

Of the life-blood, for loss of which I 
faint, 


5*3 





Quivered between 
arms.” 

I answered not, for the Eastern star 
grew pale, 

But fled to thee. 

Asia. Thou speakest, but thy words 
Are as the air: I feel them not: Oh, lift 
Thine eyes, that I may read his written 

soul ! 

Panthea. ‘I lift them tho’ they droop 

beneath the load 

Of that they would express : 
thou see 

But thine own fairest shadow imaged 
there ? 

Asia. Thine eyes are like the deep, 

blue, boundless heaven 
Contracted to two circles underneath 
Their long, fine lashes; dark, far, mea- 


our intertwining 


what canst 


sureless, 
Orb within orb, and line thro’ line in- 
woven. 
Panthea. Why lookest thou as if a 


spirit past ? 
Asia. There is a change: beyond 

their inmost depth 

I see a shade, a shape: ’tis He, arrayed 

In the soft light of his own smiles,which 
spread 

Like radiance from the cloud-surrounded 
moon. 

Prometheus, it is thine! depart not yet ! 

Say not those smiles that we shall meet 


again 

Within that bright pavilion which’ their 
beams 

Shall build on the waste world? 
dream is told. 

What shape is that. between us? Its 
rude hair 

Roughens the wind that lifts it, its 
regard 

Is wild and quick, yet ’tis a thing of air, 

For thro’ its gray robe gleams the golden 
dew 

Whose stars the noon has quenched not. 

Dream. Follow! Follow! 


The 


Panthea. It is mine other dream. 
Asia. It disappears. 
Panthea. It passes now into my 
mind. Methought 
As we sate here, the flower-infolding 
buds 
Burst on yon lightning-blasted almond- 
tree 


When swift from the white Scythian 
wilderness 

A wind swept forth wrinkling the Earth 
with frost : 


i ell 


314 BRITISH POETS 


I looked, and all the blossoms were 
blown down ; 

But on each leaf was stamped, as the 
blue bells 

Of Hyacinth tell Apollo’s written grief, 

O, FOLLOW, FOLLOW ! 


Asia. As you speak, your words 
Fill, pause by pause, my own forgotten 
sleep 


With shapes. Methought among the 
lawns together 

We wandered, underneath the young 
gray dawn, 

And multitudes of dense white fleecy 
clouds 

Were wandering in thick flocks along 
the mountains 

Shepherded by the slow, unwilling 
wind ; 

And the white dew on the new bladed 
grass, 

Just piercing the dark earth, hung 
silently : 

And there was more which I remember 


not: 

But on the shadows of the morning 
clouds, 

Athwart the purple mountain slope, was 
written | 


FOLLOow, O, FOLLOW! as they vanished 


Y> 
And on each herb, from which Heaven’s 
dew had fallen, 
The like was stamped, as with a wither- 
-ing fire, 
A wind arose among the pines ; it shook 
The clinging music from their boughs, 
and then 
Low, sweet, faint sounds, like the fare- 
well of ghosts, 
Were heard: O, FOLLOW, FOLLOW, 
FOLLOW ME! 
Andthen I said: ‘* Panthea, look on me.” 
But in the depth of those beloved eyes 
Still lsaw, FOLLOW, FOLLOW ! 
Echo. Follow, follow ! 
Panthea. Thecrags, this clear spring 
morning, mock our voices 
As they were spirit-tongued. 
Asia. It is some being 
Around the crags. What fine clear 
sounds! O, list! 


Fichoes (unseen) 


Echoes we: listen ! 
We cannot stay : 
As dew-stars glisten 
Then fade away 
Child of Ocean ! 





Asia. Hark! Spirits speak. The 
liquid résponses 
Of their aérial tongues yet sound. 
Panthea. I hear. 
Echoes 


O, follow, follow, 
As our voice recedeth 

Thro’ the caverns hollow, 
Where the forest spreadeth ; 


(More distant) 


O, follow, follow ! 
Thro’ the caverns hollow, 
As the song floats thou pursue, 
Where the wild bee never flew, 
Thro’ the noontide darkness deep, 
By the odor-breathing sleep 
Of faint night-flowers, and the waves 
At the fountain-lighted caves, 
While our music, wild and sweet, 
Mocks thy gently falling feet, 
Child of Ocean ! 
Asia. Shall we pursue the sound? It 
grows more faint 
And distant. 
Panthea. 
nearer now. 


List ! the strain floats 


Echoes 


In the world unknown 
Sleeps a voice unspoken ; 
By thy step alone 
Can its rest be broken ; 
Child of Ocean ! 
Asia. How the notes sink upon the 
ebbing wind ! 


Echoes 


O, follow, follow ! 
Thro’ the caverns hollow, 
As the song floats thou pursue, 
By the woodland noontide dew ; 
By the forests, lakes, and fountains 
Thro’ the many-folded mountains ; 
To the rents, and gulfs, and chasms, 
Where the Earth reposed from spasms, 
On the day when He and thou 
Parted, to commingle now ; 
Child of Ocean ! 
Asia. Come, sweet Panthea, link thy 
hand in mine, 
And follow, ere the voices fade away. 


SCENE II.—A FOREST, INTERMINGLED 
WITH ROCKS AND CAVERNS. 


ASIA and PANTHEA pass into it. Two 
young Fauns are sitting on a Rock 
listening. 


SHELLEY 


Semichorus I of Spirits 


The path thro’ which that lovely twain 
Have past, by cedar, pine, and yew, 
And each dark tree that ever grew, 
Is curtained out from Heaven’s wide 
blue; — 
Nor sun, nor moon, nor wind, nor rain, 
Can pierce its interwoven bowers, 
Nor aught, save where some cloud of 
dew, 
Drifted along the earth-creeping breeze, 
Between the trunks of the hoar trees, 
Hangs each a _ pearl in the pale 
flowers 
* Of the green laurel, blown anew ; 
And bends, and then fades silently, 
One frail and fair anemone: 
Or when some star of many a one 
That climbs and wanders thro’ steep 
night, 
Has found the cleft thro’ which alone 
Beams fall from high those depths upon 
Ere it is borne away, away, 
By the swift Heavens that cannot stay, 
It scatters drops of golden light, 
Like lines of rain that ne’er unite: 
And the gloom divine isall around. 
And underneath is the mossy ground. 


Semichorus IT 


There the voluptuous nightingales, 
Are awake thro’ all the broad noon- 


ay. 
When one with bliss or sadness fails, 
And thro’ the windless ivy-boughs, 
Sick with sweet love, droops dying 
away 
On its mate’s music-panting bosom ; 
Another from the swinging blossom, 
Watching to catch the languid close 
Of the last strain, then lifts on high 
The wings of the weak melody, 
Till some new strain of feeling bear 
The song, and all the woods are mute ; 
When there is heard thro’ the dim air 
The rush of wings, and rising there 
Like many a lake-surrounded flute, 
Sounds overflow the listener’s brain 
So sweet, that joy is almost pain. 


Semichorus I 


There those enchanted eddies play 
Of echoes, music-tongued, which 
draw, 
By Demogorgon’s mighty law, 
With melting rapture, or sweet awe, 
All spirits on that secret way ; 
As inland boats are driven to Ocean 


J25 


Down streams made strong with moun- 
tain-thaw : 
And first there comes a gentle sound 
To those in talk or slumber bound 
And wakes the destined. Soft emotion 
Attracts, impels them: those who saw 
Say from the breathing earth behind 
There steams a plume-uplifting wind 
Which drives then{ on their path, while 
they , 
Believe their own swift wings and feet 
The sweet desires within obey : 
And so they float upon their way, 
Until, still sweet, but loud and strong, 
The storm of sound is driven along, 
Sucked up and hurrying: as they 
fleet 
Behind, its gathering billows meet 
And to the fatal mountain bear 
Like clouds amid the yielding air. 
First Faun. Canst thou imagine 
where those spirits live 
Which make such delicate music in the 
woods? 
We haunt within the least frequented 
caves 
And closest coverts, and we know these 
wilds, 
Yet never meet them, tho’ we hear them 
oft: 
Where may they hide themselves ? 
Second Faun. Tis hard to tell: 
I have heard those more skilled in 
spirits say, 
The bubbles, which the enchantment of 
the sun 
Sucks from the pale faint water-flowers 
that pave 
The oozy bottom of clear lakes and 
pools, 
Are the pavilions where such dwell and 
float 
Under the green and golden atmosphere 
Which noontide kindles thro’ the woven 
leaves ; 
And when these burst, and the thin fiery 


air, 

The which they breathed within those 
lucent domes, 

Ascends to flow like meteors thro’ the 
night, 

They ride on them, and rein their head- 
long speed, 

And bow their burning crests, and glide 
in fire 

Under the waters of the earth again. 

First Faun. If such live thus, have 

others other lives, 

Under pink blossoms or within the bells 


316 

Of meadow flowers, or folded violets 
deep, 

Or on their dying odors, when they 
die, 


Or in the sunlight of the spheréd dew ? 
Second Faun. Ay, many more which 

we may well divine. 

But, should we stay to speak, noontide 
would come, 

And thwart Silenus find his goats un- 
drawn, 

And grudge to sing those wise and lovely 
songs 

Of fate, and chance, and God, and Chaos 


oO 
And Love, and the chained Titan’s woe- 

ful doom, 
And how he shall be loosed, and make 
the earth 
brotherhood : 
which cheer 
Our solitary twilights, and which charm 
To silence the unenvying nightingales. 


One delightful strains 


SCENE III.—A PINNACLE OF ROCK 
AMONG MOUNTAINS. ASIA and PAN- 
THEA. 


Panthea. Wither the sound has borne 
us—to the realm 
Of Demogorgon, and the mighty portal, 
Likea volcano’s meteor-breathing chasm, 
Whence the oracular vapor is hurled up 
Which lonely men drink wandering in 
their youth, 
And call truth, virtue, love, genius, or 


JOY; 

That maddening wine of life, whose 
dregs they drain 

To deep intoxication ; and uplift, 

Like Meenads who cry loud, Evoe! Evoe! 

The voice which is contagion to the 
world. 

Asia. Fit throne for such a power! 

Magnificent ! 

How glorious art thou, Earth! 
thou be 

The shadow of some spirit lovelier still, 

Though evil stain its work, and it should 
be 

Like its creation, weak yet beautiful, 

I could fall down and worship that and 


And if 


thee. 

Even now my heart adoreth: Wonder- 
ful ! 

Look, sister, ere the vapor dim thy 
brain : 


Beneath is a wide plain of billowy mist, 
As a lake, paving in the morning sky, 


BRITISH POETS 


With azure waves which burst in silver 
light, 

Some Indian vale. Behold it, rolling on 

Under the curdling winds, and islanding 

The peak whereon we stand, midway, 
around, 

Encinctured by the dark and blooming 
forests, 

Dim twilight-lawns, and stream-illu- 
mined caves, 

And wind-enchanted shapes of wander- 
ing mist ; 

And far on high the keen sky-cleaving 
mountains 

From icy spires of sun-like radiance fling, 

The dawn, as lifted Ocean’s dazzling 
spray, 

From some Atlantic islet scattered up, 

Spangles the wind with lamp-like water- 


drops. 

The vale is girdled with their walls, a 
howl 

Of cataracts from their thaw-cloven 
ravines, 

Satiates the listening wind, continuous, 
vast, 

Awful as silence. Hark! the rushing 
snow ! 

The sun-awakened avalanche ! whose 
mass, 

Thrice sifted by the storm, had gathered 
there 

Flake after flake, in heaven-defying 
minds 


As thought by thought is piled, till some 
great truth 
Is loosened, and the nations echo round, 
Shaken to their roots, as do the mountains 
now. 
Panthea. Look how the gusty sea of 
mist is breaking 
In crimson foam, even at our feet! it 
rises 
As Ocean at the enchantment of the 
moon 
Round foodless men wrecked on some 
oozy isle. 
Asia. The fragments of the cloud are 
scattered up ; 
The wind that lifts them disentwines 
my hair ; 
Its billows now sweep o’er mine eyes ; 
my brain 
Grows dizzy ; 
the mist. 
Panthea. A countenance with beckon- 
ing smiles: there burns 
An azure fire within its golden locks ! 
Another and another: hark ! they speak t 


I see thin shapes within 


— 


; SHELLEY 317 


Song of Spirits 


To the deep, to the deep, 
Down, down! 

Through the shade of sleep, 

Through the cloudy strife 

Of Death and of Life; 

Through the veil and the bar 

Of things which seem and are 

Even to the steps of the remotest throne, 
Down, down! 


While the sound whirls around, 
Down, down! 

As the fawn draws the hound, 

As the lightning the vapor, 

As the weak moth the taper ; 

Death, despair ; love, sorrow ; 

Time both ; to-day, to-morrow ; 

As steel obeys the spirit of the stone, 
Down, down ! 


Through the gray, void abysm, 
Down,.down! 

Where the air is no prism, 

And the moon and stars are not, 

And the cavern-crags wear not 

The radiance of Heaven, 

Nor the gloom to Earth given, 

Where there is one pervading, one alone, 
Down, down! 


In the depth of the deep, 
Down, down! 

Like veiled lightning asleep, 

Like the spark nursed in embers, 

The last look Love remembers, 

Like a diamond, which shines 

On the dark wealth of mines, 

A spell is treasured but for thee alone, 
Down, down! 


We have bound thee, we guide thee ; 
Down, down! 
With the bright form beside thee ; 
Resist not the weakness, 
Such strength is in meekness 
That the Fternal, the Immortal, 
3 through life’s portal 
TR ce Doom coiled underneath 
\ sis throne 
By that alone. 


SCENE IV.—THE CAVE OF 


DEMOGORGON. ASIA and PANTHEA. 


Panthea. What veiled form sits on 
that ebon throne ? 

Asia. The veil has fallen. 

Panthea. I see a mighty darkness 


Filling the seat of power, and rays of 
gloom 
Dart round, as light from the meridian 
sun, 
Ungazed upon and shapeless; neither 
limb, 
Nor form, nor outline; yet we feel it is 
A living Spirit. 
Demogorgon. 
know. 
Asia. What canst thou tell ? 
Demogorgon. All things thou 
dar’st demand. 
Asia. Who made the living world? 
Demogorgon. God. 
Asia. Who made all 
That it contains? thought, passion, 
reason, will, 
Imagination ? 
Demogorgon. God: Almighty God. 
Asia. Who made that sense which, 
when the winds of spring 
In rarest visitation, or the voice 
Of one beloved heard in youth alone, 
Fills the faint eyes with falling tears 
which dim 
The radiant looks of unbewailing flowers, 
And leaves this peopled earth a solitude 
When it returns no more? 
Demogorgon. Merciful God. 
Asia. And who made terror, madness, 
crime, remorse, 
Which from the links of the great chain 
of things, 
To every thought within the mind of 
man 
Sway and drag heavily, and each one 
reels 
Under the load towards the pit of 
death ; 
Abandoned hope, and love that turns to 
hate ; 
And self-contempt, bitterer to 
than blood ; 


Ask what thou wouldst 


drink 


Pain, whose unheeded and familiar 
speech 

Is howling, and keen shrieks, day after 
day ; 


y 5 
And Hell, or the sharp fear of Hell? 
Demogorgon. He reigns. 
Asia Utter hisname: a world pining 
in pain 
Asks but his name: curses shall drag 
him down. 
Demogorgon. He reigns. 
Asia. I feel, I know it : who? 
Demogorgon. He reigns. 
Asia. Who reigns? There was the 
Heaven and Earth at first, 


318 


And Light and Love ; then Saturn, from 
whose throne 


Time fell, an envious shadow : such the 
state 

Of the earth’s primal spirits beneath his 
sway, 

As the calm joy of flowers and living 
leaves 

Before the wind or sun has withered 
them 


And semivital worms; but he refused 
The birthright of their being, knowledge, 
ower, 

The skill which wields the elements, 
the thought 

Which pierces this dim universe like 
light, 

Self-empire, and the majesty of love ; 

For thirst of which they fainted. Then 


Prometheus 

Gave wisdom, which is strength, to 
Jupiter, 

And with this law alone, ‘‘ Let man be 
free,” 

Clothed him with the dominion of wide 
Heaven, 

To know nor faith, nor love, nor law ; to 
be 


Omnipotent but friendless, is to reign ; 

And Jove now reigned; for on the race 
of man 

First famine, and then toil, and then 
disease, 

Strife, wounds, and ghastly death unseen 
before, 

Fell; and the unseasonable 

drove 

With alternating shafts of frost and fire, 

Their shelterless, pale tribes to mountain 
caves : 

And in their desert hearts fierce wants 
he sent, 

And mad disquietudes, and shadows idle 

Of unreal good, which levied mutual 
war, 

So ruining the lair wherein they raged. 

Prometheus saw, and waked the legioned 


seasons 


hopes 

Which sleep within folded Elysian 
flowers, 

Nepenthe, Moly, Amaranth, fadeless 
blooms, 


That they might hide with thin and 
rainbow wings 

The shape of Death ; 
to bind 

The disunited tendrils of that vine 

Which bears the wine of life, the human 
heart ; 


and Love he sent 


BRITISH POETS 


And he tamed fire which, like some 
beast of prey 

Most terrible, but lovely, played beneath 

The frown of man; and tortured to his 
will 

Iron and gold, the slaves and signs of 
power, 

And gems and poisons, and all subtlest 
forms 

Hidden beneath the mountains and the 
waves, 

He gave man speech, and speech created 
thought, 

Which is the measure of the universe ; 

And Science struck the thrones of earth 
and heaven, 

Which shook, but fell not ; 
harmonious mind 
Poured itself forth in all-prophetic song ; 
And music lifted up the listening spirit 
Until it walked, exempt from mortal 


and the 


care, 
Godlike, o’er the clear billows of sweet 
sound ; 
And human “hands first mimicked and 
then mocked, 
With moulded limbs more lovely than 
its own, 
human 
divine ; 
And mothers, gazing, drank the love 
men. see 


The form, till marble grew 


Reflected in their race, behold, and 
perish. 

He told the hidden power of herbs and 
springs, 


And Disease drank and slept. Death 
grew like sleep. 

He taught the implicated orbits woven 

Of the wide-wandering stars ; and how 
the sun 

Changes his lair, and by what secret 
spell 

The pale moon is transformed, when her 
broad eye 

Gazes not on the interlunar sea : 

He taught to rule, as life directs the 


limbs, 

The tempest-wingéd chariots of the 
Ocean, 

And the Celt knew the Indian. Cities 
then 


Were built, and through their snow- -like 
columns flowed 

The warm winds, and the azure aether 
shone, 

And the blue sea and shadowy hills were 
seen. 

Such, the alleviations of his state, 





SHELLEY 


329 





Prometheus gave to man, for which he 
hangs 

Withering in destined pain: but who 
rains down 

Evil, the immedicable plague, which, 
while 

Man looks on his creation like a God 

And sees that it is glorious, drives him 


on 

The wreck of his own will, the scorn of 
earth, 

The outcast, the abandoned, the alone ? 

Not Jove: while yet his frown shook 
heaven, ay when 

His adversary from adaniantine chains 

Cursed him, he trembled like a slave. 
Declare 

Who is his master? Is he tooa slave ? 

Demogorgon. All spirits are enslaved 

which serve things evil : 

Thou knowest if Jupiter be such or no. 


Asia. Whom called’st thou God? 
Demogorgon. I spoke but as ye 
speak, 


For Jove is the supreme of living things. 
Asia. Who isthe master of the slave ? 
_Demogorgon. If the abysm 

Could vomit forth its secrets. . . Buta 

voice 

Is wanting, the deep truth is imageless ; 

For what would it avail to bid thee gaze 

On the revolving world? What to bid 


speak 
Fate, Time, Occasion, Chance, and 
Change? To these 


All things are subject but eternal Love. 
Asia. So much I asked before, and 
my heart gave 
The response thou hast given; and of 
such truths 
Each to itself must be the oracle. 


One more demand ; and do thou answer 


me 
As mine own soul would answer, did it 
know 
That which I ask. Prometheus shall 
arise 
Henceforth the sun of this rejoicing 
world : 
When shall the destined hour arrive? 
Demogorgon. Behold ! 
Asia: The rocks are cloven, and 


through the purple night 

I see cars drawn by rainbow-wingéd 
steeds 

Which trample the dim winds: in each 
there stands 

A wild-eyed charioteer urging their 
flight. 





Some look behind, as fiends pursued 
them there. 

And yet Isee no shapes but the keen 
stars: 

Others, with burning eyes, lean forth, 
and drink 

With eager lips the wind of their own 
speed, 

As if the thing they loved fled on before, 

And now, even now, they clasped it. 
Their bright locks 

Stream like a comet’s flashing hair: they 
all 

Sweep onward. 

Demogorgon. 

Hours, 

Of whom thou didst demand. One 
waits for thee. 

Asia. <A spirit with a dreadful coun- 

tenance 

Checks its dark chariot by the cragg 


These are the immortal 


gulf. 
Unlike thy brethren, ghastly charioteer, 
Who art thou? Whither wouldst thou 
bearme? Speak! 
Spirit. Tam the shadow of a destiny 
More dread than is my aspect: ere yon 
planet 
Has set, the darkness which ascends 
with me 
Shall wrap in lasting night heaven’s 
kingless throne. 
Asia. What meanest thou? 
Panthea. That terrible shadow 
floats 
Up from its throne, as may the lurid 
smoke 
Of earthquake-ruined cities o’er the sea. 
Lo! it ascends the car; the coursers fly 
Terrified : watch its path among the 
stars 
Blackening the night! 
Asia. Thus I am answered ; 
strange ! 
Panthea. See, near the verge, another 
chariot stays ; 
An ivory shell inlaid with crimson fire, 
Which comes and goes within its sctlp- 
tured rim 
Of delicate strange tracery ; the young 
spirit 
That guides it has the dove-like eyes of 
hope ; 
How its soft smiles attract the soul! as 
light 
Lures wingéd insects through the lamp- 
less air. 
Spirit 
My coursers are fed with the lightning, 


They drink of the whirlwind’s stream, 
And when the red morning is brightning 
They bathe in the fresh sunbeam ; 
They have strength for their swiftness 
I deem, 
Then ascend with me, daughter of Ocean. 


I desire ; and their speed makes night 
kindle ; 
I fear: they outstrip the Typhoon ; 
Ere the cloud piled on Atlas can dwindle 
We encircle the earth and the moon: 
Weshall rest from long labors at noon : 
Then ascend with me,daughter of Ocean, 


SCENE V.—THE CAR PAUSES WITHIN 
A CLOUD ON THE TOP OF A SNOWY 


MOUNTAIN. ASIA, PANTHEA, and the 
SPIRIT OF THE Hour. 
Spirit 

On the brink of the night and the 


morning 
My coursers are wont to respire ; 
But the Earth has just whispered a warn- 
ing 


That their flight must be swifter than 
fire : 

They shall drink the hot speed of 
desire ! ’ 


Asia. Thou breathest on their nostrils, 
but my breath 
Would give them swifter speed. 
Spirit. Alas ! it could not. 
Panthea. Oh Spirit! pause, and tell 
whence is the light 
Which fills the cloud? the sun is yet 
unrisen, 
Spirit. The sun will rise not until 
noon. Apollo 
Is held in heaven by wonder; and the 
light 
Which fills this vapor, as the aérial hue 
Of fountain-gazing roses fills the water, 
Flows from thy mighty sister. 
Panthea. Yes, I feel— 
Asia. What is it with thee, sister ? 
* Thou art pale. 
Panthea. How thou art changed ! I 
dare not look on thee ; 
I feel but see thee not. I scarce endure 
The radiance of thy beauty. Some good 
change 
Is working in the elements, which suffer 
Thy presence thus unveiled. The Ne- 
reids tell 
That on the day when the clear hyaline 
Was cloven at thy uprise, and thou didst 
stand 


320 BRITISH POETS 





Within aveinéd shell, which floated on _ 


Over the calm floor of the crystal sea, 

Among the Atgean isles, and by the 
shores 

Which bear thy name; love, like the 
atmosphere 

Of the sun’s fire filling the living world, 

Burst from thee, and illumined earth 
and heaven 

And the deep ocean-and the sunless 
caves 

And all that dwells within them ; till 
grief cast 

Keclipse upon the soul from which it 
came : 

Such art thou now; nor is it I alone, 

Thy sister, thy companion, thine own 
chosen one, 

But the whole world which seeks thy 
sympathy. 

Hearest thou not sounds i the air which 
speak the love 

Of all articulate beings? Feelest thou 
not 

The inanimate winds enamored of thee ? 
List ! (Music.) 

Asia. Thy words are sweeter than 

aught else but his 

Whose echoes they are: yet all love is 
sweet, 

Given or returned. Common as light 
is love, 

And its familiar voice wearies not ever. 

Like the wide heaven, the all-sustaining 
air. 

It makes the reptile equal to the God: 

They who inspire it most are fortunate, 

Aslam now ; but those who feel it most 

Are happier still, after long sufferings, 

As I shall soon becoine. 

Panthea. List ! Spirits speak. 


Voice in the Air Singing 


Life of Life ! thy lips enkindle 
With their love the breath between 
them ; 
And thy smiles before they dwindle 
Make the cold air fire; then screen 
them 
In those looks, where whoso gazes 
Faints, entangled in their mazes. 


Child of Light! thy limbs are burning 
Thro’ the vest which seems to hide 
them ; 
As the radiant lines of morning 
Thro’ the clouds ere they divide them ; 
And this atmosphere divinest 
Shrouds thee wheresoe’er thou shinest. 





SHELLEY 321 





Fair are others ; none beholds thee, 
But thy voice sounds low and tender 
Like the fairest, for it folds thee 
From the sight, that liquid splendor, 
And all feel, yet see thee never, 
As I feel now, lost for ever! 


Lamp of Earth ! where’er thou movest 
Its dim shapes are clad with bright- 
ness, 
And the souls of whom thou lovest 
Walk upon the winds with lightness, 
Till they fail, as I am failing, 
Dizzy, lost, yet unbewailing ! 


_ Asia 


My soul is an enchanted boat, 
Which, like a sleeping swan, doth 
float 
Upon the silver waves of thy sweet 
singing ; 
And thine doth like an angel sit 
Beside a helm conducting it, 
Whilst all the winds with melody are 
ringing. 
It seems to float ever, for ever, 
Upon that many-winding river, 
Between mountains, woods, abysses, 
A paradise of wildernesses ! 
Till, like one in slumber bound, 


Borne to the ocean, I float down, 
around, 

Into a sea profound, of ever-spreading 
sound : 


Meanwhile thy spirit lifts its pinions 
In music’s most serene dominions ; 
Catching the winds that fan that happy 
heaven. 
And we sail on, away, afar, 
Without a course, without a star, 
But, by the instinct of sweet music 
driven ; 
Till through Elysian garden islets 
By thee, most beautiful of pilots, 
Where never mortal pinnace glided, 
The boat of my desire is guided : 
Realms where the air we breathe is 
love, 
Which in the winds and on the waves 
doth move, 
Harmonizing this earth with what we 
feel above. 


We have pass’d Age’s icy caves, 
And Manhood’s dark and_ tossing 
waves, 
And Youth’s smooth ocean, smiling to 
betray : 
21 


Beyond the glassy gulfs we flee 
Of shadow-peopled Infancy, 
azonen Death and Birth, to a diviner 
ay; 
A paradise of vaulted bowers, 
Lit by downward-gazing flowers, 
And watery paths that wind between 
Wildernesses calm and green, 
Peopled by shapes too bright to see, 
And rest, having beheld; somewhat 
like thee: 
Which walk upon the sea, and chant 
melodiously ! 


ACT III 


SCENE  I.—HEAVEN. JUPITER on 
his Throne; THETIS and the other 
Deities assembled. 


Jupiter. Ye congregated powers of 

heaven, who share 

The glory and the strengthof him ye 
serve, 

Rejoice ! henceforth I am omnipotent. 

All else had been subdued to me ; alone 

Thesoul of man, like unextinguished fire, 

Yet burns towards heaven with fierce 
reproach, and doubt, 

And lamentation, and reluctant prayer, 

Hurling up insurrection, which might 
make 

Our antique empire insecure, though 
built 

On eldest faith, and hell’s coeval, fear ; 

And tho’ my curses thro’ the pendulous 


aie 
Like snow on herbless peaks, fall flake 
by flake, 
And cling to it; tho’? under my wrath’s 
night 


It climbs the crags of life, step after step, 

Which wound it, as ice wounds unsan- 
dalled feet, 

It yet remains supreme o’er misery, 

Aspiring, unrepressed, yet soon to fall : 

Even now have I begotten a strange 
wonder, 

That fatal child, the terror of the earth, 

Who waits but till the destined hour 
arrive, 

Bearing from 
throne 

The dreadful might of ever-living limbs 

Which clothed that awful spirit un- 
beheld, 

To redescend, and trample out the spark. 


Demogorgon’s vacant 


Pour forth heaven’s wine, Idzean Gany- 
mede, 


322 


And let it fill the Dzedal cups like fire, 

And from the flower-inwoven soil divine 

Ye all-triumphant harmonies arise, 

As dew from earth under the twilight 
stars : 

Drink ! be the nectar circling thro’ your 
veins 

The soul of joy, ye ever-living Gods, 

Till exultation burst in one wide voice 

Like music from Elysian, winds. 

And thou 

Ascend beside me, veiléd in the light 

Of the desire which makes thee one with 
me, 

Thetis, bright image of eternity ! 

When thou didst cry, ‘‘ Insufferable 
night ! 

God! Spare me! I sustain not the quick 
flames, 

The penetrating presence ; all my being, 

Like him whom the Numidian seps did 
thaw 

Into a dew with poison, is dissolved, 

Sinking thro’ its foundations :” even then 

Two mighty spirits, mingling, made a 


third 

Mightier than either, which, unbodied 
now 

Between us floats, felt, although unbe- 
held, 


Waiting the incarnation, which ascends, 

(Hear ye the thunder of the fiery wheels 

Griding the winds?) from Demogorgon’s 
throne. 

Victory ! victory ! 
world, 

The earthquake of his chariot thunder- 
ing up 

Olympus ? 

[The Car of the Hour arrives. 
DEMOGORGON descends, and moves 
towards the Throne of JUPITER. 

Awfulshape, what art thou? 
Speak ! 
Demogorgon. Eternity. Demand no 
direr name. 
Descend, and follow me down theabyss. 
Tam thy child, as thou wert Saturn’s 
child ; 
Mightier than thee: and we must dwell 
together 
Henceforth in darkness. 
nings not. 
The tyranny of heaven none may retain, 
Or reassume, or hold, succeeding thee : 
Yet if thou wilt, as ’tis the destiny 
Of trodden worms to writhe till they 
are dead, 
Put forth thy might. 


Feel’st thou not, O 


Lift thy light- 


BRITISH POETS 


Jupiter. Detested prodigy! 
Even thus beneath the deep Titanian 
prisons 
I trample thee! thou Hn ere 
Mercy ! mercy ! 
No pity, no release, no respite! Oh, 
That thou wouldst make mine enemy 
my judge, 
Even where he hangs, seared by my 
long revenge, 
On Caucasus! he would not doom me 
thus. 
Gentle, and just, and dreadless, is he 
not 
The monarch of the world? What then 
art thou ? 
No refuge ! no appeal ! 
Sink with me then, 
We too will sink on the wide waves of 
ruin, 
Even as a vulture and a snake outspent 
Drop, twisted in inextricable fight, 
Into a shoreless sea. Let hell unlock 
Its mounded oceans of tempestuous fire, 
And nee on them into the bottomless 
vol 
This desolated world, and thee, and me, 
The conqueror and the conquered, and 
the wreck 
Of that for which they combated. 
Ai! Ai! 
The elements obey me not. I sink 
Dizzily down, ever, for ever, down. 
And, like a cloud, mine enemy above 
Darkens my fall with victory! Ai, Ai! 


SCENE II.—THE MOUTH OF A GREAT 
RIVER IN THE ISLAND ATLANTIS. OCEAN 
ts discovered reclining near the Shore ; 
APOLLO stands beside him. 


Ocean. He fell, thou sayest, beneath 
his conqueror’s frown ? 
Apollo. Aye, when the strife was 
ended which made dim 
The orb I rule, and shook the solid stars, 
The terrors of his eye illumined heaven 
With sanguine light, through the pas 
' ragged skirts 
Of the victorious darkness, as he fell: 
Like the last glare of day’s red agony, 
Which, from a rent among the fiery 
clouds, 
Burns far along the tempest-wrinkled 
deep. 
Ocean. He sunk to the ayaa To the 
dark void ? 
Apollo. Aneagle so caught in some 
bursting cloud 


SHELLEY 


323 








On Caucasus, his thunder-bafiled wings 

Entangled in the whirlwind, and his 
eyes 

Which gazed on the undazzling sun, 
now blinded 

By the white lightning, while the pon- 
derous hail 

Beats on his struggling form, which 
sinks at length 

Prone, and the aérial ice clings over it. 

Ocean. Henceforth the fields of 

Heaven-reflecting sea 

Which are my realm, will heave, un- 
stained with blood, 

Beneath the uplifting winds, like plains 


of corn 

Swayed by the summer air; my streams 
will flow 

Round many-peopled continents, and 
round 

Fortunate isles; and from their glassy 
thrones 

Blue Proteus and his humid nymphs 
shall mark 


The shadow of fair ships, as mortals see 

The floating bark of the light-laden 
moon 

With that white star, its sightless pilot’s 
crest, 

Borne down the rapid sunset’s ebbing 
sea ; 

Tracking their path no more by blood 
and groans, 

And desolation, and the mingled voice 

Of slavery and command! but by the 
light 

Of wave-reflected flowers, and floating 
odors, 

And music soft, and mild, free, gentle 
voices, 

And sweetest music, such as spirits love. 

Apollo. And I shall gaze not on the 

deeds which make 

My mind obscure with sorrow, as eclipse 

Darkens the sphere I guide; but list, I 
hear 

The small, clear, silver lute of the young 
Spirit 

That sits i’ the morning star. 

Ocean. Thou must away ; 

Thy steeds will pause at even, till when 
farewell : 

The loud deep calls me home even now 
to feed it 

With azure calm out of the emerald 
urns 

Which stand for ever full beside my 
throne. 

Behold the Nereids under the green sea, 


Their wavering limbs borne on the wind- 
like stream, 

Their white arms lifted o’er their stream- 
ing hair 

With garlands pied and starry sea-flower 
crowns, 

Hastening to grace their mighty sister’s 
joy. [A-sound of waves is heard. 

It is the unpastured sea hungering for 
cali. 

Peace, monster ; 
well. 

Apollo. 


I come now. Fare- 


Farewell. 


SCENE IIIJ.—Caucasus. PROMETHEUS, 
HERCULES, IONE, the EARTH, SPIR- 
ITS, ASIA, and PANTHEA, borne 
in the Car with the SPrRiT OF THE 
Hour. HERCULES unbinds PROME- 
THEUS, who descends. 


Hercules. Most glorious 
spirits, thus doth strength 
To wisdom, courage, and long-suffering 


among 


love, 
And thee, who art the form they ani- 
mate, 
Minister like a slave. 
Prometheus. Thy gentle words 


Are sweeter even than freedom long 
desired 

And long delayed. 

Asia, thou light of life, 

Shadow of beauty unbeheld: and ye, 

Fair sister nymphs, who made long 
years of pain 

Sweet to remember, thro’ your love and 
care : 

Henceforth we will not part. 
a cave, 

All overgrown with trailing odorous 
plants, — 

Which curtain out the day with leaves 
and flowers, 

And paved with veinéd emerald, and a 
fountain 

Leaps in the midst with an awakening 
sound. 

From its curved roof the mountain’s 
frozen tears 

Like snow, or silver, or long diamond 
spires, 

Hang downward, raining forth a doubt- 
ful light : 

And there is heard the ever-moving air, 

Whispering without from tree to tree, 
and birds, 

And bees; and all around are mossy 
seats, 


There is 


324 BRITISH POETS 





And the rough walls are clothed with 
long soft grass ; 

A simple dwelling, which shall be our 
own ; 

Where we will sit and talk of time and 
change, 

As the world ebbs and flows, ourselves 
unchanged. 

What can hide man from mutability ? 

And if ye sigh, then I will smile; and 
thou, 

Ione, shalt chant fragments of sea- 
music, 

Until I weep, when ye shall smile away 

The tears she brought, which yet were 
sweet to shed. 

We will entangle buds and flowers and 
beams 

Which twinkle on the fountain’s brim, 
and make 

Strange combinations out of common 
things, 

Like human babes in their brief inno- 
cence ; 

And we will search, with looks and 
words of love, 

For hidden thoughts, each lovelier than 
the last, 

Our unexhausted spirits ; and like lutes 

Touched by the skill of the enamored 
wind, 

Weave harmonies divine, yet ever new, 

From difference sweet where discord 
cannot be ; 

And hither come, sped on the charméd 
winds, 

Which meet from all the points of 
heaven, as bees 

From every flower aérial Enna feeds, 

At their known island-homes in Himera, 

The echoes of the human world, which 
tell 

Of the low voice of love, almost un- 
heard, 

And dove-eyed pity’s murmured pain, 
and music, 

Itself the echo of the heart, and all 

That tempers or improves man’s life, 
now free ; 

And lovely apparitions, dim at first, 

Then radiant, as the mind, arising 
bright 

From the embrace of beauty, whence 
the forms 

Of which these are the phantoms, cast 
on them 

The gathered rays which are reality, 

Shall visit us, the progeny immortal 

Of Painting, Sculpture, and rapt Poesy, 


And arts, tho’ unimagined, yet to be. 
The wandering voices and the shadows 
these 
Of all that man becomes, the mediators 
Of that best worship love, by him and us 
Given and returned; swift shapes and 
sounds, which grow 
More fair and soft as man grows wise 
and kind, 
And, veil by veil, evil and error fall: 
Such virtue has the cave and place 
around. 
[Turning to the Spirit of the Hour. 
For thee, fair Spirit, one toil remains. 
Jone, 
Give her that curvéd shell, which Pro- 
teus old 
Made Asia’s nuptial boon, breathing 
within it 
A voice to be accomplished, and which 
thou 
Didst hide in grass under the hollow 
rock. 
Ione. Thou most desired Hour, more 
loved and lovely 
Than all thy sisters, this is the mystic 
shell ; 
See the pale azure fading into silver 
Lining it with a soft yet glowing light: 
Looksit not like lulled music sleeping 
there ? 
Spirit. It seems in truth the fairest 
shell of Ocean : 
Its sounds must be at once both sweet 
and strange. 
Prometheus. Go, borne over the 
cities of mankind 
On whirlwind-footed coursers: once 
again 
Outspeed the sun around the orbéd world; 
And as thy chariot cleaves the kindling 
airy 
Thou breathe into the many-folded shell, 
Loosening its mighty music ; it shall be 
As thunder mingled with clear echoes : 
then 
Return ; and thou shalt dwell beside our 
cave. 
And thou, O, Mother Earth !— 
The Earth. 1 hear, I feel ; 
Thy lips are on me, and thy touch runs 
down 
Even to the adamantine central gloom 
Along these marble nerves ; ’tis life, *tis 
Oy, 
And tneouan my withered, old and icy 
frame 
The warmth of an immortal youth shoots 
down 


— 


SHELLEY 


Circling. Henceforth the many children 
fair 

Folded in my sustaining arms; all 
plants, 

And creeping forms, and insects rain- 
bow-winged, 

And birds, and beasts, and fish, and 
human shapes, 

Which drew disease and pain from my 
wan bosom, 

Draining the poison of despair, shall 
take 

And interchange sweet nutriment ; to me 

Shall they become like sister antelopes 

By one fair dam, snow-white and swift 


as wind, 

Nursed among lilies near a brimming 
stream. 

The dew-mists of my sunless sleep shall 
float 

Under the stars like balm: night-folded 
flowers 

Shall suck unwithering hues in their 
repose : 

And men and beasts in happy dreams 
shall gather 


Strength for the coming day, and all its 


joy: 

And goer shall be the last embrace of 
er 

Who takes the life she gave, even as a 
mother 

Folding her child, says, ‘‘ Leave me not 
apain.”) 

Asia. Oh, mother! wherefore speak 

the name of death ? 

Cease they to love, and move, 
breathe, and speak, 


and 


Who die ? 
The Harth. It would avail not to 
reply : 
Thou art immortal, and this tongue is 
known 


But to the uncommunicating dead. 

Death is the veil which those who live 
call life : 

They sleep, and it is lifted : and mean- 
while 

In mild variety the seasons mild 

With rainbow-skirted showers, 
odorous winds, 

And long blue meteors cleansing the 
dull night, 

And the life-kindling shafts of the keen 


> 


and 


All-piercing bow, and the dew-mingled 
rain 

Of the calm moonbeams, a soft influence 
mild, 


325 


Shall clothe the forests and the fields, 
ay, even 
The crag-built deserts of the barren deep, 
With ever-living leaves, and fruits, and 
flowers. 
And thou ! There is a cavern where my 
spirit 
Was panted forth in anguish whilst thy 
pain 
Made my heart mad, and those who did 
inhale it 
Became mad too, and built a temple 
there, 
And spoke, and were oracular, and lured 
The erring nations round to mutual war, 
And faithless faith, such as Jove kept 
with thee ; 
Which breath now rises, asamongst tall 
weeds 
A violet’s exhalation, and it fills 
With a serener light and crimson air 
Intense, yet soft, the rocks and woods 
around ; 
It feeds the quick growth of the serpent 
vine, 
And the dark linkéd ivy tangling wild, 
And budding, blown, or odor-faded 
blooms 
Which star the winds with points of 
colored light, 
As they rain thro’ them, and _ bright 
golden globes 
Of fruit, suspended in their own green 
heaven, 
And thro’ their veinéd leaves and amber 
stems 
The flowers whose purple and trans- 
lucid bowls 
Stand ever mantling with aérial dew, 
The drink of spirits: and it circles 
round, 
Like the soft waving wings of noonday 
dreams, 
Inspiring calm and happy thoughts, like 
- mine, 
Now thou art thus restored. This cave 
is thine. 
Arise! Appear ! 
[A Spirit rises in the likeness of 
a winged child. 
This is my torch-bearer ; 
Who let his lamp out in old time with 
gazing 
On eyes from which he kindled it anew 
With love, which is as fire, sweet 
daughter mine, 
For such is that within thine own. Run, 
wayward, 
And guide this company beyond the peak 


326 


Of Bacchic Nysa, Meenad-haunted moun- 
tain, 

And beyond Inaus and its tribute rivers, 

Trampling the torrent streams and glassy 
lakes 

With feet unwet, unwearied, undelaying, 

And up the green ravine, across the vale, 

Beside the windless and er ystalline pool, 

Where ever lies, on unerasing waves, 

The image of a temple, built above, 

Distinct with column, arch, and archi- 
trave, 

And palm-like capital, and over- -wrought 

And populous most with living imagery, 

Praxitelean shapes, whose mar rble smiles 

Fill the hushed air with everlasting love. 

It is deserted now, but once it bore 

Thy name, Prometheus ; there the emu- 
lous youths 

Bore to thy honor thro’ the divine gloom 

The lamp which was thine emblem ; 
even as those 

Who bear the untransmitted torch of 
hope 

Into the grave, across the night of life, 

As thou hast borne it most triumphantly 

To this far goal of Time. Depart, fare- 
well, 

Beside that temple is the destined cave. 


SCENEIV. A Forest. IN THE BACK- 
GROUND A CAVE, PROMETHEUS, ASIA, 
PANTHEA, IONE, and the SPIRIT OF THE 
EARTH. 


Jone. Sister, it is not earthly : how it 
glides 

Under the leaves ! how on its head there 
burns 


A light, likea green star, whose em- 
erald beams 

Are twined with its fair hair} how, as 
it moves, 

The splendor drops in flakes upon the 
grass ! 

Knowest thou it ? 

Panthea. It is the delicate spirit 

That guides the earth thro’ heaven. 
From afar 

The populous constellations call that 
light 

The loveliest of the planets ; 
times 

It floats along the spray of the salt sea, 

Or makes its chariot of a foggy cloud, 

Or walks thro’ fields or cities while men 
sleep, 

Or o’er the mountain tops, or down the 
rivers, 


and some- 





BRITISH POETS 


Or thro’ the green waste wilderness, as 
now, 

Wondering at all it sees. 
reigned 

It loved our sister Asia, and it came 

Each leisure hour to drink: the liquid 
light 

Out of her eyes, for which it said it 
thirsted 

As one bit by adipsas, and with her 

It made its childish confiience, and told 
her 

Allit had known or seen, 
much, 

Yet idly reasoned what it saw; and 
called her— 

For whence it sprung it knew not, nor 
do I— 

Mother, dear mother. 

The Spirit of the Earth (running to 

Asia). Mother, dearest mother ; 

May I then talk with thee as I was 
wont? 

May I then hide my eyes in thy soft 
arms, 

After thy looks have made them tired of 


Before Jove 


for it saw 


joy? 

May I then play beside thee the long 
‘noons, 

When work is none in the bright silent 
air? 

Asia. I love thee, gentlest being, and 

henceforth 

Can nee thee unenvied: speak, I 
pra 

Thy SHADIC ‘alle once solaced, now de- 
lights. 
Spirit of the Earth. Meine I am 
grown wiser, though a child 
Cannot be wise like thee, within this 
day 

And happier too ; happier and wiser both. 

Thou knowest that toads, and snakes, 
and loathly worms, 

And venomous and malicious beasts, 
and boughs 

That bore ill berries in the woods, were 
ever 

An hindrance to my walks o’er the green 
world : 

And that, among the haunts of human- 
kind, 

Hard-featured men, or with proud, angry 
looks, 

Or cold, staid gait, or false and hollow 
smiles, 

Or the dull sneer of self-loved ignorance, 

Or other such foul masks, with which 
ill thoughts 


SHELLEY 


Hide that fair being whom we spirits 
Calliman ; 

And women too, ugliest of all things 
evil, 

(Tho’ fair, even ina world where thou 
art fair, 

When good and kind, free and sincere 
like thee), 

When false or frowning made me sick 
at heart 

To pass them, tho’ they slept, and I un- 


seen. 

Well, my path lately lay thro’ a great 
cit 

Into the woody hills surrounding it: 

A sentinel was sleeping at the gate: 

When there was heard a sound, so loud 
it shook 

The towers amid the 
more sweet 

Than any voice but thine, sweetest of 
all 5 

A long, ee sound, asit would never 
end: 

And all the inhabitants leapt suddenly 

Out of their rest, and gathered in the 
streets, 

Looking in wonder up to Heaven, while 
yet 

The music pealed along. I hid myself 

Within a fountain in the public square, 

Where I lay like the refléx of the moon 

Seen in a wave under green leaves ; and 
soon 

Those ugly human shapes and visages 

Of which I spoke as having wrought me 
pain, 

Passed floating thro’ the air, and fading 
still 

Into the winds that scattered them ; and 
those 

From whom they passed seemed mild 
and lovely forms 

After some foul disguise had fallen, and 
ailino: 

Were somewhat changed, and after brief 
surprise 

And greetings of delighted wonder, all 

Went to their sleep again: and when 
the dawn 

Came, would’st thou think that toads, 
and snakes, and efts, 

Could e’er be beautiful? yet so they were, 

And that with little change of shape or 
hue: 

All things had put their evil nature off ; 

I cannot tell my joy, when o’er a lake 

Upon a drooping bough with night- 
shade twined, 


moonlight, yet 


S77 


I saw two azure halcyons clinging down- 
ward 
And thinning one bright bunch of 
amber berries, 
With quick long beaks, and in the deep 
there lay 
Those lovely forms imaged as in a sky ; 
So, with my thoughts full of these happy 
changes, 
We a again, the happiest change of 
all, 
Asia. And never will we part, till 
thy chaste sister 
Who guides the frozen and inconstant 
moon 
Will look on thy more warm and equal 
light 
Till her heart thaw like flakes of April 
Snow 
And love thee. 
Spirit of the Earth. 
Asia loves Prometheus ? 
Asia. Peace, wanton, thou art yet 
not old enough. 
Think ye by gazing on each other’s eyes 
To multiply your lovely selves, and fill 
With spheréd fires the interlunar air ? 
Spirit of the Earth. Nay, mother, 
while my sister trims her lamp 
*Tis hard I should go darkling. 
Asia. Listen; look! 


The SPIRIT OF THE Hour enters. 


Prometheus. We feel what thou hast 
heard and seen; yet speak. 
Spirit of the Hour. Soon asthe sound 

had ceased whose thunder filled 

The abysses of the sky and the wide earth, 

There was a change: the impalpable 
thin air 

And the all-circling sunlight were trans- 
formed, 

As if the sense of love dissolved in them 

Had folded itself round the spheréd 
world. 

My vision then grew clear, and I could 
see 

Into the mysteries of the universe: 

Dizzy as with delight I floated down ; 

Winnowing the lightsome air with lan- 
guid plumes, 

My coursers sought their birthplace in 
the sun, 

Where they henceforth will live exempt 
from toil 

Pasturing flowers of vegetable fire ; 

And where my moonlike car will stand 
within 

A temple, gazed upon by Phidian forms 


What; as 


328 


BRITISH POETS 


Of thee, and Asia, and the Earth, and 


me, 

And you fair nymphs looking the love 
we feel,— 

In memory of the tidings it has borne,— 

Beneath a dome fretted with graven 
flowers, 

Poised on twelve columns of resplendent 
stone, 

And open to the bright and liquid sky. 

Yoked to it by an amphisbenic snake 

The likeness of those winged steeds will 
mock 

The flight from which they find repose. 
Alas, 

Whither has wandered now my partial 
tongue 

When all remains untold which ye 
would hear ? 

As I have said I floated to the earth : 

It was, as it is still, the pain of bliss 

To move, to breathe, to be; I wander- 
ing went 

Among the haunts and dwellings of 
mankind, 

And first was disappointed not to see 

Such mighty changeasI had felt within 

Expressed in outward things; but soon 

I looked, 

And behold, thrones were kingless, and 
men walked 

One with the other even as spirits do, 

None fawned, none trampled; hate, 
disdain, or fear, 

Self-love or self-contempt, on human 
brows, 

No EOE as o’er the gate of 
hell, 

‘** All hope abandon ye who enter here ;”’ 

None frowned, none trembled, none 
with eager fear 

Gazed on another’s eye of cold command, 

Until the subject of the tyrant’s will 

Became, worse fate, the abject of his 
own, 

Which spurred him, like an outspent 
horse, to death. 

None wrought his lips in truth-entang- 
ling lines 

Which smiled the lie his tongue dis- 
dained to speak ; 

None, with firm sneer, trod out in his 
own heart 

The sparks of love and hope till there 
remained 

Those bitter ashes, a soul self-consumed, 

And the wretch crept a vampire among 
men, 

Infecting all with his own hideous ill ; 


None talked that common, false, cold, 
hollow talk 

Which makes the heart deny the yes it 
breathes, 

Yet question that unmeant hypocrisy 

With such a self-mistrust as has no 
name. 

And women, too, frank, beautiful, and 
kind 

As the free heaven which rains fresh 
light and dew 

On the wide earth, passed; gentle radi- 
ant forms, 

From custom’s evil taint exempt and 
pure ; 

Speaking the wisdom once they could 
not think, 

Looking emotions once they feared to 


eel, 
And changed to all which once they 
dared not be, 
Yet being now, made earth like heaven ; 
nor pride, 
Nor jealousy, nor envy, nor ill shame, 
The bitterest of those drops of treasured 


gall, 

Spoilt the sweet taste of the nepenthe, 
love. 

Thrones, altars, judgment-seats, and 


prisons, wherein, 

And beside which, by wretched men 
were borne 

Sceptres, tiaras, swords, and chains, 
and tomes 

Of reasoned wrong, glozed on by ignor- 
ance, 

Were like those monstrous and barbaric 
shapes, 

The ghosts of a no more remembered 
fame, 

Which, from their unworn  obelisks, 
look forth 

In triumph o’er the palaces and tombs 

Of those who were their conquerors : 
mouldering round 

Those imaged to the pride of kings and 
priests, 

A dark yet mighty faith, a power as 
wide 

As is the world it wasted, and are now 

But an astonishment; even so the tcols 

And emblems of its last captivity, 

Amid the dwellings of the peopled 
earth, 

Stand, not o’erthrown, but unregarded 


now. 
And those foul shapes, abhorred by god 
and man, 


SHELLEY 


ong 





Which, under many a nameand many a 
form, 
Strange, savage, 
execrable, 

Were Jupiter, the tyrant of the world; 

And which the nations, panic-stricken, 
served 

With blood, and hearts broken by long 
hope, and love 

Eereeed to his altars soiled and garland- 
ess, 

And slain among men’s unreclaiming 


ghastly, dark and 


tears, 

Flattering the thing they feared, which 
fear was hate, 

Frown, mouldering fast, o’er 
abandoned shrines : 

The painted veil, by those who were, 
called life. 

Which mimicked, as with colors idly 


their 


spread, 

All men believed and hoped, is torn 
aside ; 

The loathsome mask has fallen, the man 
remains 

Sceptreless, free, uncircumscribed, but 
man 

Equal, unclassed, tribeless, and nation- 
less, 

Exempt from awe, worship, degree, the 
king 

Over himself; just, gentle, wise : but 
man 


Passionless ; no, yet free from guilt or 


pain, 

Which were, for his will made or suffered 
them, 

Nor yet exempt, tho’ ruling them like 
slaves, 

From chance, and death, and mutability, 

The clogs of that which else might over- 
soar 

The loftiest star of unascended heaven, 

Pinnacled dim in the intense inane. 


ACT IV 


SCENE, A PART OF THE FOREST NEAR THE 
‘CAVE OF PROMETHEUS. PANTHEA 
and IONE are sleeping : they awaken 
gradually during the first Song. 
Voice of unseen Spirits 
The pale stars are gone ! 
For the sun, their swift shepherd, 
To their folds them compelling, 
In the depths of the dawn, 
Hastes, in meteor-eclipsing array, and 
they flee 


Beyond his blue dwelling, 
As fawns flee the leopard. 
But where are ye? 


A Train of dark Forms and Shadows 
passes by confusedly, singing. 

Here, oh, here: 
We bear the bier 

Of the Father of many a cancelled year ! 
Spectres we 
Of the dead Hours be, 

We bear Time to his tomb in eternity. 


Strew, oh, strew 
Hair, not yew! 
Wet the dusty pall with tears, not dew! 
Be the faded flowers 
Of Death’s bare bowers 
Spread on the corpse of the King of 
Hours ! 


Haste, oh, haste! 
As shades are chased, 
Trembling, by day, from heaven’s blue 
waste. 
We melt away, 
Like dissolving spray, 
From the children of a diviner day, 
With the lullaby 
Of winds that die 
On the bosom of their own harmony ! 


Tone 
What dark forms were they ? 


Panthea 
The past Hours weak and gray, 
With the spoil which their toil 
Raked together 
From the conquest but One could 
foil. 
Ione 


Have they past ? 
Panthea 
They have past ; 
They outspeeded the blast, 
While ’tis said, they are fled : 
Ione 
Whither, oh, whither ? 
Panthea 
To the dark, to the past, to the dead. 
Voice of unseen Spirits 
Bright clouds float in heaven, 
Dew-stars gleam on earth, 


Waves assemble on ocean, 
They are gathered and driven 


a 


BRITISH POETS 





By the storm of delight, by the panic of 
glee! 
They shake with emotion, 
They dance in their mirth. 
But where are ye? 


The pine boughs are singing 
Old songs with new gladness, 
The billows and fountains 
Fresh music are flinging, 
Like the notes of a spirit from land and 
from sea; 
The storms mock the mountains 
With the thunder of gladness. 
But where are ye? 


Tone. What charioteers are these ? 
Panthea. Where are their 
chariots ? 


Semichorus of Hours 


The voice of the Spirits of Air and of 
Earth 
Have drawn back the figured curtain 
of sleep 
Which covered our being and darkened 
our birth 
In the deep. 
A Voice 


In the deep? 


Semichorus IT 
Oh, below the deep. 


Semichorus I 
An hundred ages we had been kept 
Cradled in visions of hate and care, 
And each one who waked as his brother 
slept, 
Found the truth— 


Semichorus IT 
Worse than his visions were! 
Semichorus I 


We have heard the lute of Hope in sleep ; 
We have known the voice of Love in 
dreams, 
We have felt the wand of Power, and 
leap— 


Semichorus II 
As the billows leap in the morning 


beams! 
Chorus 
Weave the dance on the floor of the 
breeze, 


Pierce with song heaven’s silent ight, 


Enchant the day that too swiftly flees, 
To check its flight ere the cave of 
night. 


Once the hungry Hours were hounds 
Which chased the day like a bleeding 
deer, 
And it limped and stumbled with many 
wounds 
Through the nightly dells 
desert year. 


of the 


But now, oh weave the mystic measure 
Of music, and dance, and shapes of 
light, 
Let the Hours, and the spirits of might 
and pleasure, 
Like the clouds and sunbeams, unite. 


A Voice 
Unite! 
Panthea. See, where the Spirits of 
the human mind 
Wrapt in sweet sounds, as in bright veils, 


approach, 
Chorus of Spirits 


We join the throng 
Of the dance and the song, 
By the whirlwind of gladness borne 
along ; 
As the flying-fish leap 
From the Indian deep, 
And mix with the sea-birds, half asleep. 


Chorus of Hours 


Whence come ye, so wild and so fleet, 
For sandals of lightning are on your 
feet, 
And your wings are soft and swift as 
thought, 
And your eyes are as love whichis veiléd 
not? 
Chorus of Spirits 
We-come from the mind 
Of human kind 
Which was late so dusk, and obscene, 
and blind, 
Now ’tis an ocean 
Of clear emotion, 
A heaven of serene and mighty motion ; 


From that deep abyss 
Of wonder and bliss, 
Whose caverns are crystal palaces ; 
From those skiey towers 
Where Thought’s crowned powers 
Sit watching your dance, ye happy 
Hours ! 


SHELLEY 


From the dim recesses 
Of woven caresses, 
Where lovers catch ye by your loose 
tresses ; 
From the azure isles, 
Where sweet Wisdom smiles, 
Delaying your ships with her siren 
wiles. 


. From the temples high 
Of Man’s ear and eye, 
Roofed over Sculpture and Poesy ; 
From the murmurings 
Of the unsealed springs 
Where Science bedews his Deedal wings. 


Years after years, 
Through blood, and tears, 
And a thick hell of hatreds. and hopes, 
and fears ; 
We waded and flew, 
And the islets were few 
Where the bud-blighted flowers of hap- 
piness grew. 


Our feet now, every palm, 
Are sandalled with calm, 
And the dew of our wings is a rain of 
balm ; 
And, beyond our eyes, 
The human love lies 
Which makes all it gazes on Paradise. 


Chorus of Spirits and Hours 


Then weave the web of the mystic 
measure ; 
From the depths of the sky and the ends 
of the earth, 
Come, swift Spirits of might and of 
pleasure, 
Fill the dance and the music of mirth, 
As the waves of a thousand streams 
rush by 
To an ocean of splendor and harmony ! 


Chorus of Spirits 


Our spoil is won, 
Our task is done, 
We are free to dive, or soar, or run ; 
Beyond and around, 
Or within the bound 
Which clips the world with darkness 
round. 


We'll pass the eyes 
Of the starry skies 

Into the hoar deep to colonise : 
Death, Chaos, and Night, 


33% 





From the sound of our flight, 
Shall flee, like mist from a tempest’s 
might. 


And Earth, Air, and Light, 
And the Spirit of Might, 
Which drives round the stars in their 
fiery flight ; 
And Love, Thought, and Breath, 
The powers that quell Death, 
Wherever we soar shall assemble be- 
neath. 


And our singing shall build 
In the void’s loose field 
A world for the Spirit of Wisdom to 
wield ; 
We will take our plan 
From the new world of man, : 
And our work shall be called the Pro- 
methean. 


Chorus of Hours 


Break the dance, and scatter the song ; 
Let some depart, and some remain. 


Semichorus I 
We, beyond heaven, are driven along ! 


Semichorus IT 
Us the enchantments of earth retain : 


Semichorus I 


Ceaseless, and rapid, and fierce, and free, 

With the Spirits which build a new earth 
and sea, 

And a heaven where yet heaven could 
never be. 


Semichorus IT 


Solemn,and slow, and serene, and bright, 
Leading the Day and outspeeding the 
Night, 
With the powers of a world of perfect 
light. 
Semichorus I 


We whirl, singing loud, round the gather- 
ing sphere, 
Till the trees, and the beasts, and the 
clouds appear 
From its chaos made calm by love, not 
fear. 
Semichorus IT 


We encircle the ocean and mountains of 
earth, 

And the happy forms of its death and 
birth 


356 


Change to the music of oursweet mirth. 


Chorus of Hours and Spirits 


Break the dance, and scatter the song, 
Let some depart, and some remain, 
Wherever we fly we lead along 

In leashes, like starbeams, 
strong, 
The clouds that are heavy with love’s 
sweet rain. 


soft yet 


Panthea. Ha! they are gone! 

Tone. Yet feel you no delight 
From the past sweetness ? 

Punthea. As the bare green hill 
When some soft cloud vanishes into rain, 
Laughs with a thousand drops of sunny 

water 
To the unpavilioned sky! 

Tone. Even whilst we speak 
New notes arise. What is that awful 

sound ? 

Panthea. °Tis the deep music of the 

rolling world 

Kindling within the strings of the waved 
air, 

A®olian modulations. 

Tone. Listen too, 

How every, pause is filled with under 
notes, 

Clear, silver, icy, keen, awakening tones, 

Which pierce the sense, and live within 
the soul, 

As the sharp stars pierce winter’s crystal 
air p 

And gaze upon themselves within the sea. 

Panthea. But see where through two 

openings in the forest 

Which hanging branches overcanopy, 

And where two runnels of a rivulet, 

Between the close moss violet-inwoven, 

Have made their path of melody, like 
sisters 

Who part with sighs that they may meet 
in smiles, 

Turning their dear disunion to an isle 

Of lovely grief, a wood of sweet sad 
thoughts ; 

Two visions of strange radiance float 
upon 

The ocean-like enchantment of strong 
sound, 

Which flows intenser, keener, deeper yet 

Under the ground and through the wind- 
less air, 

Jone. Iseeachariotlike that thinnest 

boat, 
In which the mother of the months is 
borne 


BRITISH POETS 


—_— 


By ebbing night into her western cave, 

When she upsprings from interlunar 
dreams, 

O’er which is curved an orblike canopy 

Of gentle darkness, and the hills and 
woods 

Distinctly seen through that dusk airy 
veil, 

Regard like shapes in an enchanter’s 
glass ; 

Its wheels are solid clouds, azure and 
gold, 

Such as the genii of the thunderstorm 

Pile on the floor of the illumined sea 

When the sun rushes under it ; they roll 

And move and grow as with an inward 
wind ; 

Within it sits a wingéd infant, white 

Its countenance, like the whiteness of 
bright snow, 

Its plumes are as feathers of sunny frost, 

Its limbs gleam white, through the wind 
flowing folds 

Of its white robe, woof of ethereal pear]. 

Its hair is white, the brightness of white 
light 

Scattered in strings; yet its two eyes 
are heavens 

Of liquid darkness, which the Deity 

Within seems pouring, as a storm is 
poured ; 

From jaggéd clouds, out of their arrowy 
lashes, 

Tempering the cold and radiant air 
around, 

With fire that is not brightness : in its 
hand 

It sways a quivering moonbeam, from 
whose point 

A guiding power directs the chariot’s 
prow 

Over its wheeléd clouds, which as they 
roll 

Over the grass, and flowers, and waves, 
wake sounds, 

Sweet as a singing rain of silver dew. 

Panthea. And from the other open- 

ing in the wood 

Rushes, with loud and whirlwind har- 
mony, 

A sphere, which is as many thousand 
spheres, 

Solid as crystal, yet through all its mass 

Flow, as through empty space, music 
and light: 

Ten thousand orbs involving and in- 
volved, 

Purple and azure, white, and green, and 
golden, 


SHELLEY 





J3S 





Sphere within sphere; and every space 
between 

Peopled with unimaginable shapes, 

Such as ghosts dream dwell in the lamp- 
less deep, 

Yet each inter-transpicuous, and they 
whirl 

Over each other with a thousand motions, 

Upon a thousand sightless axles spin- 
ning, 

And with the force of self- Boye 
swiftness, 

Intensely, slowly, solemnly roll on, 

Kindling with mingled sounds, 
many tones, 

Intelligible words and music wild. 

With mighty whirl the multitudinous 
orb 

Grinds the bright brook into an azure 
mist 

Of elemental subtlety, like light : 

And the wild odor of the forest flowers, 

The music of the living grass and air, 

The emerald light of leaf-entangled 
beams 

Round its intense yet self-conflicting 
speed, 

Seem kneaded into one aérial mass 

Which drowns the sense. Within the 
orb itself, 

Pillowed upon its alabaster arms, 

Like to a child o’erwearied with sweet 
toil, 

On its own folded wings, and wavy hair, 

The Spirit of the Earth is laid asleep, 

And you can see its little lips are moving, 

Amid the changing light of their own 


and 


smiles, 
Like one who talks of what he loves in 
dream. 
fone. ’T is only mocking the orb’s 


harmony. 
Panthea. And from a star upon its 
forehead, shoot, 
Like swords of azure fire, or golden 
spears 
With tyrant-quelling myrtle overtwined, 


Embleming heaven and earth united 
now, 

Vast beams like spokes of some invisible 
wheel 


Which whirl as the orb whirls, swifter 
than thought, 

Filling the abyss with sun-like lighten- 
ings, 

And perpendicular now, and now trans- 
verse, 

Pierce the dark soil, and as they pierce 
and pass, 


Make bare the secrets of the earth’s deep 
heart ; 

Infinite mine of adamant and gold, 

Valueless stones, and unimagined gems, 

And caverns on crystalline columns 
poised 

With vegetable silver overspread ; 


Wells of unfathomed fire, and water 
springs 

Whence the great sea, even as a child is 
fed, 


Whose vapors clothe earth’s monarch 
mountain-tops 

With kingly ermine snow. 
flash on 

And make appear the melancholy ruins 

Of cancelled cycles ; anchors, beaks of 
ships ; 

Planks turned to marble ; quivers, helms, 

and spears, 

gorgon-headed targes, 

wheels 

Of scythed chariots and the emblazonry 

Of trophies, standards, and armorial 


The beams 


And and the 


beasts, 
Round which death laughed, sepulchred 
emblems 


Of dead destruction, ruin within ruin ! 
The wrecks beside of many a city vast, 
Whose population which the earth grew 


over 

Was mortal, but not human: see, they 
lie, 

Their monstrous works, and uncouth 
skeletons, 

Their statues, homes and fanes; pro- 
digious shapes 

Huddled in gray annihilation, split, 

Jammed in the hard, black deep ; and 


over these, 


The anatomies of unknown wingéd 
things, 

And fishes which were isles of living 
scale, 

And serpents, bony chains, twisted 
around 


The iron crags, or within heaps of dust 

To which the tortuous strength of their 
last pangs 

Had crushed the iron crags ; 
these 

The jagged alligator, and the might 


and over 


Of earth-convulsing behemoth, which 
once 

Were monarch beasts, and on the slimy 
shores, 


And weed-overgrown continents of earth, 
Increased and multiplied like summer 
worms 


J3¢ 





On an abandoned corpse, till the blue 
globe 

Wrapt deluge round it like a cloak, and 
the 

Yelled, gasped, and were abolished ; or 
some God 

Whose throne was in a comet, passed, 
and cried, 

Be not! And like my words they were 
no more. 


The Earth 


The joy, the triumph, the delight, the 
madness ! 
The boundless, overflowing, bursting 
gladness, 
The vaporous exultation not to be con- 
fined! 
Ha! ha! the animation of delight 
Which wraps me, like an atmosphere 
of light, 
And bears me asa cloud is borne by its 
own wind. 


The Moon 


Brother mine, calm wanderer, 
Happy globe of land and air, 
Some Spirit is darted like a beam from 
thee, 
Which penetrates my frozen frame, 
And passes with the warmth of flame, 
With love, and odor, and deep melody 
Through me, through me ! 


The Earth 
Ha! ha! the caverns of my hollow 


mountains, 

My cloven fire-crags, sound-exulting 
fountains 

Laugh with a vast and inextinguishable 

laughter. 

The oceans, and the deserts, and the 
abysses, 

And the deep air’s unmeasured 


wildernesses, 
Answer from all their clouds and billows, 
echoing after. 


They cry aloud as I do. Sceptred 
curse, 
Who all our green and azure universe 
Threatenedst to muffle round with black 
destruction, sending 
A solid cloud to rain hot thunder- 
stones, 
And splinter and knead down my 
children’s bones, 
All I bring forth, to one void mass, 
battering and blending, 


BRITISH WPOETS 


Until each crag-like tower, and 
storied column, : 
Palace, and obelisk, and temple 
solemn, 
My imperial mountains crowned with 
cloud, and snow, and fire ; 
My sea-like forests, every blade and 
blossom 
Which finds a grave or cradle in my 
bosom, 
Were stamped by thy strong hate into a 
lifeless mire. 


How art thou’ sunk, withdrawn, 
covered, drunk up 
By thirsty nothing, as the brackish 


cup 
Drained by a desert-troop, a little drop 
for all; 
And from beneath, around, within, 
above, 
Filling thy void annihilation, love 
Burst in like light on caves cloven by 
the thunder-ball. 


The Moon 


The snow upon my lifeless mountains 
Is loosened into living fountains, 
My solid oceans flow, and sing, and 
shine: 
A spirit from my heart bursts forth, 
It clothes with unexpected birth 
My cold bare bosom: Oh! it must be 
thine 
On mine, on mine! 


Gazing on thee I feel, I know 
Green stalks burst forth, and bright 
flowers grow, 
And living shapes upon my bosom 
move: 
Music is in the sea and air, 
Wingéd clouds soar here and there, 
Dark with the rain new buds are dream- 
ing of : 
’Tis love, all love! 


The Earth 


It interpenetrates my granite mass, 
Through tangled roots and trodden 
clay doth pass, 
Into the utmost leaves and delicatest 
flowers ; 
Upon the winds, among the clouds ’tis 
spread, 
It wakes a life inthe forgotten dead, 
They breathe a spirit up from their 
obscurest bowers, 


SHELLEY 


And likea storm bursting its cloudy 
prison 
With thunder, and with whirlwind, 
has arisen 
Out of the lampless caves of unimagined 
being : 
With earthquake shock and swift- 
ness making shiver 
Thought’s stagnant chaos, unremoved 
for ever, 
Tillhate, and fear, and pain, light-van- 
quished shadows, fleeing, 


Leave Man, who was a many-sided 
mirror, 
Which could distort to many a shape 
of error, 
This true fair world of things, a sea re- 
flecting love ; 
Which over all his kind as the sun’s 
heaven 
Gliding o’er ocean, smooth, serene, and 
even 
Darting from starry depths radiance and 
life, doth move, 


Leave Man, even as a leprous child 
is left, 

Who follows a sick beast to some 
warm cleft 

Of rocks, through which the might of 

healing springs is poured ; 

Then when it wanders home with 
rosy smile, 


Unconscious, and its mother fears 
aw hile 
It is a spirit, then, weeps on her child 
restored— 


Man, oh, not men! achain of linkéd 
thought, 
Of love and might to be divided not, 
Compelling the elements with adaman- 
tine stress ; [gaze, 
As the sun rules, even with a tyrant’s 
The unquiet republic of the maze 
Of planets, struggling fierce towards 
heaven’s free wilderness— 


Man, one harmonious soul of many 
a soul, 
Whose nature is its own divine control, 
Where all things flow to all, as rivers to 
the sea ; [love ; 
Familiar acts are beautiful through 
Labor, and pain, and grief, in life’s 
green grove 
Sport like tame beasts, none knew how 
gentle they could be! 


335 

His will, with all mean passions, bad 
delights, 

And selfish cares, its trembling 
satellites, 


A spirit ill to guide, but mighty to obey, 
Is as a tempest-wingéd ship, whose 
heln 
Love rules, through waves which 
dare not overwhelm, 
Forcing life’s wildest shores to own its 
sovereign sway. 
All things confess his 
Through the cold mass 
Of marble and of color his dreams pass ; 
Bright threads whence mothers weave 
the robes their children wear ; 
Language is a perpetual orphic song, 
Which rules with Deedal harmony a 
throng 
Of thoughts and forms, which 
senseless and shapeless were. 


strength. 


else 


The lightning is his slave; heaven’s 
utmost deep 
Gives up her stars, and like a flock of 
sheep 
They pass before his eye, are numbered, 
and rojl on! 
The tempest is his steed, he strides 
the air ; 
And the abyss shouts from her depth 
laid bare, 
Heaven, hast thou secrets ? 
veils me; I have none. 


The Moon 


The shadow of white death has past 
From my path in heaven at last, 

A clinging shroud of solid frost and sleep ; 
And through my newly-woven bowers, 
Wander happy paramours, 

Less mighty, but as mild as those who 

keep 


Man un- 


Thy vales more deep. 


The Earth 


As the dissolving warmth of dawn 


may fold 

A half unfrozen dew-globe, green and 
gold, - 

And crystalline, till it becomes a wingéd 

mist, 

And wanders up the vault of the blue 
day, 

Outlives the noon, and on the sun’s 
last ray 


Hangs o’er the sea, a fleece of fire and 
amethyst, 


336 


BRITISH POETS 





The Moon 


Thou art folded, thou art lying 
In the light which is undying 
Of thine own joy, and heaven’s smile 
divine ; 

All suns and constellations shower 
On thee a light, a life, a power 
Which doth array thy sphere; 

pourest thine 
On mine, on mine! 


The Earth 


I spin beneath my pyramid of night. 
Which points into the heavens dreain- 
ing delight, 
Murmuring victorious joy in my en- 
chanted sleep ; 
As a youth lulled in love-dreams faint- 
ly sighing, 
Under the shadows of his beauty ly- 
ing, 
Which round his rest a watch of lght 
and warmth doth keep. 


The Moon 


As in the soft and sweet eclipse, 
When soul meets soul on lovers’ lips, 
High hearts are calm, and brightest eyes 

are dull ; 
So when thy shadow falls on me, 
Then am I mute and still, by thee 
Covered ; of thy love, Orb most beautiful, 
Full, oh, too full! 


thou 


Thou art speeding round the sun 
Brightest world of many a one ; 
Green and azure sphere which shinest 
With a ight which is divinest 
Among all the lamps of Heaven 
To whom life and light is given ; 
I, thy crystal paramour, 

Borne beside thee by a power 
Like the polar Paradise, 
Magnet-like of lovers’ eyes ; 

I, a most enamored maiden 
Whose weak brain is overladen 
With the pleasure of her love, 
Maniac-like around thee move 
Gazing, an insatiate bride, 

On thy form from every side 

Like a Mezenad, round the cup 
Which Agave lifted up 

In the weird Cadmezean forest. 
Brother, wheresoe’er thou soarest 
I must hurry, whirl and follow 
Through the heavens wide and hollow, 
Sheltered by the warm embrace 
Of thy soul from hungry space, 


Drinking from thy sense and sight 
Beauty, majesty, and might, 
As a lover or chameleon 
Grows like what it looks upon 
As a violet’s gentle eye 
Gazes on the azure sky 
Until its hue grows like what it beholds, 
Asa gray and watery mist 
slows like solid amethyst 
Athwart the western moantain it en- 
folds, 
When the sunset sleeps 
Upon its snow. 


The Earth 


And the weak day weeps 
That it should be so. 
Oh, gentle Moon, the voice of thy de- 
light 
Falls on me like thy clear and tender 
light 
Soothing the seaman, borne the summer 
night, 
Through isles for ever calm ; 
Oh, gentle Moon, thy crystal accents 
pierce 
The caverns of my pride’s deep universe, 
Charming the tiger joy, whose tramp- 
lings fierce 
Made wounds which need thy balm. 
Panthea. I rise as from a bath of 
sparkling water, 
A bath of azure light, among dark rocks, 
Out of the stream of sound. 
Tone. Ah me! sweet sister, 
The stream of sound has ebbed away 
from us, 
And you pretend to rise out of its wave, 
Because your words fall like the clear, 
soft dew 
Shaken from a bathing wood-nymph’s 
limbs and hair. 
Panthea. Peace! peace! A mighty 
Power, which is as darkness, 
Is rising out of Earth, and from the sky 
Is showered like night, and from within 
the air 
Bursts, like eclipse which had been 
gather ed up 
Into the pores of panirenee the bright 
visions, 
Wherein the singing spirits rode and 
shone, 
Gleam like pale meteors through a 
watery night. 
Ione. There is a sense of words upon 
mine ear. 
Panthea. An universal sound like 
words: Oh, list ! 


SHELLEY 


Soon 





Demogorgon 
Thou, Earth, calm empire of a happy 
soul, 
Sphere of divinest shapes and _har- 
monies, 
Beautiful orb! gathering as thou dost 
roll 
The love which paves thy path along 
the skies : 
The Earth 
Ihear: I am as a drop of dew that 
dies. 
Demogorgon 


Thou, Moon, which gazest on the nightly 
Earth : 
With wonder, as it gazes upon thee: 
Whilst each to men, and beasts, and the 
swift birth 
Of birds, is beauty, love, calm, har- 
mony : 
The Moon 


I hear: Iam a leaf shaken by thee ! 


Demogorgon 


Ye kings of suns and stars, Demons and 
Gods, 
Ethereal Dominations, who possess 
Elysian, windless, fortunate abodes 
Beyond Heaven’s constellated wilder- 
ness : 


A Voice from above 


Our great Republic hears, we are 
blest, and bless. 


Demogorgon 


Ye happy dead, whom beams of brightest 
verse 
Are clouds to hide, not colors to 
portray, 
Whether your nature is that universe 
Which once ye saw and suffered— 


A Voice from beneath 


Or as they 
Whom we have left, we change and 
pass away. 


Demogorgon 


Ye elemental Genii, who have homes 
From man’s high mind even to the 
central stone 
Of sullen lead; from Heaven’s star- 
fretted domes 
22 


To the dull weed some sea- worm 
battens on: 


A confused Voice 
We hear: thy words waken Oblivion, 


Demogorgon 


Spirits, whose homes are flesh: ye beasts 
and birds, 
Ye worms, and fish; ye living leaves 
and buds ; 
Lightning and wind; and ye untame- 
able herds, 
Meteors and mists, which throng air’s 
solitudes :— 


A Voice 
Thy voice to us is wind among still 
woods. 
Denogorgen 


Man,who wert once a despot and a slave; 
A dupe and a deceiver; a decay ; 
A traveller from the cradle to the grave 
Through the dim night of this im- 
mortal day : 


All 


Speak; thy strong words may never 
pass away. 


Demogorgon 


This is the day, which down the void 
abysm 
At the Earth-born’s spell yawns for 
Heaven's despotism, 
And Conquest is dragged 
through the deep: 
Love, from its awful throne of patient 


captive 


power 

In the wise heart, from the last giddy 
hour 

Of dead endurance, from the slippery, 

steep, 

And narrow verge of crag-like agony, 
springs 

And folds over the world its healing 
wings. 

Gentleness, Virtue, Wisdom, and En- 
durance, 

These are the seals of that most firm 
assurance 


Which bars the pit over Destruction’s 
strength ; 
And if, with infirm hand, Eternity, 
Mother of many acts and hours, should 
free 


338 


BRITISH POETS 





The serpent that would clasp her with 
his length ; 
These are the spells by which to reas- 
sume 
An empire o’er the disentangled doom. 


To suffer woes which Hope thinks in- 
finite ; : 
To forgive wrongs darker than death or 
night ; 
To defy Power, which seems omni- 
potent ; 
To love, and bear; to hope till Hope 
creates 
From its own wreck the thing it con- 
templates ; 
Neither to change, nor falter, nor re- 
pent ; 
This, like thy glory, Titan, is to be 
Good, great and joyous, beautiful and 


free; 
This is alone Life, Joy, Empire, and 
Victory.} 1819. 1820. 


1 The prominent feature of Shelley’s theory of 
the destiny of the human species was that evil is 
not inherent in the system of the creation, but 
an accident that might be expelled. This also 
forms a portion of Christianity: God made 
earth and man perfect, till he, by his fall, 


“ Brought death into the world and all our woe.” 


Shelley believed that mankind had only to will 
that there should be no evil, and there would be 
none. It isnot my part in these Notes to notice 
the arguments that have been urged against 
this opinion, but to mention the fact that he en- 
tertained it, and was indeed attached to it with 
fervent enthusiasm. That man could be So per- 
fectionized as to be able to expel evil from his 
own nature, and from the greater part of the 
creation, was the cardinal point of his system. 
And the subject he loved best to dwell on was 
the image of One warring with the Evil Princi- 
ple, oppressed not only by it, but by all—even 
the good, who were deluded into considering evil 
a necessary portion of humanity; a victim full 
of fortitude and hope and the spirit of triumph, 
emanating from a reliance in the ultimate 
omnipotence of Good. Such he had depicted in 
his last poem, when he made Laon the enemy 
and the victim of tyrants. He now took a more 
idealised image of the same subject. He fol- 
lowed certain classical authorities in figuring 
Saturn as the good principle, Jupiter the usurp- 
ing evil one, and Prometheus as the regenerator, 
who, unable to bring mankind back to primitive 
innocence, used knowledge as a weapon to de- 
feat evil, by leading mankind, beyond the state 
wherein they are sinless through ignorance, to 
that in which they are virtuous through wisdom. 
Jupiter punished the temerity of the Titan by 
chaining him to a rock of Caucasus, and causing 
a vulture to devour his still-renewed heart. 
There was a prophecy afloat in heaven portend- 
ing the fall of Jove, the secret of averting which 
was known only to Prometheus; and the god 
offered freedom from torture on condition of its 
being communicated to him. According to the 


THE SENSITIVE PLANT 
PaRT FIRST 


A SENSITIVE Plant in a garden grew, - 

And the young winds fed it with silver 
dew, 

And it opened its fan-like leaves to the 
light, 

And closed them beneath the kisses of 
night. 


And the Spring arose on the garden fair, 


mythological story, this referred to the off- 
spring of Thetis, who was destined to be greater 
than his father. Prometheus at last bought 
pardon for his crime of enriching mankind with 
his gifts, by revealing the prophecy. Hercules 
killed the vulture, and set him free; and Thetis 
was married to Peleus, the father of Achilles. 

Shelley adapted the catastrophe of this story to 
his peculiar views. The son greater than his 
father, born of the nuptials of Jupiter and 
Thetis, was to dethrone Evil, and bring back a 
happier reign than that of Saturn. Prometheus 
defies the power of his enemy, and endures cen- 
turies of torture; till the hour arrives when 
Jove, blind to the real event, but darkly guess- 
ing that some great good to himself will flow, 
espouses Thetis. At the moment, the Primal 
Power of the world drives him from his usurped 
throne, and Strength, in the person of Hercules, 
liberates Humanity, typified in Prometheus, 
from the tortures generated by evil done or 
suffered. Asia, one of the Oceanides, is the wife 
of Prometheus--she was, according to other my- 
thological interpretations, the same as Venus 
and Nature. When the benefactor of mankind 
is liberated, Nature resumes the beauty of her 
prime, and is united to her husband, the emblem 
of the human race, in perfect and happy union. 
In the fourth Act, the Poet gives further scope 
to his imagination, and idealizes the forms of 
creation—such as we know them, instead of such 
as they appeared to the Greeks. Maternal 
Earth, the mighty parent, is superseded by the 
Spirit of the Earth, the guide of our planet 
through the realms of sky; while his fair and 
weaker companion and attendant, the Spirit of 
the Moon, receives bliss from the annihilation of 
Evil in the superior sphere. 

Shelley develops more particularly in the 
lyrics of this drama his abstruse and imagin- 
ative theories with regard to the creation. It 
requires a mind as subtle and penetrating as his 
own to understand the mystic meanings scat- 
tered throughout the poem. They elude the 
ordinary reader by their abstraction and deli- 
cacy of distinction, but they are far from vague. 
It was his design to write prose metaphysical es- 
says on the nature of Man, which would have 
served to explain much of what is obscure in his 
poetry ; a few scattered fragments of observa- 
tions and remarks alone remain. He considered 
these. philosophical views of Mind and Nature to 
be instinet with the intensest spirit of poetry. 

More popular poets clothe the ideal with fa- 
miliar and sensible imagery. Shelley loved to 
idealize the real—to gift the mechanism of the 
material universe with a soul and a voice, and ta 
bestow such also on the most delicate and ab- 
stract emotions and thoughts of the mind, 
Sophocles was his great master in this species of 
imagery.—(From Mrs. Shelley’s note.) 


SHELLEY 


Like the Spirit of Love felt everywhere ; 

And each flower and herb on Earth’s 
dark breast 

Rose from the dreams of its wintry rest. 


But none ever trembled and panted with 
bliss 

In the garden, the field, or the wilder- 
ness, 

Like a doe in the ndontide with love’ s 
sweet want, 

As the companionless Bennie Plant. 


The snowdrop and then the violet, 

Arose from the ground with warm rain 

; wet, 

And their breath was mixed with fresh 
odor, sent 

From the turf, like the voice and the 
instrument. 


Then the pied wind-flowers and the 
tulip tall, 
And narcissi, the fairest among them all, 
Who gaze on their eyes in the stream’s 
* recess, 
Till they die of their own dear loveliness ; 


And the Naiad-like lily of the vale, 

Whom youth makes so fair and passion 
so pale, 

That the light of its tremulous bells is 
seen 


Through their pavilions of tender green ; 


And the hyacinth purple, and white, 
and blue, 

Which flung from its bells a sweet peal 
anew 

Of music so delicate, soft, and intense, 

It was felt like an odor within the 
sense ; 


And the rose like a nymph to the bath 
addrest, 

Which unveiled the depth of her glow- 
ing breast, 

Till, fold after fold, to the fainting air 

The soul of her beauty and love lay 
bare : 


And the wand-like lily, which lifted up, 

As a Meenad, its moonlight-colored cup, 

Till the fiery star, which is its eye, 

Gazed through clear dew on the tender 
sky ; 


And the jessamine faint, and the sweet 
tuberose, 


a9 


The sweetest flower for scent that blows ; 
And all rare blossoms from every clime 
Grew in that garden in perfect prime. 


And on the stream whose inconstant 
bosom 

Was prankt under boughs of embower- 
ing blossom, 

With golden and green light, slanting 
through 

Their heaven of many a tangled hue, 


Broad water-lilies lay tremulously, 

And starry river-buds glimmered by, 

And around them the soft stream did 
glide and dance 

With a motion of sweet sound and 
radiance. 


And the sinuous paths of lawn and of 
moss, 

Which led through the garden, along’ 
and across, 

Some open at once to the sun and the 
breeze, 

Some lost among bowers of blossoming 
trees, 


Were all paved with daisies and delicate 
bells 

As fair as the fabulous asphodels, 

And flowrets which drooping as day 
drooped too 

Fell into pavilions, white, purple, and 
blue, 

To roof the glow-worm from the evening 
dew. 


And from this undefiled Paradise 


The flowers (as an infant’s awakening 
eyes 

Smile on its mother, whose singing 
sweet 

Can first lull, and at last must awaken 
it), 


When Heaven’s blithe winds had un- 
folded them, 

As mine-lamps enkindle a hidden gem, 

Shone smiling to Heaven, and every one 

Shared joy in the light of the gentle sun ; 


For each one was interpenetrated 

With the light and the odor its neigh- 
bor shed, 

Like young lovers whom youth and love 
make dear 

Wrapped and filled by their mutual 
atmosphere. 


340 


BRITISH YPOETS 





But the Sensitive Plant which could 
give small fruit 

Of the love which it felt from the leaf 
to the root, 

Received more than all, it loved more 
than ever, 

Where none wanted but it, could belong 
to the giver, 


For the Sensitive Plant has no bright 
flower : 

Radiance and odor are not its dower ; 

It loves, even like Love, its deep heart 
is full, 

It desires what it has not, the beautiful ! 


The light winds which from unsustain- 
ing wings, 

Shed the music of many murmurings ; 

The beams which dart from many a 
star 

Of the flowers whose hues they bear 

alan: 


The pluméd insects swift and free, 

Like golden boats on a sunny sea, 
Laden with light and odor, which pass 
Over the gleam of the living grass ; 


The unseen clouds of the dew, which le 

Like fire in the flowers till the sun rides 
high, 

Then wander like spirits among the 
spheres, 

Each cloud faint with the fragrance it 
bears : 


The quivering vapors of dim noontide, 

Which lkea sea o’er the warm earth 
glide, 

In which every sound, and odor, and 
beam, 

Move, as reeds in a single stream ; 


Each and all like ministering angels 
were 


For the Sensitive Plant sweet joy to 
bear, 

Whilst the lagging hours of the day 
went by 


Like windless clouds o’er a tender sky. 

And when evening descended from 
heaven above, 

Andthe Earth was all rest, and the air 
was all love, 

And delight, tho’ less bright, was far 
more deep, 

And the day’s veil fell from the world 
of sleep, 


And the beasts, and the birds, and the 
insects were drowned > 

In an ocean of dreams without a sound ; 

Whose waves never mark, tho’ they 
ever impress 

The ight sand which paves it, conscious- 
DeSS ; 


(Only overhead the sweet nightingale 

Ever sang more sweet as the day might 
fail, 

And snatches of its Elysian chant 

Were mixed with the dreams of the 
Sensitive Plant.) 


The Sensitive Plant was the earliest 
Up-gathered into the bosom of rest ; 
A sweet child weary of its delight, 
The feeblest and yet the favorite, 
Cradled within the embrace of night. 


PART SECOND 


There was a Power in this sweet place, 

An Eve in this Eden; a ruling grace 

Which to the flowers did they waken or 
dream. 

Wasas God isto the starry scheme. 


A Lady, the wonder of her kind, 

Whose form was upborne by a lovely 
mind 

Which, dilating, had moulded her mien 
and motion 

Like a sea-flower unfolded beneath the 
ocean, 


Tended the garden from morn to even: 

And the meteors of that sublunar heaven, 

Like the lamps of the air when night 
walks forth, 

Laughed round her footsteps up from 
the Earth ! 


She had no companion of mortal race. 

But her tremulous breath and her flush- 
ing face 

Told, whilst the morn kissed the sleep 
from her eyes 

That her dreams were less slumber than 
Paradise: 


Asif some bright Spirit for her sweet 
sake 

Had deserted heaven while the stars 
were awake. 

As if yet around her he lingering were, 

Tho’ the veil of daylight concealed him 
from her. 


SHELLEY 


341 





Her step seemed to pity the grass it 
pressed ; 

You might hear by the heaving of her 
breast, 

That the coming and going of the wind 

Brought pleasure there and left passion 
behind. 


And wherever her airy footstep trod, 

Her trailing hair from the grassy sod 

Erased its light vestige, with shadowy 
sweep, 

Like a sunny storm o’er the dark green 
deep. 


I doubt not the flowers of that garden 
sweet 

Rejoiced in the sound of her gentle feet ; 

I doubt not they felt the spirit that came 

From her glowing fingers thro’ all their 
frame. 


She sprinkled bright water from the 
stream 

On those that were faint with the sunny 
beam ; 

And out of the cups of the heavy flowers 

She emptied’ the rain of -the thunder 
showers. 


She lifted their heads with her tender 
hands, 

And sustained them with rods and osier 
bands ; 

If the flowers had been her own infants 
she 

Could never have nursed them 
tenderly. 


more 


And all killing insects and gnawing 
worms, 

And things of obscene and unlovely 
forms, 

She bore in a basket of Indian woof, 

Into the rough woods far aloof, 


In a basket, of grasses and wild-flowers 
full, 

The freshest her gentle hands could pull 

For the poor banished insects, whose 
intent, 

Although they did ill, was innocent. 


But the bee and the beamlike ephemeris 

Whose path is the lightning’s, and soft 
moths that kiss 

The sweet lips of the flowers, and harm 
not, did she 

Make her attendant angels be. 


And many an antenatal tomb, 

Where butterflies dream of the life to 
come, 

She left clinging round the smooth and 
dark 

Edge of the odorous cedar bark. 


This fairest creature from earliest spring 
Thus moved through the garden minis- 
tering 
All the sweet season of summer tide, 
And ere the first leaf looked brown—she 
died ! 
PART THIRD 


Three days the flowers of the garden fair, 

Like stars when the moon is awakened, 
were, 

Or the waves of Baie, ere luminous 

She floats up through the smoke of 
Vesuvius, 


And on the fourth, the Sensitive Plant 

elt the sound of the funeral chant, 

And the steps of the bearers, heavy and 
slow, 

And the sobs of the mourners deep and 
low ; 


The weary sound and the heavy breath, 

And the silent motions of passing death, 

And the smell, cold, oppressive, and 
dank, 

Sent through the pores of the coffin 
plank: ; 


The dark grass, and the flowers among 
the grass, 

Were bright with tears as the crowd did 
Pass ; 5 

From their sighs the 
mournful tone, 

And sate in the pines, and gave groan 
for groan. 


wind caught a 


The garden once fair, became cold and 
foul, 
Like the corpse of her who had been its 
soul, 

Which at first was lovely as if in sleep, 
mp . . . 

Then slowly changed, till it grew a heap 
To make men tremble who never weep. 


Swift summer into the autumn flowed, 

And frost in the mist of the morning 
rode, 

Though the noonday sun looked clear 
and bright, 

Mocking the spoil of the secret night. 


342 


BRITISH POETS 


& 





The rose leaves, like flakes of crimson 
snow, 

Paved the turf and the moss below. 

The lilies were drooping, and white, and 


wan, 
Like the head and the skin of a dying 
mgn. 


And Indian plants, of scent and hue 
The sweetest that ever were fed on dew, 
Leaf by leaf, day after day, 

Were massed into the common clay. 


And the leaves, brown, yellow, and gray, 
and red, 

And white with the whiteness of what 
is dead, 

Like troops of ghosts on the dry wind 
past ; 

Their whistling noise made the birds 
aghast. 


And the gusty winds waked the wingéd 
seeds, 

Out of their birthplace of ugly weeds, 

Till they clung round many a sweet 
flower’s stem, 

Which rotted into the earth with them. 


The water-blooms under the rivulet 

Fell from the stalks on which they were 
Set ; 

And the eddies drove them here and 
there, 

As the winds did those of the upper air. 

Then the rain came down, and the 
broken stalks, 

Were bent and tangled across the walks; 

And the leafless network of parasite 
bowers 

Massed into ruin; and all sweet flowers. 


Between the time of the wind and the 
snow, 

All loathliest weeds began to grow, 

Whose coarse leaves were splashed with 
many a speck, 

Like the water-snake’s belly and the 
toad’s back. 


And thistles, and nettles, and darnels 
rank, 

And the dock, and henbane, and hem- 
lock dank, 

Stretched out its long and hollow shank, 

And stifled the air till the dead wind 
stank. 


And plants, at whose names the verse 
feels loath, 


Filled the place witha monstrous under 
growth, 

Prickly, and pulpous, and blistering, and 
blue, 

Livid, and starred with a lurid dew. 


And agarics, and fungi, with mildew 
and mould 

Started like mist from the wet ground 
cold; 

Pale, fleshy, as if the decaying dead 

With a_ spirit of growth had been 
animated ! 


Spawn, weeds, and filth, a leprous scum, 

Made the running rivulet thick and 
dumb 

And at its outlet flags huge as stakes 

Dammed it up with roots knotted like 
water snakes. 


And hour by hour, when the air was 


still, 

The vapors arose which have strength 
to kill: 

At morn they were seen, at noon they 
were felt, 


At night they were darkness no star 
could melt. 


And unctuous meteors from spray to 
spra 

Crept and flitted in broad noonday 

Unseen; every branch on which they 
alit 

By a venemous blight was burned and 
bit. 


The Sensitive Plant like one forbid 

Wept, and the tears within each lid 

Of its folded leaves which together grew 

Were changed to a blight of frozen 
glue. 


For the leaves soon fell, and the branches’ 
soon 

By the heavy axe of the blast were 
hewn ; 

The sap shrank to the root through 
every pore 

As blood to a heart that will beat no 
more. 

For Winter the wind was his 
whip: 

One choppy finger was on his lip: 

He had torn the cataracts from the hills 

And they clanked at his girdle like 
manacles ; 


came: 





SHELLEY 


His breath was a chain which without 
a sound 

The earth, and the air, and the water 
bound ; 

He came, fiercely driven, in his chariot- 
throne 

By the tenfold blasts of the arctic zone. 


Then the weeds which were forms of 
. living death 
Fled from the frost to the earth beneath. 
Their decay and sudden flight from frost 
Was but like the vanishing of a ghost! 


And under the roots of the Sensitive 


Plant 

The moles and the dormice died for 
want: 

The birds dropped stiff from the frozen 
air 


And were caught in the branches naked 
and bare. 


First there came down a thawing rain 

And its dull drops froze on the boughs 
again, 

Then there steamed up a freezing dew 

Which to the drops of the thaw-rain 
grew ; 


Anda northern whirlwind, wandering 
about 
Like a wolf that had smelt a dead child 


out, 
Shook the boughs thus laden, and heavy 
and stiff, 
And snapped them off with his rigid 


griff, 


When winter had gone and spring came 
back 

The Sensitive Plant was a leafless wreck ; 

But the mandrakes, and toadstools, and 
docks, and darnels, 

Rose like the dead from their ruined 
charnels. 


CONCLUSION 


“Whether the Sensitive Plant, or that 

Which within its boughs like a spirit 
sat 

Ere its outward form had known decay, 

Now felt this change, I cannot say. 


Whether that lady’s gentle mind, 

No longer with the form combined 
Which scattered love, as stars do light, 
Found sadness, where it left delight, 


343 


I dare not guess ; but in this life 

Of error, ignorance, and strife, 

Where nothing is, but all things seem, 
And we the shadows of the dream, 


It is a modest creed, and yet 
Pleasant if one considers it, 

To own that death itself must be, 
Like all the rest, a mockery. 


That garden sweet, that lady fair, 

And all sweet shapes and odors there, 

In truth have never passed away : 

Tis we, ’tis ours, are changed ; not they. 
1820. 1820. 


THE CLOUD 


I BRING fresh showers for the thirsting 
flowers, 
From the seas and the streams ; 
I bear light shade for the leaves when 
laid 
In their noonday dreams. 
From my wings are shaken the dews 
that waken 
The sweet buds every one, 
When rocked to rest on their mother’s 
breast, 
As she dances about the sun. 
I wield the flail of the lashing hail, 
And whiten the green plains under, 
And then again I dissolve it in rain, 
And laugh as I pass in thunder. 


I sift the snow on the mountains below, 
And their great pines groan aghast ; 
And all the night ’tis my pillow white, 
While I sleep in the arms of the 
blast. 
Sublime on the towers of my skiey 
bowers, 
Lightning my pilot sits, 
In a cavern under is fettered the thunder, 
It struggles and howls at fits; 
Over earth and ocean, with 
motion, 

This pilot is guiding me, 
Lured by the love of the genii that move 
In the depths of the purple sea ; 
Over the rills, and the crags, and the 

hills, 
Over the lakes and the plains, 
Wherever he dream, under mountain or 
stream, 
The Spirit he loves remains ; 
And I all the while bask in heaven’s 
blue smile, 
Whilst he is dissolving in rains, 


gentle 


344 


The sanguine sunrise, with his meteor 
eyes, 
And his burning plumes outspread, 
Leaps on the back of my sailing rack, 
When the morning star shines dead, 
As on the jag of a mountain crag, 
Which an earthquake rocks and 
swings, 
An eagle alit one moment may sit 
In the light of its golden wings. 
And when sunset may breathe, from the 
lit sea beneath, 
Its ardors of rest and of love, 

And the crimson pall of eve may fall 
From the depth of heaven above, 
With wings folded I rest, on mine airy 

nest, 
As still as a brooding dove. 


That orbéd maiden with white fire laden, 
Whom mortals call the moon, 
Glides glimmering o’er my fleece-like 
floor, 
By the midnight breezes strewn ; 
And wherever the beat of her unseen 
feet, 
Which only the angels hear, 
May have broken the woof of my tent’s 
thin roof, 
The stars peep behind her and peer ; 
And I laugh to see them whirl and flee, 
Like a swarm of golden bees, 
When I widen the rent in my wind-built 
tent, 
Till the calm rivers, lakes, and seas, 
Like strips of the sky fallen through me 
on high, 
Are each paved with the moon and 
these. 


I bind the sun’s throne with a burning 
zone, 
And the moon’s with a girdle of 
pearl ; 
The volcanoes are dim, and the stars 
reel and swim, 
When the whirlwinds my banner 
unfurl. 
From cape to cape, with a bridge-like 
shape, 
Over a torrent sea, 
Sunbeam-proof, I hang like a roof, 
The mountains its columns be. 
The triumphal arch through which I 
march 
With hurricane, fire, and snow, 
When the powers of the air are chained 
to my chair, 
Is the million-colored bow ; 


BRITISH POETS 


The sphere-fire above its soft colors wove, 
While the moist earth was laughing 
below. 


I am the daughter of earth and water, 
And the nursling of the sky ; 
I pass through the pores of the ocean 
and shores ;: 
I change, but I cannot die. 
For after the rain when with nevera 
stain, 
The pavilion of heaven is bare, 
And the winds and sunbeams with their 
convex gleams, 
Build up the blue dome of air, 

I silently laugh at my own cenotaph, 
And out of the caverns of rain, 
Like a child from the womb, like a 
ghost from the tomb, 

I arise and unbuild it again. 
1820. 1820. 


TO A SKYLARK 


HAIL to thee, blithe spirit! 
Bird thou never wert, 
That from heaven, or near it, 
Pourest thy full heart 
In profuse strains of unpremeditated art. 


' Higher still and higher 
From the earth thou springest 
Like a cloud of fire ; 
The blue deep thou wingest, 
And singing still dost soar, and soaring 
ever singest. 


In the golden lightning 
Of the sunken sun, 
O’er which clouds are brightning, 
Thou dost float and run ; 
Like an unbodied joy whose race is just 
begun. 


The pale purple even 
Melts around thy flight ; 
Like a star of heaven, 
In the broad daylight 
Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy . 
shrili delight, 


Keen as are the arrows 
Of that silver sphere, 
Whose intense lamp narrows 
In the white dawn clear, 
Until we hardly see, we feel that it is 
there. 


All the earth and air 
With thy voice is loud, 


SHELLEY 


ove 





As, when night is bare, 
From one lonely cloud 
The moon rains out her beams, and 
heaven is overflowed. 


What thou art we know not ; 
What is most like thee ? 
From rainbow clouds there flow not 
Drops so bright to see, 
As from thy presence showers a rain of 
melody. 


Like a poet hidden 
In the light of thought, 
Singing hymns unbidden, 
Till the world is wrought 
To sympathy with hopes and fears it 
heeded not : 


Like a high-born maiden 
In a palace-tower, 
Soothing her love-laden 
Soul in secret hour . 
With music sweet as love, which over- 
flows her bower : 


Like a glow-worm golden 
In a dell of dew, 
Scattering unbeholden 
Its aérial hue 
Among the flowers and grass, which 
screen it from the view : 


Like a rose embowered 
In its own green leaves, 
By warm winds deflowered, 
Till the scent it gives 
Makes faint with too much sweet these 
heavy-wingéd thieves : 


Sound of vernal showers 
On the twinkling grass, 
Rain-awakened flowers, 
All that ever was 
Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music 
doth surpass : 


“Teach us, sprite or bird, 
What sweet thoughts are thine: 
I have never heard 
Praise of love or wine 
That panted forth a flood of rapture so 
divine. 


Chorus Hymeneal, 
Or triumphal chant, 
Matched with thine would be all 
But an empty vaunt, 
A thing wherein we feel there is some 
hidden want. 


What objects are the fountains 
Of thy happy strain ? 

What fields, or waves, or mountains ? 
What shapes of sky or plain ? 
What love of thine own kind ? what ig- 

norance of pain ? 


With thy clear keen joyance 
Languor cannot be : 
Shadow of annoyance 
Never came near thee: 
Thou lovest ; but ne’er knew love’s sad 
satiety. 


Waking or asleep, 
Thou of death must deem 
Things more true and deep 
Than we mortals dream, 
Or how could thy notes flow in such a 
crystal stream ? 


We look before and after. 
And pine for what is not : 
Our sincerest laughter 
With some pain is fraught ; 
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of 
saddest thought. 


Yet if we could scorn 
Hate, and pride, and fear; 
If we were things born 
Not to shed a tear, 
I know not how thy joy we ever should 
come near. 


Better than all measures 
Of delightful sound, 
Better than all treasures 
That in books are found, 
Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of 
the ground! 


Teach me half the gladness 
That thy brain must know, 
Such harmonious madness 
From my lips would flow, 
The world should listen then, as I am 
listening now. 1820. 1820. 


TO 


I FEAR thy kisses, gentle maiden, 
Thou needest not fear mine ; 

My spirit is too deeply laden 
Ever to burthen thine. 





I fear thy mien, thy tones, thy motion, 
Thou needest not fear mine ; 
Innocent is the heart’s devotion 
With which I worship thine. 
1820. 1824. 


346 | BRITISH POETS 


- ARETHUSA 


ARETHUSA arose 
From her couch of snows 
In the Acroceraunian mountains,— 
From cloud and from crag, . 
With many a jag, 
Shepherding her bright fountains. 
She leapt down the rocks, 
With her rainbow locks 
Streaming among the streams ;— 
Her steps paved with green 
The downward ravine 
Which slopes to the western gleams : 
And gliding and springing 
She went, ever singing, 
In murmurs as soft as sleep ; 
The Earth seemed to love her, 
And Heaven smiled above her, 
As she lingered towards the deep. 


Then Alpheus bold, 
On his glacier cold, 
With his trident the mountains strook 
And opened a chasm 
In the rocks ;—with the spasm 
All Erymanthus shook. 
And the black south wind 
It concealed behind 
The urns of the silent snow, 
And earthquake and thunder 
Did rend in sunder 
The bars of the springs below. 
The beard and the hair 
Of the River-god were 
Seen through the torrent’s sweep, 
As he followed the light 
Of the fleet nymph’s flight 
To the brink of the Dorian deep. 


‘Oh, save me! Oh, guide me! 
And bid the deep hide me, 
For he grasps me now by the hair!” 
The loud Ocean heard, 
To its blue depth stirred, 
And divided at her prayer ; 
And under the water 
The Earth’s white daughter 
Fled like a sunny beam ; 
Behind her descended 
Her billows, unblended 
With the brackish Dorian stream :— 
Like a gloomy stain 
On the emerald main 
Alpheus rushed behind,— 
As an eagle pursuing 
A dove to its ruin 


Down the streams of the cloudy wind. 


Under the bowers 
Where the Ocean Powers 

Sit on their pearléd thrones, 
Through the coral woods 
Of the weltering floods, 

Over heaps of unvalued stones ; 
Through the dim beams 
Which amid the streams 

Weave a network of colored light ; 
And under the caves, 

Where the shadowy waves 

Are as green as the forest’s night ;— 
Outspeeding the shark. 

And the sword-fish dark, 

Under the ocean foam, 

And up through the rifts 
Of the mountain clifts 
They passed to their Dorian home. 


And now from their fountains 
In Enna’s mountains, 
Down one vale where the morning basks, 
Like friends once parted 
Grown single-hearted, 
They ply their watery tasks. 
At sunrise they leap 
From their cradles steep 
In the cave of the shelving hill ; 
At noontide they flow 
Through the woods below 
And the meadows of Asphodel ; 
And at night they sleep 
In the rocking deep 
Beneath the Ortygian shore ; 
Like spirits that lie 
In the azure sky 
When they love but live no more. 
1820. 1824. 


HYMN OF PAN 


From the forests and highlands 
We come, we come; 
From the river-girt islands, 
Where loud waves are dumb 
Listening to my sweet pipings. 
The wind in the reeds and the rushes,. 
The bees on the bells of thyme, 
The birds on the myrtle bushes, 
The cicale above in the lime, 
And the lizards below in the grass, 
Were as silent as ever old Tmolus was, 
Listening to my sweet pipings. 


Liquid Peneus was flowing, 
And all dark Tempe lay 
In Pelion’s shadow, outgrowing 
The light of the dying day, 
Speeded by my sweet pipings. 


SHELLEY 


The Sileni, and Sylvans, and Fauns, 
And the Nymphs of the woods and 
waves, 
To the edge of the moist river-lawns, 
And the brink of the dewy caves, 
And all that did then attend and follow 
Were silent with love, as you now, 
Apollo, 
With envy of my sweet pipings. 


[ sang of the dancing stars, 
I sang of the deedal Earth, 
And of Heaven—and the giant wars, 
And Love, and Death, and Birth,— 
And then I changed my pip- 
ings,— 
Singing how down the vale of Menalus 
I pursued a maiden and clasp’da reed : 
Gods and men, we are all deluded thus! 
It breaks in our bosom and then we 
bleed : 
All wept, as [think both ye now would, 
If envy orage had not frozen your blood, 
At the sorrow of my sweet pipings. 
1820. 1824. 


THE QUESTION 


I DREAMED that, as I wandered by the 
way, 
Bare winter suddenly was changed to 
spring, 
And gentle odors led my steps astray, 
Mixed with a sound of waters mur- 
muring 
Along a shelving bank of turf, which lay 
Under a copse, and hardly dared to 
fling 
Its green arms round the bosom of the 
stream, 
But kissed it and then fled, as thou 
mightest in dream. 


There grew pied wind-flowers and violets, 
Daisies, those pearled Arcturi of the 
earth, 
The constellated flower that never sets ; 
Faint ox lips; tender bluebells, at 
whose birth 
The sod scarce heaved; and that tall 
flower that wets— 
Like achild, half in tenderness and 
mirth— 
Its mother’s face with heaven’s collected 
tears, 
When the low wind, its playmate’s voice, 
it hears. 


And in the warm hedge grew lush 
eglantine, 


347 


Green cowbind and the moonlight- 
colored May, 
And cherry-blossoms, and white cups, 
whose wine 
Was the bright dew, yet drained not 
by the day ; iyi a 
And wild roses, and ivy serpentine, 
With its dark buds and leaves, wan- 
dering astray ; 
And flowers azure, black, and streaked 
with gold, 
Fairer than any wakened eyes behold. 


And nearer to the river’s trembling edge, 
There grew broad flag-flowers, purple 
prankt with white, 
And starry river buds among the sedge, 
And floating water-lilies, broad and 
bright, 
Which lit the oak that overhung the 
hedge 
With moonlight beams of their own 
watery light ; 
And bulrushes, and reeds of such deep 
reen 
As soothed the dazzled eye with sober 
sheen. 


Methought that of these visionary flowers 

I made a nosegay, bound in sucha 
wa 

That the same hues, 

natural bowers ‘ 

Were mingled or opposed, the like 


which in their 


array 

Kept these imprisoned children of the 
Hours 

Within my hand,—and then, elate 

and gay, 

I hastened to the spot whence I had 
come, 

That I might there present it !—oh! to 
whom? 1820. 1824. 

SONG 


RARELY, rarely, comest thou, 
Spirit of Delight ! 

Wherefore hast thou left me now 
Many a day and night? 

Many a weary night and day 

‘Tis since thou art fled away. 


How shall ever one like me 
Win thee back again ? 
With the joyous and the free 
Thou wilt scoff at pain. 
Spirit false ! thou hast forgot 
All but those who need thee not. 


346 


As a lizard with the shade 
Of a trembling leaf. 
Thou with sorrow art dismayed ; 
Even the sighs of grief 
Reproach thee, that thou art not near, 
And reproach thou wilt not hear. 


Let me set my mournful ditty 
To a merry measure, 
Thou wilt never come for pity, 
Thou wilt come for pleasure, 
Pity then will cut away 
Those cruel wings, and thou wilt stay. 


I love all that thou lovest, 
Spirit of Delight! 

The fresh Earth in new leaves drest, 
And the starry night ; 

Autumn evening, and the morn 
When the golden mists are born. 


1 love snow, and all the forms 
Of the radiant frost ; 
I love waves, and winds, and storms, 
Every thing almost 
Which is Nature’s, and may be 
Untainted by man’s misery. 


I love tranquil solitude, 
And such society 
As is quiet, wise, and good ; 
Between thee and me 
What differenee ? but thou dost possess 
The things I seek, not love them less. 





IT love Love—though he has wings, ~ 
And like hght can flee, 
But above all other things, 
Spirit, I love thee— 
Thou art love and life! Oh come, 
Make once more my heart thy home. 
1820.1 1824. 


TO THE MOON 


ART thou pale for weariness 
Of climbing heaven and gazing on the 
earth, 
Wandering companionless 
Among the stars that have a different 
birth,— 
And ever changing, like a joyless eye 
That finds no object worth its constancy? 
1820. 1824. 


1 Thoughincluded by Mrs. Shelley, and by later 
editors, among the poems of 1821, there is a 
copy of this poem in the Harvard College Man- 
uscripts, dated in Shelley’s handwriting, ‘‘ Pisa, 
May, 1820.” See note in Edward Dowden’s, 
Edition of Shelley. 


BRITISH POETS 


THE WORLD’S WANDERERS 


TELL me, thou star, whose wings of light 
Speed thee in thy fiery flight, 
In what cavern of the night 

Will thy pinions close now ? 


Tell me, moon, thou pale and gray 

Pilgrim of heaven’s homeless way, 

In what depth of night or day 
Seekest thou repose now ? 


Weary wind, who wanderest 
Like the world’s rejected guest, 
Hast thou still some secret nest 
On the tree or billow? 
18:20. 


TIME LONG PAST 


1824. 


LIKE the ghost of a dear friend dead 
Is Time long past. 
A tone which is now forever fled, 
A hope which is now forever past, 
A love so sweet it could not last, 
Was Time long past. 


There were sweet dreams in the night 
Of Time long past: 
And, was it sadness or delight, 
Each day a shadow onward cast 
Which made us wish it yet might last— 
That Time long past. 


There is regret, almost remorse, 
For Time long past. 
Tis like a child’s beloved corse 
A father watches, till at last 
Beauty is like remembrance, cast 
From Time long past. 
1820. 1824, 


EPIPSYCHIDION 


VERSES ADDRESSED TO THE NOBLE AND 
UNFORTUNATE LADY," EMU Yo ea 
NOW IMPRISONED IN THE CONVENT 
Oy 


L’anima amante si slancia fuori del creato, e 
si crea nel infinito un Mondo tutto per essa, 
diverso assai da questo oscuro e pauroso baratro. 

HER OWN WORDS. 


SWEET Spirit! Sister of that orphan 
one, 
Whose empire is the name thou weepest 
on, 
In my heart’s temple I suspend to thee 
These votive wreaths of withered 
memory. 


SHELLEY 


Poor captive bird! who, 
narrow cage, 
Pourest such music, that it might as- 
suage 
The rugged hearts of those who prisoned 
thee, 
Were they not deaf to allsweet melody ; 
This song shall be thy rose: its petals 
pale 
Are dead, indeed, my adored Nightin- 
ale! 
But soft and fragrant is the faded 
blossom, 
And it has no thorn left to wound thy 
bosom. 


from thy 


High, spirit-wingéd Heart! who dost 

for ever 

Beat thine unfeeling bars with vain en- 
deavor, 

Till those bright plumes of thought, in 
which arrayed 

It over-soared this low and worldly 
shade, 

Lie shattered ; and thy panting, wounded 
breast 

Stains with dear blood its unmaternal 
nest ! 

I weep vain tears: blood would less 
bitter be, 

Yet peed forth gladlier, could it profit 
thee. 


Seraph of Heaven! too gentle to be 

human, 

Veiling beneath that radiant form of 
Woman 

All that is insupportable in thee 

Of light, and love, and immortality ! 

Sweet Benediction in the eternal Curse ! 

Veiled Glory of this lampless Universe ! 

Thou Moon beyond the clouds! Thou 
living Form 

_ Among the Dead! Thou Star above the 
Storm ! 

Thou Wonder, and thou Beauty, and 
thou Terror! 

Thou Harmony of Nature’s art! 
Mirror 

In whom, as in the splendor of the Sun, 

All shapes look glorious which thou 
gazest on! 

Ay, even the dim words which obscure 

thee now 

lightning-like, 

tomed glow ; 

I pray thee that thou blot from this sad 
song 

All of its much mortality and wrong, 


Thou 


Flash, with unaccus- 


349 


With those clear drops, which start like 
sacred dew 

From the twin lights thy sweet soul 
darkens through, 

Weeping, till sorrow becomes ecstasy : 

Then smile on it, so that it may not die. 


I never thought before my death to 
see 
Youth’s vision 
Emily, 

I love thee; though the world by no 
thin name 

Will hide that love, from its unvalued 
shame. 

Would we two had been twins of the same. 
mother ! 

Or, that the name 
another 
Could be a sister’s bond for her and 

thee, 
Blending two beams of one eternity ! 
Yet were one lawful and the other true, 
These names, though dear, could paint 
not, as is due, 
How beyond refugeIam thine. Ah me! 
Iam not thine: Iam a part of thee. 


thus made _ perfect. 


my heart lent to 


Sweet Lamp! my moth-like Muse has 

burnt its wings; 

Or, like a dying swan who soars and 
sings, 

Young Love should teach Time; in his 
own gray Style, 

All that thou art. Art thou not void of 
guile, 

A lovely soul formed to be blest and 
bless ? 

A well of sealed and secret happiness, 

Whose waters like blithe lght and 
music are, 

Vanquishing dissonance and gloom? A 


Star 

Which moves not in the moving 
Heavens, alone? 

A smile amid dark frowns? a gentle 


tone 

Amid rude voices? a belovéd light ? 

A Solitude, a Refuge, a Delight ? 

A Lute which those whom Love has 
taught to play 

Make music on, to soothe the roughest 
da 

And lull fond grief asleep? a buried 
treasure ? 

A eradle of young thoughts of wingless 
pleasure ; 

A violet-shrouded grave of Woe?—I 
measure 


Jo 





The world of fancies, seeking one like 
thee, 

And find—alas! mine own infirmity. 

She met me, Stranger, upon life’s 

rough way, 

And lured me towards sweet Death ; as 
Night by Day, 

Winter by Spring, or Sorrow by swift 
Hope, 

Led into light, life, peace. Anantelope, 

In the suspended impulse of its light- 


ness, 

Were less ethereally ight: the bright- 
ness 

Of her divinest presence’ trembles 
through 


Her limbs, as underneath a cloud of dew 

Embodied in the windless Heaven of 
June 

Amid the splendor-wingéd stars, the 
Moon 

Burns, inextinguishably beautiful : 

And from her lips, as from a hyacinth 
full 

Of honey-dew, a liquid murmur drops, 

Killing the sense with passion ; sweet 
as stops 

Of planetary music heard in trance. 

In her mild lights the starry spirits 


dance, 

The sunbeams of those wells which ever 
leap 

Under the lightnings of the soul—too 
deep 

For the brief fathom-line of thought or 


sense, 

The glory of her being, issuing thence, 

Stains the dead, blank, cold air with a 
warm shade 

Of unentangled intermixture, made 

By Love, of light and motion: one in- 
tense 

Diffusion, one serene Omnipresence, 

Whose flowing outlines mingle in their 


‘flowing 

Around her cheeks and utmost fingers 
glowing 

With the unintermitted blood, which 
there 


Quivers (as in a fleece of snow-like air 
The crimson. pulse of living morning 
quiver), 


Continuously prolonged, and ending 
never, 

Till they are lost, and in that Beauty 
furled 


Which penetrates and clasps and fills 
the world; 


BRITISH POETS 


Scarce visible from extreme loveliness. 
Warm fragrance seems to fall from her 
light dress 
And her loose hair ; 
heavy tress 

The air of her own speed has disentwined, 

The sweetness seems to satiate the faint 
wind ; 

And in the soul a wild odor is felt, 

Beyond the sense, like fiery dews that 
melt . 

Into the bosom of a frozen bud.— 

See where she stands! a mortal shape 
indued 

With love and life and light and deity, 

And motion which may change but can- 
not die ; 

An image of some bright Eternity ; 

A shadow of some golden dream; a 
Splendor 

Leaving the third sphere pilotless ; a 
tender 

Reflection of the eternal Moon of Love 

Under whose motions life’s dull billows 
move; 

A Metaphor of Spring and Youth and 
Morning ; 

A Vision like incarnate April, warning, 

With smiles and tears, Frost the 
Anatomy 

Into his summer grave, 


and where some 


Ah, woe is me! 
What have I dared? where am I lifted ? 
how 
Shall I descend, and perish not? I know 
That Love makes all things equal: I 
have heard 
By mine own heart this joyous truth 
averred : 
The spirit of the worm beneath the sod 
In love and. worship, blends itself with 


God. 
Spouse! Sister! Angel! Pilot of the 
Fate 
Whose course has been so starless! Oh, 
too late 


Belovéd ! Oh, too soon adored, by me! 

For in the fields of immortality 

My spirit should at first have worshipped 
thine, 

A divine presence in a place divine ; 

Or should have moved beside it on this 
earth, 

A shadow of that substance, from its 
birth ; 

But not as now :—I love thee; yes, I feel 

That on the fountain of my heart a seal 


SHELLEY 


Sat 





Is set, to keep its waters pure and bright 

For thee, since in those tears thou hast 
delight. 

We—are we not formed, as notes of 
music are, 

For one another, though dissimilar ; 

Such difference without discord, as can 
make 

Those sweetest sounds, in which all 
spirits shake 

As trembling leaves in a continuous air? 


Thy wisdom speaks in me, and bids 

me dare 

Beacon the rocks on which high hearts 
are wrecked. 

I never was attached to that great sect, 

Whose doctrine is, that each one should 
select 

Out of the crowd a mistress or a friend, 

And all the rest, though fair and wise, 
commend 

To cold oblivion, though it is in the 
code 

Of modern morals, and the beaten road 

Which those poor slaves with weary 
footsteps tread, 

Who travel to their home among the 
dead 

By the broad highway of the world, and 
So 

With one chained friend, perhaps a 
jealous foe, 

The dreariest and the longest journey go. 


True Love in this differs from gold 

and clay 

That to divide is not to take away. 

Love is like understanding, that grows 
bright, 

Gazing on many truths; ’tis like thy 
light, 

Imagination ! which from earth and sky, 

And from the depths of human phan- 
tasy, 

As from a thousand prisms and mirrors, 
fills « 

The Universe with glorious beams, and 
kills 

Error, the worm, with many a sun-like 
arrow 

Of its reverberated lightning. Narrow 

The heart that loves, the brain that 


contemplates, 

The life that wears, the spirit that 
creates 

One object, and one form, and builds 
thereby 


A sepulchre for its eternity. 


Mind from its object differs most in 

this : 

Evilfrom good ; misery from happiness ; 

The baser from the nobler; the impure 

And frail, from what is clear and must 
endure. 

If you divide suffering and dross, you 
may 

Diminish till it is consumed away ; 


If you divide pleasure and love and 
thought, 

Each part exceeds the whole; and we 
know not 

How much, while any yet remains un- 
shared, 

Of pleasure may be gained, of sorrow 
spared : 


This truth is that deep well, whence 
sages draw 

The unenvied light of hope; the eternal 
law 

By which those live, to whom this world 
of life 

Is as a garden ravaged, and whose strife 

Tills for the promise of a later birth 

The wilderness of this Elysian earth. 


There was a Being whom my spirit 


oft 

Met on its visioned wanderings, far 
aloft, 

In the clear golden prime of my youth’s 
dawn, 


Upon the fairy isles of sunny lawn, 
Amid the enchanted mountains, and the 


caves 

Of divine sleep, and on the air-like 
waves 

Of wonder-level dream, whose tremu- 
lous floor 

Paved her light steps ;—on an imagined 
shore, 

Under the gray beak of some promon- 
tory 

She met me, robed in such exceeding 

lory 


’ 

That I beheld her not. In solitudes 

Her voice came to me through the 
whispering woods, 

And from the fountains, and the odors 
deep 

Of flowers, which, like lips murmuring 
in their sleep 

Of the sweet kisses which had lulled 
them there, 

Breathed but of herto the enamored air ; 

And from the breezes whether low or 
loud, 

And from the rain of every passing cloud, 


a 


BRITISH POETS 








And from the singing of the summer 
birds, 

And from all sounds, all silence. In 
the words 

Of antique verse and high romance,—in 
form, 

Sound, color—in whatever checks that 
Storm 

Which with the shattered present chokes 
the past ; 

And in that best philosophy, whose taste 

Makes this cold common hell, our life, a 
doom 

As glorious as a fiery martyrdom ; 

Her Spirit was the harmony of truth.— 


Then, from the caverns of my dreamy 

youth 

I sprang, as one sandalled with plumes 
of fire, 

And towards the loadstar of my one 
desire, 

I flitted, like a dizzy moth, whose flight 

Is as a dead leaf’s in the owlet light, 

When it would seek in Hesper’s setting 
sphere 

A radiant death, a fiery sepulchre, 

As if it were a lamp of earthly flame.— 

But She, whom prayers or tears then 
could not tame, 

Passed, like a God throned on a wingéd: 
planet, 

Whose burning plumes to tenfold swift- 
ness fan it, ; 

Into the dreary cone of our life’s shade ; 

And asa man with mighty loss dismayed, 

I would have followed, though the 
grave between 

Yawned likea gulf whose spectres are 
unseen : 

When a voice said :——‘‘ O Thou of hearts 
the weakest, 

The phantom is beside thee whom thou 

seekest.” 

I-—‘‘ Where?” the world’s echo 

answered ‘‘ where!” 

Andin that silence, and in my despair, 

I questioned every tongueless wind that 
flew 

Over my tower of mourning, if it knew 

Whither ’ twas fled, this soul out of my 
soul: 

And murmured names and spells which 
have control 

Over the sightless tyrants of our fate ; 

But neither prayer nor verse could dis- 
sipate 

The night which closed on her ; 
uncreate 


Then 


nor 





That world within this Chaos, mine and 
me, 

Of which she was the veiled Divinity, 

The world I say of thoughts that wor- 
shipped her : 

And thereforeI went forth, with hope 
and fear 

And every gentle passion sick to death, 

Feeding my course with expectation’s 
breath, 

Into the wintry forest of our life ; 

And struggling through its error with 
vain strife, 

And stumbling inmy weakness and my 
haste, 

And half bewildered by new forms, I past, 

Seeking among those untaught foresters 

If I could find one form resembling hers, 

In which she might have masked her- 
self from me. 

There,—One, whose voice was venomed 
melody 

Sate by a well, under blue nightshade 
bowers ; 

The breath of her false mouth was like 
faint flowers, 

Her touch was as electric poison,—flame 

Out of her looks into my vitals came, 

And from her living cheeks and bosom 
flew 

A killing air, which pierced like honey- 
dew 

Into the core of my green heart, and lay 

Upon its leaves ; until, as hair grown gray 

O’er a young brow, they hid its unblown 
prime 

With ruins of unseasonable time. 


In many mortal forms I rashly sought 
The shadow of that idol of my thought. 
And some were fair—but beauty dies 


away : 

Others were wise—but honeyed words 
betray : 

And One was true—oh! why not true 
to me? 

Then, as a hunted deer that could not 
flee, 

I turned upon my thoughts, and stood 
at bay, 

Wounded and weak and panting; the 
cold day 


Trembled, for pity of my strife and pain. 

When, like a noonday dawn, there 
shone again 

Deliverance. One stood on my path 
who seemed 

As like the glorious shape whichI had 
dreamed, 


SHELLEY 


aoc 





As is the Moon, whose changes ever run 

Into themselves, to the eternal Sun ; 

The cold chaste Moon, the Queen of 
Heaven’s bright isles, 

Who makes all beautiful on which she 
smiles, 

That wandering shrine of soft yet icy 
flame 

Which ever is transformed, yet still the 
same, 

And warms not but illumines. Young 
and fair 

As the descended Spirit of that sphere, 

She hid me, as the Moon may hide the 
night 

From its own darkness, until all was 
bright 

Between the Heaven and Earth of my 
calm mind, 

And, as acloud charioted by the wind, 

She led me to acave in that wild place, 

And sate beside me, with her downward 
face 

Ilumining my slumbers, like the Moon 

Waxing and waning o’er Endymion. 

And I was laid asleep, spirit and limb, 

And all my being became bright or dim 

As the Moon’s image in asummer sea, 

According as she smiled or frowned on 


me ; 

And there I lay, within a chaste cold 
bed : 

Alas, I then was nor alive nor dead ;— 

For at her silver voice came Death and 
Life, 

Unmindful each of their accustomed 
strife, 

Masked like twin babes,a sister and a 
brother, 

The wandering hopes of one abandoned 
mother, 

And through the cavern without wings 
they flew, 

And cried ‘‘ Away, 

’ crew.” 

I wept, and though it be a 

weep. 


he is not of our 


dream, I 


What storms then shook the ocean of 

my sleep, 

Blotting that Moon, whose pale and 
waning lips 

Then shrank as 
eclipse ;— 

And how my soul was as a lampless sea, 

And who was then its Tempest ; and 
when She, 

The Planet of that hour, was quenched, 
what frost 


23 


in the sickness of 


Crept o’er those waters, till from coast 
to coast 

The moving billows of my being fell 

Into a death of ice, immovable ;-— 

And then—what earthquakes made it 
gape and split, 

The white Moon smiling all the while 


on it, 

These words conceal :—If not, each word 
would be 

The key of stanchless tears. Weep not 
for me ! 


At length, into the obscure Forest 

came 

The Vision I had sought through grief 
and shame. 

Athwart that wintry wilderness of 
thorns 

Flashed from her motion splendor like 
the Morn’s 

And from her presence life was radiated 

Through thegray earth and branches 
bare and dead ; 

So that her way was paved, and roofed 
above 

With flowers as soft as thoughts of -bud- 
ding love ; 

And music from her respiration spread 

Like hght,—all other sounds were pene- 


trated 

By the small, still, sweet spirit of that 
sound, 

So that the savage winds hung mute 
around ; 

And odors warm and fresh fell from her 


hair, 
Dissolving the dull cold in the frore air : 
Soft as an Incarnation of the Sun, 
When light is changed to love, this 
glorious One 
Floated into the cavern where I lay, 
And called my Spirit, and the dreaming 


clay 
Was lifted by the thing that dreamed 


below 

As smoke by fire, and in her beauty’s 
glow 

I stood, and felt the dawn of my long 
night 


Was penetrating me with living light: 
I knew it was the Vision veiled from me 
So many years—that it was Emily. 


Twin Spheres of light who rule this 
passive Earth, 

This world of love, this me; and into 

birth [dart 

Awaken all its fruits and flowers, and 


are 


BRITS Hanoi 





Magnetic might into its central heart ; 

And lift its billows and its mists, and 
guide 

By everlasting laws, each wind and tide 

To its fit cloud, and its appointed cave ; 

And lull its storms, each in the craggy 
grave 

Which was its cradle, luring to faint 

bowers 

armies of the 

showers ; 

And, as those married lights, which 
from the towers 

Of Heaven look forth and fold the wan- 

dering globe 

In liquid sleep and splendor, as a robe; 

And all their many-mingled influence 
blend, 

If equal, yet unlike, to one sweet end ;— 

So ye, bright regents, with alternate 
sway 

RNEEe my sphere of being, night and 

ay ! 

Thou, not disdaining even a borrowed 
might: 

Thou, not eclipsing a remoter light ; 

And, through the shadow of 
seasons three, 

From Spring to Autumn’s sere maturity, 

Light it into the Winter of the tomb, 

Where it may ripen to a brighter bloom. 

Thou too, O Comet beautiful and fierce, 

Who drew the heart of this frail Uni- 
verse 

Towards thine own; till, wrecked in 
that convulsion, 

Alternating attraction and repulsion, 

Thine went astray and that was rent in 
twain ; 

Oh, float into our azure heaven again ! 

Be there love’s folding-star at thy return ; 

The living Sun will feed thee from its 
urn [horn 

Of golden fire ; the Moon will veil her 

In thy last smiles; adoring Even and 
Morn 

Will worship thee with incense of calm 
breath 

And lights and shadows; as the star of 
Death 

And Birth is worshipped by _ those 
sisters wild 

Called Hope and Fear—upon the heart 
are piled 

Their offerings,—of this sacrifice divine 

A. world shall be the altar. 


The rainbow-winged 


the 


Lady mine, 
Scorn not these flowers of thought, the 
fading birth 


Which from its heart of hearts that plant 
puts forth 
Whose fruit, made perfect by thy sunny 


eyes, 
Will be as of the trees of Paradise. 


The day is come, and thou wilt fly 

with me. 

To whatsoe’er of dull mortality 

Is mine, remain a vestal sister still ; 

To the intense, the deep, the imperish- 
able, 

Not mine but me, henceforth be thou 
united 

Even as a bride, delighting and de- 
lighted. 

The hour is come :—the destined Star 
has risen 

Which shall descend upon a vacant 
prison. 

The walls are high, the gates are strong, 
thick set 

The sentinels—but true love never yet _ 

Was thus constrained: it overleaps all 
fence: 

Like lightning, with invisible violence 

Piercing its continents ; like Heaven’s 
free breath, 

Which he who grasps can hold not ; 
liker Death, 

Who rides upon a thought, and makes 
his way 

Through temple, tower, and palace, and 
the array 

Of arms; more strength has Love than 
he or they ; 

For it can burst his charnel, and make 
free 

The limbs in chains, the heart in agony, 

The soul in dust and chaos, 

Emily, 

A ship is floating in the harbor now, 

A wind is hovering o’er the mountain’s 
brow ; 

There is a path on the sea’s azure floor, 

No keel has ever ploughed that path 


before ; 
The halcyons brood around the foamless 
isles ; [wiles ; 


The treacherous Ocean has forsworn its 

The merry mariners are bold and free: 

Say, my heart’s sister, wilt thou sail 
with me? 

Our bark is as an albatross, whose nest 

Is a far Eden of the purple East ; 

And we between her wings will sit, 
while Night 

And Day, and storm, and Calm, pursue 
their flight, 


SHELLEY 


—_ -. 


Our ministers, along the boundless Sea, 
Treading each other’s heels, unheededly. 
It is an Isle under Ionian skies, 
Beautiful as a wreck of Paradise, 

And, for the harbors are not safe and 


good, 
This land would have remained a soli- 

tude 

But for some pastoral people native 
there, 

Who from the Elysian, clear, and golden 
air 

Draw the last spirit*of the age of gold, 

Simple and spirited ; innocent and bold. 

The blue Agean girds this chosen home, 

With ever-changing sound and light and 
foam, 

Kissing the sifted sands, and caverns 
hoar ; 

And all the winds wandering along the 
shore 

Undulate with the undulating tide: 

There are thick woods where sylvan 
forms abide ;: 

And many a fountain, rivulet, and pond, 

As clear as elemental diamond, 

Or serene morning air; and far beyond, 

The mossy tracks made by the goats 
and deer 

(Which the rough shepherd treads but 
once a year), 

Pierce into glades, caverns, and bowers, 
and halls 

Built round with ivy, which the water- 
falls 

Illumining, with sound that never fails 

Accompany the noonday nightingales ; 

- And all the place is peopled with sweet 
airs ; 

The light clear element which the isle 
wears 

Is heavy with the scent of lemon-flowers, 

Which floats like mist laden with unseen 
showers 

And falls upon the eyelids like faint 
sleep ; 

And from the moss violets and jonquils 


peep, 

And dart their arrowy odor through the 
brain 

Till you might faint with that delicious 

pain, 

And every motion, odor, beam, and tone 

With that deep music is in unison : 

Which is a soul within the soul—they 
seem 

Like echoes of an antenatal dream.— 

It is an isle ’twixt Heaven, Air, Earth, 
and Sea, 


305 


Cradled, and hung in clear tranquility ; 

Bright as that wandering Eden Lucifer, 

Washed by the soft blue Oceans of 
young air, 

It is a favored place. Famine or Blight, 

Pestilence, War, and Earthquake, never 
light 

Upon its mountain-peaks; blind vul- 
tures, they 

Sail onward far upon their fatal way : 

The wingéd storms, chanting their 
thunder-psalm 

To other lands, leave azure chasms of 
calm 

Over this isle, or weep themselves in dew, 

From which its fields and woods ever 
renew 

Their green and golden immortality. 

And from the sea there rise, and from 
the sky 

There fall, clear exhalations, soft and 
bright, 

Veil after veil, each hiding some delight, 

Which Sun or Moon or zephyr draw 


aside, _ 

Till the isle’s beauty, like a naked bride 

Glowing at once with love and loveli- 
ness, 

Blushes and trembles at its own excess: 

Yet, like a buried lamp, a Soul no less 

Burns in the heart of this delicious isle, 

An atom of th’ Eternal, whose own 
smile 

Unfolds itself, and may be felt, not seen 

O’er the gray rocks, blue waves, and 
forests green, 

Filling their bare and void interstices.— 

But the chief marvel of the wilderness 

Is a lone dwelling, built by whom or 
how 

None of the rustic island-people know ; 

’Tis not a tower of strength, though 
with its height 

It overtops the woods ; but, for delight, 

Some wise and tender Ocean-King, ere 
crime 

Had been invented, in the world’s young 
prime, 

Reared it, a wonder of that simple time, 

An envy of the isles, a pleasure-house 

Made sacred to his sister and his spouse. 

It scarce seems now a wreck of human 
art, 

But, as it were Titanic; in the heart 

Of Earth having assumed its form, then 
grown 

Out of the mountains, from the living 
stone, 

Lifting itself in caverns light and high ; 


356 


BRITISH POar> 





For all the antique and learned imagery 

Has been erased, and in the place of it 

The ivy and the wild-vine interknit 

The volumes of their many twining 
stems ; 

Parasite flowers illume with dewy gems 

The lampless halls, and when they fade, 
the sky 

Peeps through 
tracery 

With Moonlight patches, or star atoms 
keen, 

Or fragments of the day’s 
serene ;— 

Working mosaic on their Parian floors. 

And, day and night, aloof, from the 
high towers 

And terraces, the Earth and Ocean seem 

To sleep in one another's arms, and dream 

Of waves, flowers, clouds, woods, rocks, 
and all that we 

Read in their smiles, and call reality. 


their winter-woof of 


intense 


This isle and house are mine, and I 
have vowed 
Thee to be lady of the solitude.— 
And I have fitted up some chambers 
there 
Looking towards the golden Eastern air, 
And level with the living winds, which 


flow 

Like waves above the living waves 
below.— 

I have sent books and music there, and 
all 

Those instruments with which high 


spirits call 

The future from its cradle, and the past 

Out of its grave, and make the present 
last 

In thoughts and joys which sleep, but 
cannot die, 

Folded within their own eternity. 

Our simple life wants little, and true 


taste 

Hires not the pale drudge Luxury, to 
waste 

The scene it would adorn, and therefore 
still, 

Nature with all her children, haunts the 
hill. 

The ring-dove, in the embowering ivy, 
yet 

iKeeps up her love-lament, and the owls 
flit 


Round the evening tower, and the young 
stars glance 

Between the quick bats in their twilight 
dance; 


The spotted deer bask in the fresh 
moonlight 

Before our gate, and the slow, silent 
night 

Is measured by the pants of their calm 
sleep. 

Be this our home in life, and when years 
heap 

Their withered hours, like leaves, on 
our decay, 

Let us become the overhanging day, 

The living soul of this Elysian isle, 

Conscious, inseparable, one. Meanwhile 

We two will rise, and sit, and walk 
together, 

Under the roof of blue Ionian weather, 

And wander in the meadows, or ascend 

The mossy mountains, where the blue 
heavens bend 

With lightest winds, to touch their para- 
mour ; 

Or linger, where the pebbie-paven shore, 

Under the quick, faint kisses of the sea 

Trembles and sparkles as with ecstasy,— 

Possessing and possest by all that is 

Within that calm circumference of bliss, 

And by each other, till to love and live 

Be one :—or, at the noontide hour, arrive 

Where some old cavern hoar seems yet 
to keep 

The moonlight of the expired night 
asleep, 

Through which the awakened day can 
never peep ; 

A veil for our seclusion, close as Night’s, 

Where secure sleep may kill thine 
innocent lights ; 

Sleep, the fresh dew of languid love, the 
rain 

Whose drops quench kisses till they 
burn again. 

And we will talk, until thought’s melody 

Become too sweet for utterance, and it 


die 

In words, to live again in looks, which 
dart 

With thriling tone into the voiceless 
heart, 


Harmonising silence without a sound. 

Our breath shall intermix, our bosoms 
bound, 

And our veins beat together; and: our 
lips 

With other eloquence than words, eclipse 

The soul that burns between them, and 
the wells 

Which boil under our being’s inmost 
cells, 

The fountains of our deepest life, shall be 


ee 


SHELLEY 357 





Confused in passion’s golden purity, 
As beeen aprines under the morning 
un. 

We shall become the same, we shall be 
one 

Spirit within two frames, oh ! wherefore 
two? 

One passion in twin-hearts, which grows 
and grew, 

Till like two meteors of expanding flame, 

Those spheres instinct with it become 
the same, 

Touch, mingle, are transfigured ; ever 
still 

Burning, yet ever inconsumable : 

In one another’s substance finding food, 

Like flames too pure and light and un- 
imbued 

To nourish their bright lives with baser 


prey, 
Which point to Heaven and cannot pass 


away :. 

One hope within two wills, one will 
beneath 

Two overshadowing minds, one life, one 
death, 


One Heaven, one Hell, one immortality, 

And one annihilation. Woe is me! 

The wingéd words on which my soul 
would pierce 

Into the height of love’s rare Universe, 

Are chains of lead around its flight of 
fire— 

I pant, I sink, I tremble, I expire! 





Weak Verses, go, kneel at your 
Sovereign’s feet, 
And say :—‘‘ We are the masters of thy 
slave ; 
What wouldest thou with us and ours 
and thine ? ” 
Then call your sisters from Oblivion’s 


cave, 

All singing loud: ‘* Love’s very pain is 
sweet, 

But its reward is in the world divine 

Which, if not here, it builds beyond the 

rave.” 

So shall ye live when Iam there. Then 
haste 

Over the hearts of men, until ye meet 

Marina, Vanna, Primus, and the rest, 

And bid them love each other and be 
blest ; 

And leave the troop which errs, and 
which reproves, 

And come and be my guest,—for I am 
Love’s. 1821. 1821. 


TO NIGHT 


SWIFTLY walk over the western wave, 
Spirit of Night ! 

Out of thy misty eastern cave, 

Where all the long and lone daylight, 

Thou wovest dreams of joy and fear, 

Which make thee terrible and dear,— 
Swift be thy flight ! 


Wrap thy form in a mantle gray, 
Star-inwrought ! 

Blind with thine hair the eyes of Day ; 

Kiss her until she be wearied out, 

Then wander o’er city, and sea, and land 

Touching all with thine opiate wand— 
Come, long sought ! 


When I arose and saw the dawn, 

I sighed for thee ; 
When light rode high, and the dew was 

gone, - 

And noon lay heavy on flower and tree, 
And the weary Day turned to his rest, 
Lingering like an unloved guest, 

I sighed for thee. 


Thy brother Death came, and cried, 
Wouldst thou me? 

Thy sweet child Sleep, the filmy-eyed, 

Murmured like a noontide bee, 

Shall I nestle near thy side ? 

Wouldst thou me ?—And I replied, 
No, not thee ! 


Death will come when thou art dead 
Soon, too soon— 
Sleep will come when thou art fled ; 
Of neither would I ask the boon 
I ask of thee, beloved Night—- 
Swift be thine approaching flight, 
Come soon, soon ! 
1821. 1824. 


TIME’ 


UNFATHOMABLE Sea! whose waves are 
years, 
Ocean of Time, whose waters of deep 
woe 
Are brackish with the salt of human 
tears ! 
Thou shoreless flood, which in thy 
ebb and flow 
Claspest the limits of mortality ! 
And sick of prey, yet howling on for 
more, 
Vomitest thy wrecks on its inhospitable 
shore ; 


358 


BRITISH POETS 





Treacherous in calm, and terrible in 
storm, 
Who shall put forth on thee, 
Unfathomable Sea ? 1821, 1824. 


SONNET: POLITICAL GREATNESS 


Nor happiness, nor majesty, nor fame, 

Nor peace, nor strength, nor skill in 
arms or arts, 

Shepherd those herds whom tyranny 
makes tame ; 

Verse echoes not one beating of their 


hearts, 

History is but the shadow of their 
shame, 

Art veils her glass, or from the pageant 
starts 

As to oblivion their blind millions 
fleet, 

Staining that Heaven with obscene 
imagery 

Of their own likeness. What are 


numbers knit 

By force or custom? 
would be, 

Must rule the empire of himself; in it 

Must be supreme, establishing his 
throne 

On vanquished will, quelling the an- 
archy 

Of hopes and fears, being himself alone. 

1821. 1824. 


MUTABILITY 


THE flower that smiles to-day 
To-morrow dies; 
All that we wish to stay 
Tempts and then flies. 
What is this world’s delight ? 
Lightning that mocks the night, 
Brief even as bright. 


Man who man 


Virtue, how frail it is! 
Friendship how rare! 

Love, how it sells poor bliss 
For proud despair ! 

But we, though soon they fall, 

Survive their joy, and all 
Which ours we call. 


Whilst skies are blue and bright, 
Whilst flowers are gay, 
Whilst eyes that change ere night 

Make glad the day ; 
Whilst yet the calm hours creep, 
Dream thou—and from thy sleep 
Then wake to weep. 
1821, 1824. 


A LAMENT 


O world! O life! O time! 
On whose last steps I climb 
Trembling at that where I had stood 
before ; 
When will return the glory of your 
prime? 
No more—Oh, never more! 


Out of the day and night 
A. joy has taken flight ; 
Fresh spring, and summer, and winter 
hoar, 
Move my faint heart with grief, but with 
delight 
No more—Oh, never more! 
1821. 


TO ——— 


Music, when soft voices die, © 
Vibrates in the memory— 

Odors, when sweet violets sicken, 
Live within the sense they quicken, 


1824, 


Rose leaves. when the rose is dead, . 
Are heaped for the beloved’s bed ; 
And so thy thoughts, when thou art 
gone 
Love itself shall slumber on. 
1821. 1824. 


ADONAIS 


AN ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF JOHN KEATS, 
AUTHOR OF ENDYMION, HYPERION, ETC. 


"AotHp Tpiv mev Edaptrec Evt Cwototv “E@oc* 
Nov de Oavav Adurerc “Eorepog Ev pAipevore, 
PLATO. 


I WEEP for Adonais—he is dead ! 

Oh weep for Adonais! though our tears 

Thaw not the frost which binds so dear 
a head! 

And thou, sad Hour, selected from all 
years 

To mourn our loss, rouse thy obscure 
compeers, 

And teach them thine own sorrow ! Say : 
‘* With me 

Died Adonais ; till the Future dares 

Forget the Past, his fate and fame shall 
be 

An echo and a light unto eternity !” 

Where wert thou mighty Mother, when 
he lay, 

When thy Son lay, pierced by the shaft 
which flies 


SHELLEY 


In darkness ? where was lorn Urania 

When Adonais died? With veiléd eyes, 

’Mid listening Echoes, in her Paradise 

She sate, while one, with soft enamored 
breath, 

Rekindled all the fading melodies 

With which, like flowers that mock 
the corse beneath, 

He had adorned and hid the coming bulk 
of death. 


Oh weep for Adonais—he is dead ! 

Wake, melancholy Mother, wake and 
weep ! 

Yet wherefore? Quench within their 
burning bed 

Thy fiery tears, and let thy lov’d heart 
keep, 

Like his, a mute and uncomplaining 
sleep ; 

For he is gone, where all things wise 
and fair 

Descend;—oh, dream not that the am- 
orous Deep 

Will yet restore him to the vital air ; 

Death feeds on his mute voice, and 

laughs at our despair. 


Most musical of mourners, weep again 

Lament anew, Urania !—He died, 

Who was the Sire of an immortal strain, 

Blind, old, and _ lonely, when his 
country’s pride, 

The priest, the slave, and the liberticide, 

Trampled and mocked with many a 
loathéd rite 

Of lust and blood ; he went, unterrified, 

Into the gulf of death; but his clear 
Sprite 

Yet reigns o’er earth; the third among 
the sons of light. 


Most musical of mourners, weep anew ! 
Not all to that bright station dared to 
climb ; 
And happier they their happiness who 
. knew, 
Whose tapers yet burn through that 
night of time 
In which suns perished ; others more 


sublime, 

Struck by the envious wrath of man 
or God, 

Have sunk, extinct in their refulgent 
prime ; 

And some yet live, treading the thorny 


road, 
Which leads, through toil and hate, to 
Fame’s serene abode. 


a0 


But now, thy youngest, dearest one 
has perished, 

The nursling of thy widowhood, who 
grew, 

Like a pale flower by some sad maiden 
cherished, 

And fed with true love tears, instead of 
dew ; 

Most musical of mourners, weep anew ! 

Thy extreme hope, the loveliest and 
the last, 

The bloom, whose petals nipt before 
they blew 

Died on the promise of the fruit, is 
waste ; 

The broken lily lies—the storm is over- 
past. 


To that high Capital, where kingly Death 

Keeps his pale court in beauty and 
decay, 

He came; and bought, with price of 
purest breath, 

A grave among the eternal. — Come 
away ! 

Baerga ne the vault of blue Italian 

ay 

Is yet his fitting charnel-roof ! while still 

He lies, as if in dewy sleep he lay ; 

Awake him not! surely he takes his fill 

Of geen and liquid rest, forgetful of all 
ill. 


He will awake no more, oh, 
more !— 
Within the twilight chamber spreads 


never 


apace, 

The shadow of white Death, and at the 
door 

Invisible Corruption waits to trace 

His extreme way to her dim dwelling- 


place ; 

The eternal Hunger sits, but pity and 
awe 

Soothe her pale rage, nor dares she to 
deface 


So fair a prey, till darkness, and the law 
Of change shall o’er his sleep the mortal 
curtain draw. 


Oh weep for Adonais!— The quick 
Dreams, 

The passion-wingéd Ministers of thought, 

Who were his flocks, whom near the 
living streams 

Of his young spirit he fed, and whom he 
taught 

The love which was its music, wander 
not,— 


360 


Wander no more, from kindling brain to 
brain, 

But droop there, whence they sprung ; 
and mourn their lot 

Round the cold heart, where, after their 
sweet pain, 

They ne’er will gather strength, or find 
a home again. 


And one with trembling hands clasps 
his cold head, 

And fans him with her moonlight wings, 
and cries ; 

‘* Our love, our hope, our sorrow, is not 
dead ; 

See, on the silken fringe of his faint 
eyes, 

Like dew upon a sleeping flower, there 
lies 

A tear some Dream has loosened from 
his brain.” 

Lost Angel of a ruined Paradise ! 

She knew not ’twas her own; as with no 
stain 

She faded, like a cloud which had out- 
wept its rain. 


One from a lucid urn of starry dew 

Washed his ight limbs as if embalming 
them ; 

Another clipt her profuse locks, and 
threw 

The wreath upon him, like an anadem, 

Which frozen tears instead of pearls 
begem ; 

Another in 
break 

Her bow and wingéd reeds, as if to 
stem 

A greater loss with one which was more 
weak ; 

And dull the barbed fire against his frozen 
cheek. 


her wilful grief would 


Another Splendor on his mouth alit, 

That mouth, whence it was wont to draw 
the breath 

Which gave it strength to pierce the 
guarded wit, 

And pass into the panting heart be- 
neath 

With lightning and with music: the 
damp death 

Quenched its caress upon his icy lips ; 

And, as a dying meteor stains a wreath 

Of moonlight vapor, which the cold 
night clips, 

It flushed through his pale limbs, and 
passed to its eclipse. 


BRITISH POETS 


And others came .. . Desires and 
Adorations, 

Wingéd Persuasions and veiled Des- 
tinies, 

Splendors and Glooms, and glimmering 
Incarnations 

Of hopes and fears, and twilight Phan- 
tasies ; 

And Sorrow, with her family of Sighs, 

And Pleasure, blind with tears, led by 
the gleam 

Of her own dying smile instead of eyes, 

Came in slow pomp ;—the moving pomp 
might seem 

Like pageantry of mist on an autumnal 
stream. 


All he had loved, and moulded into 
thought, 

From shape, and hue, and odor, and 
sweet sound, 

Lamented Adonais. Morning sought 

Her eastern watchtower, and her hair 
unbound, 

Wet with the tears which should adorn 
the ground, 

Dimmed the aérial eyes that kindle day ; 

Afar the melancholy thunder moaned, 

Pale Ocean in unquiet slumber lay, 

And the wild winds flew round, sobbing » 
in their dismay. 


Lost Echo sits amid the voiceless moun- 
tains, 

And feeds her grief with his remembered 
lay, 

And will no more reply to winds or 
fountains, 

Or amorous birds perched on the young 
green spray, 

Or herdsman’s horn, or bell at closing 
day ; 

Since she can mimic not his lips, more 
dear 

Than those for whose disdain she pined 
away 

Into a shadow of all sounds :—a drear 

Murmur, between their songs, is all the 
woodmen hear. 


Grief made the young Spring wild, and 
she threw down 

Her kindling buds, as if she Autumn 
were, 

Or they dead leaves; since her delight is 
flown 

For whom should she have waked the 
sullen year? 

To Phoebus was not Hyacinth so dear 


SHELLEY 


361 





Nor to himself Narcissus, as to both 
Thou Adonais: wan they stand and 
sere 
Amid the faint companions of their 
youth, 
With fw all turned to tears ; odor, to 
sighing ruth. 


Thy spirit’s sister, the lorn nightingale, 
Mourns not her mate with such melodi- 


ous pain ; 

Not so the eagle, who like thee could 
scale 

Heaven, and could nourish in the sun’s 
domain 

Her mighty youth with morning, doth 
complain, 

Soaring and screaming round her empty 
nest, 

As Albion wails for thee ; the curse of 
Cain 


Light on his head who pierced thy inno- 
cent breast 

And scared the angel soul that was its 
earthly guest! 

Ah woe is me! Winter is come and 
gone, 

But grief returns with the revolving 
year ; 

‘The airs and streams renew their joyous 
tone : 

The ants, the bees, the swallows re- 
appear ; 

Fresh leaves and flowers deck the dead 
Seasons’ bier ; 

The amorous birds now pair in every 
brake, 

And build their mossy homes in field and 
brere ; 

And the green lizard, and the 
snake, 

Like unimprisoned flames, out of their 
trance awake. 


golden 


Through wood and stream and field and 


hill and Ocean 

A quickening life from the Earth’s heart 
has burst 

As it has ever done, with change and 
motion, 

From the great morning of the world 
when first 

God dawned on Chaos ; in its stream im- 
mersed — 

The lamps of Heaven flash with a softer 
light ; 

All baser things pant with life’s sacred 
thirst ; 


Diffuse themselves ; and spend in love’s 
delight, 

The beauty and the joy of their renewéd 
might. 


The leprous corpse touched by this spirit 
tender 

Exhales itself in flowers of gentle breath ; 

Like incarnations of the stars, when 
splendor 

Is changed to fragrance, they illumine 
death 

And mock the merry worm that wakes 
beneath ; 

Nought we know, dies. Shall that alone 
which knows 

Be as a sword consumed before the 
sheath 

By sightless lightning ?—th’ 
atom glows 

A moment, then is quenched in a most 
cold repose. 


intense 


Alas! that all we loved of him should be 

But for our grief, as if it had not been, 

And grief itself be mortal! Woe is me! 

Whence are we, and why are we? of 
what scene 

The actors or spectators? Great and 
mean 

Meet massed in death, who lends what 
life must borrow. 

As long as skies are blue, and fields are 
green, 

Evening must usher night, night urge 
the morrow, 

Month follow month with woe, and year 
wake year to sorrow. 


He will awake no more, oh, never more! 

‘“Wake thou,” cried Misery, ‘‘ child- 
less Mother, rise 

Out of thy sleep, and slake, 
heart’s core, 

A wound more fier ce than his with tears m 
and sighs.” 

And all the Dreams that watched 
Urania’s eyes, 

And all the Echoes whom their sister’s 


in thy 


song 
Had held in holy silence, cried: 
** Arise!” 
Swiftas a Thought by the snake Memory 
stung, 


From her ‘ambrosial rest the fading 
Splendor sprung. 


She rose like an autumnal Night, that 
springs 


362 


BRIVISH SPO ES 





Out of the East, and follows wild and 

: drear 

The golden 
wings, 

Even as a ghost abandoning a bier, 

Had left the Earth a corpse. Sorrow 
and fear 

So struck. so roused, so rapt Urania ; 

So saddened round her like an atmo- 
sphere 

Of stormy wist ; 
way 

Even to the mournful place 
Adonais lay. 


Day, which, on eternal 


so swept her on her 


where 


Out of her secret Paradise she sped, 

Through camps and cities rough with 
stone, aud steel, 

And human hearts, which to her airy 
tread 

Yielding not, wounded the invisible 

Palms of her tender feet where’er they 
fell : 

And barbéd tongues, and thoughts more 
sharp than they 

Rent the soft Form they never could 
repel, 

Whose sacred blood, 
tears of May, 

Paved with eternal flowers that unde- 
serving way. 


like the young 


In the death chamber for a moment 
Death 

Shamed by the presence of that living 
Might 

Blushed to annihilation, andthe breath 

Revisited those lips, and life’s pale light 

Flashed through those limbs, so late her 
dear delight. 

‘‘Teave me not wild 
comfortless, 

As silent lightning leaves the starless 
night ! 

Leave me _ not!” cried 
distress 

Roused Death: Death rose and smiled, 
and met her vain caress. 


and drear and 


Urania: her 


‘‘ Stay yet awhile! speak to me once 
again ; 

Kiss me, so long but as a kiss may live; 

And in my heartless breast and burning 
brain 

That word, that kiss, shall all thoughts 
else survive, 

With food of saddest memory kept alive, 

Now thou art dead, as if it were a part 

Of thee. my Adonais! I would give 


All that I am to be as thou now art! 
But Iam chained to Time, and cannot 
thence depart ! 


‘‘O gentle child, beautiful as thou wert, 

Why didst thou leave the trodden paths 
of men 

Too soon, and with weak hands though 
mighty heart 

Dare the unpastured dragon in his den ? 

Defenceless as thou wert, oh where was 
then 

Wisdom the mirrored shield, or scorn 
the spear ? 

Or hadst thou waited the full cycle, 
when 

Thy spirit should have filled its crescent 
sphere, -. 

The monsters of life’s waste had fled 
from thee like deer. 


‘‘The herded wolves, bold only to 
pursue ; 

The obscene ravens, clamorous o’er the 
dead ; 

The vultures to the conqueror’s banner 
true 


Who feed where Desolation first has fed, 

And whose wings rain contagion ;—how 
they fled, 

When like Apollo, from his golden bow, 

The Pythian of the age one arrow sped 

And smiled !—The spoilers tempt no 
second blow, 

They fawn on the proud feet that spurn 
them lying low. 


‘*The sun comes forth, and many rep- 
tiles spawn ; 

He sets, and each ephemeral insect then 

Is gathered into death without a dawn, 

And the immortal stars awake again : 

So is it in the world of living men: 

A godlike mind soars forth, in its delight 

Making earth bare and veiling heaven, 
and when 

It sinks, the swarms that dimmed or 
shared its light 

Leave to its kindred lamps the spirit’s 
awful night.” 


Thus ceased she: and the mountain 
shepherds came, 

Their garlands sere, their magic mantles 
rent ; 

The Pilgrim of Eternity, whose fame 

Over his living head like Heaven is bent, 

An early but enduring monument, 

Came, veiling all the lightnings of his 
song 


SHELLEY 


In sorrow ; from her wilds Ierne sent 

The sweetest lyrist of her saddest wrong, 

And love taught grief to fall like music 
from his tongue. 


Midst others of less note, came one 
frail Form, 

A phantom among men ; companionless 

As the last cloud of an expiring storm 

Whose thunder is its knell; he, as I 
guess, 

Had gazed on Nature’s naked loveliness, 

Actzeon-like, and now he fled astray 

With feeble steps o’er the world’s wil- 
derness, 

And his own thoughts, along that rugged 
way, 

Pursued, like raging hounds, their father 
and their prey. 


A pardlike Spirit beautiful and swift— 

A Love in desolation masked ;—a Power 

Girt round with weakness ;—it can 
scarce uplift 

The weight of the superincumbent hour ; 

It is a dying lamp, a falling shower, 

A breaking billow ;—even whilst we 


speak 

Is it not broken? On the withering 
flower 

The killing sun smiles brightly: on a 
cheek 


The life can burn in blood, even while 
the heart may break. 


His head was bound with pansies over- 
blown, 

And faded violets, white, and pied, and 
blue ; 

And a light spear topped with a cypress 
cone, 

Round whose rude shaft dark ivy tresses 
grew 

Yet dripping with the forest’s noonday 
dew, 

Vibrated, as the ever-beating heart 

Shook the weak hand that grasped it ; 
of that crew 

He came the last, neglected and apart ; 

A herd-abandoned deer struck by the 
hunter’s dart. 


All stood aloof, and at his partial moan 

Smiled through their tears; well knew 
that gentle band 

Who in another’s fate now wept his own ; 

As in the accents of an unknown land, 

He sung new sorrow; sad Urania 
scanned 


363 


The Stranger’s mien, and murmured: 
‘“Who art thou?” 

He answered not, but with a sudden 
hand 

Made bare his branded and ensanguined 
brow, 

Which was like Cain’s or Christ’s—oh, 
that it should be so! 


What softer voice is hushed over the 
dead ? 

Athwart what brow is that dark mantle 
thrown ? 

What form leans sadly o’er the white 
deathbed, 

In mockery of monumental stone, 

The heavy heart heaving without a 
moan? 

If it be He, who, gentlest of the wise, 

Taught, soothed, loved, honored the 
departed one ; 

Let me not vex, with inharmonious 
sighs 

The silence of that heart’s accepted 
sacrifice. 


Our Adonais has drunk poison—oh ! 
What deaf and viperous murderer could 


crown 

Life’s early cup with such a draught of 
woe? 

The nameless worm would now itself 
disown : 


It felt, yet could escape the magic tone 

Whose prelude held all envy, hate, and 
wrong, 

But what was howling in one breast 
alone, 

Silent with expectation of the song, 

Whose master’s handis cold, whose silver 
lyre unstrung. 


Live thou, whose infamy is not thy 
fame! 

Live! fear no heavier chastisement from 
me, 

Thou noteless blot on a remembered 
name ! 


But be thyself, and know thyself to be! 
And ever at thy season be thou free 
To spill the venom when thy fangs o’er- 


flow : 

Remorse and Self-contempt shall cling 
to thee ; 

Hot Shame shall burn upon thy secret 
brow, 


And like a beaten hound tremble thou 
shalt—as now.} 
wh 
1 See the note on page 254, 


364 


Nor let us weep that our delight is fled 
Far from these carrion kites that scream 


below ; 

He wakes or sleeps with the enduring 
dead ; 

Thou canst not soar where he is sitting 
now.— 


Dust to the dust! but the pure spirit 
shall flow 

Back to the burning fountain whence 
it came, 

A portion of the Eternal, which must 
glow 

Through time and change, unquench- 
ably the same, 

Whilst thy cold embers choke the sordid 
hearth of shame. 


Peace, peace! he is not dead, he doth 
not sleep 

He hath awakened from the dream of 
life— 

‘Tis we, who lost in stormy visions, keep 

With phantoms an unprofitable strife, 

And in mad trance, strike with our 
spirit’s knife 

Invulnerable nothings.— We decay 

Like corpses in a charnel ; fear and grief 

Convulse us and consume us day by day, 

And cold hopes swarm like worms with- 
in our living clay. 


He has outsoared the shadow of our 
night ; 

Envy and calumny and hate and pain, 

And that unrest which men miscall de- 
light, 

Can touch him not and torture not again ; 

From the contagion of the world’s slow 
stain 

He is secure, and now can never mourn 

A heart grown cold, a head grown gray 
in vain ; 

Nor, when the spirit’s self has ceased to 
burn, : 

With sparkless ashes load an unlamented 
urn, 


He lives, he wakes—’tis Death is dead, 


not he ; 
Mourn not for Adonais,—Thou young 
Dawn [thee 


Turn all thy dew to splendor, for from 

The spirit thou lamentest is not gone ; 

Ye caverns and ye forests, cease to moan ! 

Cease ye faint flowers and fountains, 
and thou Air 

Which like a mourning veil thy scarf 
hadst thrown 


BRITISH POETS 





O’er the abandoned Earth, now leave it 
bare 

Even to the joyous stars which smile on 
its despair ! 


He is made one with Nature: there is 
heard 

His voice in all her music, from the moan 

Of eo to the song of night’s sweet 
oird ; 

He is a presence to be felt and known 

In darkness and in light, from herb and 
stone, ; 

Spreading itself where’er that Power 
may move 

Which has withdrawn his being to its 
own; 

Which wields the world with never 
wearied love, 

Sustains it from beneath, and kindles it 
above. 


He is a portion of the loveliness 

Which once he made more lovely : he 
doth bear 

His part, while the one Spirit’s plastic 
stress 

Sweeps through the dull dense world, 
compelling there 

All new successions to the forms they 
wear ; 

Torturing th’ unwilling dross 
checks its flight 

To its own likeness, as each mass may 
bear ; 

And bursting in its beauty and its might 

From trees and beasts and men into the 
Heaven’s light. 


that 


The splendors of the firmament of time 
May be eclipsed, but are extinguished 
; not ; 

Like stars to their appointed height 
they climb 

And death isa low mist which cannot 
blot 

The brightness it may veil. When lofty 

thought 

Lifts a young heart above its mortal lair, 

And love and life contend in it, for what 

Shall be its earthly doom, the dead live 
there 

And move like winds of light on dark 
and stormy air. 


The inheritors of unfulfilled renown 

Rose from their thrones, built beyond 
mortal thought, 

Far in the Unapparent. Chatterton 


SHELLEY 





Rose pale, his soleinn agony had not 

Yet faded from him; Sidney, as he 
fought 

And as he fell and as he lived and loved 

,Sublimely mild, a Spirit without spot, 

Arose; and Lucan, by his death 
approved : 

Oblivion as they rose shrank like a thing 
reproved. 


And many more, whose names on Earth 
are dark 

But whose transmitted effluence cannot 
die 

So long as fire outlives the parent spark, 

Rose, robed in dazzling immortality. 

‘*Thou art become as one of us,” they 
cry, 

“It ae for thee yon kingless sphere 
has long 

Swung blind in unascended majesty, 

Silent alone amid an Heaven of Song. 

Assume thy wingéd throne, thou Vesper 
of our throng!” 

Who mourns for Adonais? Oh come 
forth 

Fond wretch! and know thyself and 
him aright. 

Clasp with thy panting 
pendulous Earth; 

As from a centre, dart thy spirit’s light 

Beyond all worlds, until its spacious 
might 

Satiate the void circumference: then 
shrink 

Even to a point within our day and 

night ; 

And keep thy heart light lest it make 
thee sink 

When hope has kindled hope, and lured 
thee to the brink. 


soul the 


Or go to Rome, which is the sepulchre 

Oh! not of him, but of our joy: ’tis 
nought 

That ages, empires, and religions there 

Lie buried in the ravage they have 
wrought ; 

For such as he can lend,—they borrow 
not 

Glory from those who made the world 
their prey ; 

And he is gathered to the kings of 
thought 

Who waged contention with their time’s 
decay, 

And of the past are all that cannot pass 
away. 


365 


Go thou to Rome.—at once the Paradise, 

The grave, the city, and the wilderness ; 

And where its wrecks like shattered 
mountains rise, 

And flowering weeds, 
copses dress 

The bones of Desolation’s nakedness, 

Pass, till the Spirit of the spot shall lead 

Thy footsteps to a slope of green access 

Where, like an infant’s smile, over the 
dead 

A light of laughing flowers along the 
grass is spread. 


and fragrant 


And gray walls moulder round, on which 
dull Time 

Feeds, like slow fire upon a hoary brand; 

And one keen pyramid with wedge sub- 
lime, 

Pavilioning the dust of him who planned 

This refuge for his memory, doth stand 

Like flame transformed to marble; and 
beneath, 

A field is spread, on which a newer band 

Have pitched in Heaven’s smile their 
camp of death 

Welcoming him we lose with scarce ex- 
tinguished breath. 


Here pause: these graves are all too 
young as yet 

To have outgrown the sorrow which 
consigned 

Its charge to each ; and if the seal is set, 

Here, on one fountain of a mourning 


mind, 
Break it not thou! too surely shalt thou 
find [home, 


Thine own well full, if thou returnest 

Of tears and gall. From the world’s 
bitter wind 

Seek shelter in the shadow of the tomb. 

What Adonais is, why fear we to be- 
come ? 


The One remains, the many change and 
pass ; 

Heaven’s light forever shines, Earth’s 
shadows fly ; 

Life, like a dome of many-colored glass, 

Stains the white radiance of Eternity, 

Until Death tramples it to fragments. 
—Die, , 

{f thou wouldst be with that which 
thou dost seek! 

Follow where all is fled !—Rome’s azure 
sky, [are weak 

Flowers, ruins, statues, music, words, 

The glory they transfuse with fitting 
truth to speak. 


366 


Why linger, why turn back, why shrink, 
my Heart ? 

Thy hopes are gone before: from all 
things here 

They have departed ; thoushouldst now 
depart ! 

A light is past from the revolving year, 

And man, and woman; and what still 
is dear 

Attracts to crush, repels to make thee 
wither. 

The soft sky smiles,—the low wind 
whispers near ; 

*Tis Adonais calls! oh, hasten thither, 

No more let Life divide what Death can 
join together. 


That Light whose smile kindles the 
Universe, 

That Beauty in which all things work 
and move, 

That Benediction which the eclipsing 
Curse 

Of birth can quench not, that sustain- 
ing Love 

Which through the web of being blindly 
wove 

By man and beastandearth and air and 
sea, 

Burns bright or dim, aseachare mirrors of 

The fire for which all thirst ; now beams 
on me, 

Consuming the last clouds of 
mortality. 


cold 


The breath whose might I have invoked 
in song 

Descends on me; my spirit’s bark is 
driven, 

Far from the shore, far from the trem- 
bling throng 

Whose sails were never to the tempest 
given ; 

The massy earth and spheréd skies are 
riven ! 

IT am borne darkly, fearfully, afar ; 

Whilst burning through the inmost veil 
of Heaven, 

The soul of Adonais, like a star, 

Beacons from the abode where the 
Eternal are. 1821, 1821. 


LIFE MAY CHANGE, BUT IT MAY 
FLY NOT 


LIFE may change, but it may fly not ; 
Hope may vanish, but can die not ; 
Truth be veiled, but still it burneth ; 
Love repulsed,—but it returneth ! 


BRITISH POETS 





Yet were life a charnel where 
Hope lay coffined with Despair ; 
Yet were truth a sacred lie, 
Love were lust—If Liberty 


Lent not life its soul of light, 

Hope its iris of delight, 

Truth its prophet’s robe to wear, 

Love its power to give and bear. 
From Hellas. 1821. 1822. 


WORLDS ON WORLDS ARE ROLL- 
ING EVER 


WORLDS on worlds are rolling ever 
From creation to decay, 

Like the bubbles on a river 
Sparkling, bursting, borne away. 
But they are still immortal 
Who, through birth’s orient portal 

And death’s dark chasm hurrying to and 


fro, 
Clothe their unceasing flight 
In the brief dust and light 
Gathered around their chariots as they 
£0 ; 
New shapes they still may weave, 
New gods, new laws receive, 
Bright or dim are they as the robes they 
last 
On Death’s bare ribs had cast. 


A power from the unknown God, 
A Promethean conqueror came ; 
Like a triumphal path he trod 
The thorns of death and shame. 
A mortal shape to him 
Was like the vapor dim 
Which the orient planet animates with 
light ; 
Hell, Sin, and Slavery came, 
Like bloodhounds mild and tame, 
Nor preyed, until their Lord had taken 
flight ; 
The moon of Mahomet 
Arose, and it shall set: 
While blazoned as on heaven’s immortal 
noon 
The cross leads generations on. 


Swift as the radiant shapes of sleep 
From one whose dreams are Paradise 
Fly, when the fond wretch wakes to 
weep, 
And day peers forth with her blank 
eyes ; 
So fleet, so faint, so fair, 
The Powers of earth and air 
Fled from the folding star of Bethlehem : 


SHELLEY 


Apollo, Pan, and Love, 
And even Olympian Jove 
Grew weak, for killing Truth had glared 
on them; 
Our hills and seas and streams 
Dispeopled of their dreams, 
Their waters turned to blood, their dew 
to tears, 
Wailed for the golden years. 
From Hellas. 1821. 1822. 


SONGS FROM HELLAS 


DARKNESS has dawned in the East 
On the noon of time: 
The death-birds descend to their feast, 
From the hungry clime. 
Let Freedom and Peace flee far 
To a sunnier strand, 
And follow Love’s folding star 
To the Evening land! 


The young moon has fed 
Her exhausted horn, 
With the sunset’s fire: 
The weak day is dead, 
But the night is not born ; 
And, like loveliness panting with wild 
desire flight, 
While it trembles with fear and de- 
Hesperus flies from awakening night, 
And pants in its beauty and speed with 
light 
Fast flashing, soft, and bright. 
Thou beacon of love! thou lamp of the 
free ! 
Guide us far, far away, 
To climes where now veiled by the 
ardor of day 
Thou art hidden 
From waves on which weary noon 
Faints in her summer swoon, 
Between Kingless continents sinless 
as Eden, [lably 
Around mountains and islands invio- 
Prankt on the sapphire sea. 


Through the sunset of hope, 
Like the shapes of a dream, 
What Paradise islands of glory 
gleam ! 
Beneath Heaven’s cope, 
Their shadows more clear float by — 
The sound of their oceans, the light 
of their sky, 
The music and fragrance their soli- 
tudes breathe 
Burst, like morning on dream, or like 
Heaven on death 


367 


Through the walls of our prison ; 
And Greece, which was dead, is arisen ! 
1821, 1822. 


THE WORLD’S GREAT AGE BEGINS 
ANEW 


THE world’s great age begins anew, 
The golden years return, 
The earth doth like a snake renew 
Her winter weeds outworn : 
Heaven smiles, and faiths and empires 
gleam, 
Like wrecks of a dissolving dream. 


A brighter Hellas rears its mountains 
From waves serener far ; 

A new Peneus rolls his fountains 
Against the morning star. 

Where fairer Tempes bloom, there sleep 

Young Cyclads on a sunnier deep. 


A loftier Argo cleaves the main, 
Fraught with a later prize ; 
Another Orpheus sings again, 
And loves, and weeps, and dies, 
A new Ulysses leaves once more 
Calypso for his native shore. 


Oh, write no more the tale of Troy, 
If earth Death’s scroll must be! 
Nor mix with Laian rage the joy 
Which dawns upon the free: 
Although a subtler Sphinx renew 
Riddles of déath Thebes never knew. 


Another Athens shall arise, 
And to remoter time 
Bequeath, like sunset to the skies, 
The splendor of its prime ; 
And leave, if nought so bright may live, 
All earth can take or Heaven can give. 


Saturn and Love their long repose 
Shall burst, more bright and good 
Than all who fell, than One who rose, 

Than many unsubdued: } 


1 Saturn and Love were among the deities of a 
real or imaginary state of innocence and happi- 
ness. All those who fell, or the Gods of Greece, 
Asia, and Egypt; the One who rose, or Jesus 
Christ, at whose appearance the idols of the 
Pagan World were amerced of their worship ; 
and the many unsubdued, or the monstrous ob- 
jects of the idolatry of China. India, the Antare- 
tie islands, and the native tribes of America, 
certainly have reigned over the understandings 
of men in conjunction or in succession, during 
periods in which all we know of evil has been in 
astate of portentous, and, until the revival of 
learning and the arts, perpetually increasing 
activity. (rom Shelley’s Note.) 


368 


Not gold, not blood, their altar dowers, 
But votive tears and symbol flowers. 


Jh, cease! must hate and death return ? 
Cease ! must men kill and die? 
Cease ! drain not to its dregs the urn 
Of bitter prophecy. 
The world is weary of the past, 
Oh, might it die or rest at last ! 
Final Chorus from Hellas. 


TO-MORROW 


WHERE art thou, beloved To-morrow ? 

When young and old and strong and 
weak, 

Rich and poor, through joy and sorrow, 
Thy sweet smiles we ever seek,— 

In thy place—ah! well-a-day ! 

We find the thing we fled—To-day. 

1821. 1824. 


TO——— 


ONE word is too often profaned 
For me to profane it, 

One feeling too falsely disdained 
For thee to disdain it. 

One hope is too like despair 
For prudence to smother, 

And pity from thee more dear 
Than that from another. 


I can give not what men eall love, 
But wilt thou accept not 

The worship the heart lifts above 
And the Heavens reject not, 

The desire of the moth for the star, 
Of the night for the morrow, 

The devotion to something afar 
From the sphere of our sorrow ? 

1821. 1824. 


WITH A GUITAR, TO JANE 


ARIEL to Miranda.—Take 

This slave of Music, for the sake 
Of him who is the slave of thee, 
And teach it all the harmony 

In which thou canst, and only thou, 
Make the delighted spirit glow, 
Till joy denies itself again, 

And, too intense, is turned to pain ; 
For by permission and command 
Of thine own Prince Ferdinand, 
Poor Ariel sends this silent token 
Of more than ever can be spoken ; 
Your guardian spirit, Ariel, who, 


BRITISH POETS 





From life to life, must still pursue 

Your happiness ;—for thus alone 

Can Ariel ever find his own. 

From Prospero’s enchanted cell, 

As the mighty verses tell, 

To the throne of Naples, he 

Lit you o’er the trackless sea, 

Flitting on, your prow before, 

Like a living meteor. 

When you die, the silent Moon, 

In her interlunar swoon, 

Is not sadder in her cell 

Than deserted Ariel. 

When you live again on earth, 

Like an unseen star of birth, 

Ariel guides you o’er the sea 

Of life from your nativity. 

Many changes have been run, 

Since Ferdinand and you begun 

Your course of love, and Ariel still 

Has tracked your steps, and served 
your will; 

Now, in humbler, happier lot, 

This is all remembered not ; 

And now, alas ! the poor sprite is 

Imprisoned, for some fault of his, 

In a body like a grave ;— 

From you he only dares to crave, 

For his service and his sorrow, 

A smile to-day, a song to-morrow. 


The artist who this idol wrought, 

To echo all harmonious thought, 

Telled a tree, while on the steep 

The woods were in their winter sleep, 

Rocked in that repose divine 

On the wind-swept Apennine ; 

And dreaming, some of Autumn past, 

And some of Spring approaching fast, 

And some of April buds and showers, 

And some of songs in July bowers, 

And all of love ; and so this tree,-— 

Oh that such our death may be !— 

Died in sleep, and felt no pain, 

To live in happier form again : 

From which, beneath Heaven’s fairest 
star, 

The artist wrought this loved Guitar, 

And taught it justly to reply, 

To all who question skilfully, 

In language gentle as thine own ; 

Whispering in enamored tone 

Sweet oracles of woods and dells, 

And summer winds in sylvan cells ; 

For it had learnt all harmonies 

Of the plains and of the skies, 

Of the forests and the mountains, 

And the many-voiced fountains ; 

The clearest echoes of the hills, 


SHELLEY 


The softest notes of falling rills, 

The melodies of birds and bees, 

The murmuring of summer seas, 

And pattering rain, and breathing dew 

And airs of evening ; and it knew 

That seldom-heard mysterious sound, 

Which, driven on its diurnal round, 

As it floats through boundless day, 

Our world enkindles on its way— 

All this it knows, but will not tell 

To those who cannot question well 

The spirit that inhabits it ; 

It talks according to the wit 

Of its companions ; and no more 

Is heard than has been felt before, 

By those who tempt it to betray 

These secrets of an elder day : 

But sweetly as its answers will 

Flatter hands of perfect skill, 

It keeps its highest, holiest tone 

For our beloved Jane alone. 
1822, 1832-1833. 


LINES: “WHEN THE LAMP IS 
SHATTERED ” 


WHEN the lamp is shattered 
The light in the dust lies dead— 
When the cloud is scattered 
The rainbow’s glory is shed. 
When the lute is broken, 
Sweet tones are remembered not ; 
When the lips have spoken, 
Loved accents are soon forgot. 


As music and splendor 

Survive not the lamp and the lute, 
The heart’s echoes render 

No song when the spirit is mute :— 
No song but sad dirges, 

Like the wind through a ruined cell, 
Or the mournful surges 

That ring the dead seaman’s knell. 


24 


369 


When hearts have once mingled 
Love first leaves the well-built nest, 
The weak one is singled 
To endure what it once possessed. 
O Love! who bewailest 
The frailty of all things here, 
Why choose you the frailest 
For your cradle, your home, and your 
bier ? 
Its passions will rock thee 
As the storms rock the ravens on high : 
Bright reason will mock thee, 
Like the sun from a wintry sky. 
From thy nest every rafter 
Will rot, and thine eagle home 
Leave thee naked to laughter, 
When leaves fall and cold winds come. 
1822. 1824. 


SONG FROM CHARLES THE FIRST 


A wipow bird sate mourning for her 
love 
Upon a wintry bough ; 
The frozen wind crept on above, 
The freezing stream below. 


There was no leaf upon the forest bare, 
No flower upon the ground, 
And little motion in the air 
Except the mill-wheel’s sound. 
1822, 


- A DIRGE 


RouGH wind, that moanest loud 
Grief too sad for song ; 

Wild wind, when sullen cloud 
Knells all the night long ; 
Sad storm, whose tears are vain, 
Bare woods, whose branches strain, 

Deep caves and dreary main, 
Wail, for the world’s wrong ! 
1822. 


1824. 


1824, 


KEATS 


LIST OF REFERENCES 


* * Complete Works, edited by H. Buxton Forman, 4 volumes (the 
standard edition). Complete Poetical Works, together with the Letters, 
Cambridge edition, 1 volume. Poetical Works, Globe edition, 1 volume. 
Aldine Poets, 1 volume. Golden Treasury Series (edited by Palgrave), 
1 volume. 


BioGRAPHY 


* Mines (R. M.) (Lord Houghton), Life, Letters and Literary Remains, 
1st edition, 1848; 2nd, revised, edition, 1867. *Cotvrin (Sidney), Keats 
(English Men of Letters Series), 1887. * Rossrrri (W. M.), Keats (Great 
Writers Series), 1887. Gorner (M.), John Keats’ Leben und Werke, 
1897. 


REMINISCENCES AND Earty CRITICISM 


Hunt (Leigh), Lord Byron and some of his Contemporaries. Hunt 
(Leigh), Autobiography. Hunt (Leigh), Review of La Belle Dame sans 
Merci, in The Indicator, May 10, 1890; Review of the Poems of 1820, in 
The Indicator of August 2 and 9, 1820. (Given in Forman’s edition of 
Keats, Vol. I). Hunt (Leigh), Imagination and Fancy, 1844. ? Girrorp 
(William), Review of Endymion, in the Quarterly Review, No. 87, 1818. 
JEFFREY (Lord Francis), Edinburgh Review, No. 67, Art. 10, August, 
1820: Keats’ Poetry. Mirrorp (M. L.), Recollections of a Literary Life. 
CLARKE (Charles and Mary Cowden), Recollections of Writers. Dr 
Quincry, Works, Masson’s edition, Vol. XI. Haypon (B. R.), Correspon- 
dence and Table-Talk.—See also Medwin’s Life of Shelley, Shelley Memo- 
rials by Lady Shelley, Taylor’s Life of B. R. Haydon, and Medwin’s 
Conversations of Lord Byron. 





LATER CriTIcIsM 


* Arnotp (M.), Essays, Vol. II. Ditrxr (C. W.), The Papers of a Critic. 
DowveEn (Edward), Studies in Literature: Transcendental Movement and 
Literature. Gossr (E.), Critical Kit-kats. * Lane (Andrew), Letters on 

oo | 


KEATS 371 


Literature. * Lowxrtt, Prose Works, Vol. I: Keats. Manre (H. W.), 
Essays in Literary Interpretation: John Keats, Poet and Man. Masson 
(David), Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats, and Other Essays. Owen (F. M.), 
Keats, a study. Puriips (8.), Essays from the Times, Vol. I. Roserr- 
son (J. M.), New Essays Towards a Critical Method. Rosserr1 (W. M.), 
Lives of Famous Poets. Snettey (Henry C.), Keats and _ his Circle. 
* Swinpurne (A. C.), Miscellanies. TrExtrn (Joseph), Etudes de Littéra- 
ture européenne: Keats et le Néo-Hellénisme dans la Poésie anglaise. 
* Woopserry (G. E.), Studies in Letters and Life. 

Brooks (S. W.), English Poets. Carne (T. Hall), Cobwebs of Criti- 
cism. Carr (J. C.), Essays on Art. Courruorr (W. G.), Liberal Move- 
ment in English Literature. Dawson (W. J.), Makers of Modern Eng-’ 
lish. Der Vers (A.), Essays, chiefly on Poetry. Devry (J.), Comparative 
Estimate of Modern English Poets. Dixon (W.M.), English Poetry. 
Hatiarp (J. H.), Gallica: Poetry of Keats. Hupson (W. H.), Studies in 
Interpretation : Keats, Clough, Arnold. Minro (William), The Georgian 
Era. Nencroni (E.), Letteratura inglese (on Colvin’s Biography). Noe 
(R.), Essays on Poetry and Poets. Snarp (R. F.), Architects of English 
Literature. Swanwick (A.), Poets the Interpreters of Their Age. Tuc- 
KERMAN (I. T.), Thoughts on the Poets. Wruuuis (N. P.), Pencillings by 
the Way. 


TRIBUTES IN VERSE 


* * Suettey, Adonais. * SHetitey, Fragment on Keats’ Epitaph. Hunt 
(Leigh) Foliage, or Poems Original and Translated: To John Keats; On 
Receiving a Crown of Ivy from the Same; On the Same; * To the Grass- 
hopper and the Cricket. (Four Sonnets to Keats. Given also in For- 
man’s edition of Keats, Vol. I). * Rosserri, Five English Poets: John 
Keats. *GitpEr (R. W.), Poems. Lonerrettow, Keats, a Sonnet. 
Lowe, Poems: Sonnet to the Spirit of Keats. Moore (G. L.), Keats, a 
Sonnet. Tass (John B.), Keats, a Sonnet. Payn (James), Stories from 
Boceaccio, and other Poems: Sonnet to John Keats. Scorr (W. B.), 
Poems: Sonnet on the Inscription, Keats’ Tombstone ; Ode to the Memory 
of John Keats. * Sprryecarn (J. E.), in Columbia Verse 1892-97: Keats. 
* Brownine (E. B.), in Aurora Leigh, Book I. * Brownine (R.), 
Popularity. 


BrBnioGRAPHY 


Providence Public Library, Reading List; Monthly Bulletin, 1895, No. 
11. Anverson (J. P.), Appendix to Rossetti’s Life of Keats. 


Ke eS 


IMITATION OF SPENSER! 


Now Morning from her orient chamber 
came, 

And her first footsteps touch’d a verdant 
hill ; 

Crowning its lawny crest with amber 
flame, 

Silv’ring the untainted gushes of its rill ; 

Which, pure from mossy beds, did down 
distill, 

And after parting beds of simple flowers, 

By many streams a little lake did fill, 

Which round its marge reflected woven 
bowers, 

And, in its middle space, a sky that never 
lowers. 


There the king-fisher saw his plumage 
bright 

Vieing with fish of briliant dye below ; 

Whose silken fins, and golden scalés 
light 

Cast upward, through the waves, a ruby 
glow: 

There saw the swan his neck of arched 
snow, 

And oar’d himself along with majesty ; 

Sparkled his jetty eyes; his feet did 
show 

Beneath the waves like Afric’s ebony, 

And on his back a fay reclined volup- 
tuously. 


Ah! could I tell the wonders of an isle 

That in that fairest lake had placed 
been, 

I could e’en Dido of her grief beguile ; 

Or rob from aged Lear his bitter teen : 

For sure so fair a place was never seen, 

Of all that ever charm’d romantic eye: 


1 “Tt was the Faerie Queene that awakened 
his genius. In Spenser’s fairy-land he was en- 
chanted, breathed in a new world, and became 
another being; till, enamored of the stanza, he 
attempted to imitate it, and succeeded. ... 
This, his earliest attempt, the ‘Imitation of 
Spenser’, is in his first volume of poems.”’ 
(Quoted by Colvin from the Houghton MSS.) 


It seem’d an emerald in the silver sheen 

Of the bright waters; or as when on 
high, 

Through clouds of fleecy white, laughs 
the cerulean sky. 


And all around it dipp’d luxuriously 
Slopings of verdure through the glossy 
tide, 
Which, as it were in gentle amity, 
Rippled delighted up the flowery side ; 
As if to glean the ruddy tears, it tried, 
Which fell profusely from the rose-tree 
stem ! 
Haply it was the workings of its pride, 
In strife to throw upon the shore a gem 
Outvieing all the buds in Flora’s diadem. 
1818 or 1814. 1817.1 


TO SOLITUDE 


O SOLITUDE ! if I must with thee dwell, 

Let it not be among the jumbled heap 

Of murky buildings; climb with me the 
steep,— 

Nature’s observatory—whence the dell, 

Its flowery slopes, its river’s crystal swell 

May seem a span; let me thy vigils keep 

’Mongst boughs pavilion’d where the 
deer’s swift lea 

Startles the wild bee from the fox-glove 
bell. 

But though Tl] gladly trace these scenes 
with thee, 

Yet the sweet converse of an innocent 
mind, 

Whose words are images of thoughts 
refin’d, 

Is my soul’s pleasure ; and it sure must be 

Almost the highest bliss of human-kind, 

When to thy haunts two kindred spirits 
flee. 21815. May 5, 1816.2 


1 The dates for Keats’ poems are made up from 
Sidney Colvin’s careful study of the order of 
composition of the poems, in his Life of Keats, 
and from H. Buxton Forman’s excellent notes in 
his edition of Keats’ Works. 

2 In Leigh Hunt’s Hxaminer. 


Probably the 
first lines of Keats ever printed. 


372 


oa 


a). 
ie 
ot.) 
an 


’ 
7 
rr 


BEATS: 


HOW MANY BARDS GILD THE 
LAPSES OF TIME 


How many bards gild the lapses of time! 
A few of them have ever been the food 
Of my delighted fancy,—I could brood 

Over their beauties, earthly, or sublime : 
And often, when Isit me down to rhyme, 
These will in throngs before my mind 

intrude : | 

But no confusion, no disturbance rude 

Do they occasion ; ‘tis a pleasing chime. 
So the unnumber’d sounds that evening 


343 


And gentle tale of love and languishment? 

Returning home at evening, with an ear 

Catching the notes of Philomel,—an eye 

Watching the sailing cloudlet’s bright 
career, 

He mourns that day so soon has glided 


E’en like the passage of an angel’s tear 
That falls through the clear ethersilently. 
June, 1816, 1817. 


ON FIRST LOOKING INTO CHAP- 
MAN’S HOMER 


store ; 
The songs of birds—the whisp’ring of the | \ucH have I travell’d in the realms of 
leaves-— gold, 
The voice of waters—the great bell that | and many goodly states and kingdoms 
heaves seen ; 
With solémn sound,—and thousand | Round many western islands have I 
others more, been 


That distance of recognizance bereaves, 
Make pleasing music, and not wild up- 
roar. 21816. 1817. 


KEEN, FITFUL GUSTS ARE WHIS- 
PERING HERE AND THERE 


KEEN, fitful gusts are whispering here 
and there 

Among the bushes half leafless, and dry; 

The stars look very cold about the sky, 

And I have many miles on foot to fare. 

Yet feel I little of the cool bleak air, 

Or of the dead leaves rustling drearily, 


Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold. 

Oft of one wide expanse had I been told 

That deep-browed Homer ruled as his 
demesne ; 

Yet did I never breathe its pure serene 

Till I heard Chapman speak out loud 
and bold: 

Then felt I like some watcher of the 
skies 

When a new planet swims into his ken ; 

Or like stout Cortez when with eagle 
eyes 

He star’d at the Pacific—and all his men 

Look’d at each other with a wild sur- 


Or of those silver lamps that burn on mise— 
high, Silent, upon a peak in Darien. 

Or of the distance from home’s pleasant 1816, 1817. 
lair : 

For I am brimful of the friendliness GREAT SPIRITS NOW ON EARTH 


That in a little cottage I have found ; 

Of fair-hair’d Milton’s eloquent distress, 
And all his love for gentle Lycid drown’d; 
Of lovely Laura in her light green dress, 


ARE SOJOURNING 


GREAT spirits now on earth are sojourn- 


. ue = read ing ; 
And Pel eae eine He of the cloud, the cataract, the lake, 
on i ; ; Who on Helvellyn’s summit, wide 


TO ONE WHO HAS BEEN LONG IN 
CITY PENT 


To one who has been long in city pent 

‘lis very sweet to look into the fair 

And open face of heaven,—to breathe a 
prayer 

Full in the smile of the blue firmament. 

Who is more happy, when, with heart’s 
content, 

Fatigued he sinks into some pleasant lair 

Of wavy grass, and reads a debonair 


awake, 
Catches his freshness from Archangel’s 
Wing ; 

He of the rose, the violet, the spring, 
The social smile, the chain for Freedom’s 
sake : 

And _ lo !—whose 
never take 

A meaner sound than Raphael’s whis- 
pering. 

And other spirits there are standing 
apart 

Upon the forehead of the age to come ; 





steadfastness would 


374 


BRITISH POETS 





These, these will give the world another 
heart 
And other pulses. Hear ye not the hum 
Of mighty workings in the human mart ? 
Listen awhile ye nations, and be dumb. 
November, 1816. 1817. 


ON THE GRASSHOPPER AND 
CRICKET 


THE poetry of earth is never dead : 

When all the birds are faint with the 
hot sun, 

And hide in cooling trees, a voice will 
run 

From hedge to hedge about the new- 
mown mead ; 

That is the Grasshopper’s—he takes the 
lead 

In summer luxury,—he has never done 

With his delights; for when tired out 
with fun 

He rests at ease beneath some pleasant 
weed. 

The poetry of earth is ceasing never ; 

On a lone winter evening, when the 
frost 

Has wrought a silence, from the stove 
there shrills 

The Cricket’s song, in warmth increasing 
ever, 

And seems to one in drowsiness half 
lost, 

The Grasshopper’s among some grass 
hills. December 30, 1816. 1817. 


SLEEP AND POETRY 


‘* As I lay in my bed slepe full unmete 

““Was unto me, but why that I ne might 

“ Rest I ne wist, for there n’as erthly wight 

‘TAs I suppose] had more of hertis ese 

“Than I, for I n’ad sicknesse nor disese.”’ 
CHAUCER. 





WHAT is more gentle than a wind in 
summer ? 

What is more soothing than the pretty 
hummer 

That stays one moment in an open 
flower, 

And buzzes cheerily from bower to 
bower ? 

What is more tranquil than a musk- 
rose blowing 

In a green island, far from all men’s 
knowing? 

More healthful than the leafiness of 
dales? 





More secret than a nest of nightingales ? 
More serene than Cordelia’s counte- 
nance ? 

More full of visions than a high ro- 
mance ? 
What, but thee, Sleep? Soft closer of 

our eyes! 
Low murmurer of tender lullabies ! 
Light hoverer around our happy pil- 
lows ! 
Wreather of poppy buds, and weeping 
willows! 
Silent entangler of a beauty’s tresses ! 
Most happy listener ! when the morning 


blesses 

Thee for enlivening all the cheerful 
eyes 

That glance so brightly at the new sun- 
rise. 


But what is higher beyond thought than 
thee? 

Fresher than berries of a mountain tree? 

More strange, more beautiful, more 
smooth, more regal, 

Than wings of swans, than doves, than 
dim-seen eagle? 

What is it? And to what shall I com- 
pare it? 

It has a glory, and nought else can 
share it: 

The thought thereof is awful, sweet, and 
holy, 

Chasing ti all worldliness and folly ; 

Coming sometimes like fearful claps of 
thunder, 

Or the low rumblings earth’s regions 
uncer ; 

And sometimes like a gentle whispering 

Of all the secrets of some wondrous 


thing 

That breathes about us in the vacant 
air: 

So that we look around with prying 
stare, 

Perhaps to see shapes of light, aérial 
limning, 


And catch soft floatings from a faint- 
heard hymning ; 

To see the laurel wreath, on high sus- 
pended, 

That is to crown our name when life is 
ended. 

Sometimes it gives a glory to the voice, 

And from the heart up-springs, rejoice ! 
rejoice ! 

Sounds which will reach the Framer of 
all things, 

And die away in ardent mutterings. 


KEATS 


No one who once the glorious sun has 
seen 

And all the clouds, and felt his bosom 
clean 

For his great Maker’s presence, but must 
know 

What ’tis I mean, and feel his being 
glow: 

Therefore no insult will I give his spirit, 

By telling what he sees from native 
merit. 


O Poesy! for thee I hold my pen 

That am not yet a glorious denizen 

Of thy wide heaven—Should I rather 
kneel 

Upon some mountain-top until I feel 

A glowing splendor round about me 
hung, 

And echo back the voice of thine own 
tongue ? 

O Poesy ! for thee I grasp my pen 

That am not yet a glorious denizen 

Of thy wide heaven; yet, to my ardent 
prayer, 

Yield from thy sanctuary some clear air, 

Smoothed for intoxication by the breath 

Of flowering bays, that I may die a 
death 

Of luxury, and my young spirit follow 

The morning sun-beams to the great 
Apollo 

Like a fresh sacrifice ; or if I can bear 

The o’erwhelming sweets, twill bring 
me to the fair 

Visions of all places: a bowery nook 

Will be elysium—an eternal book 

Whence I may copy many a lovely saying 

About the leaves, and flowers—about 
the playing 

Of nymphs in woods, and fountains ; and 
the shade 


Keeping a silence round a sleeping 


maid 

And many a verse from so strange in- 
fluence 

That we must ever wonder how, and 
whence 

It came. Also imaginings will hover 


Round my fireside, and haply there dis- 
cover 
of solemn beauty, 

wander 

In happy silence, like the clear meander 

Through its lone vales; and where I 
found a spot 

Of awfuller shade, or an enchanted grot, 

Or a green hill o’erspread with chequered 
dress 


Vistas where I’d 


3S 


Of flowers, and fearful from its love- 
liness, 

Write on my tablets all that was per- 
mitted, 

All that was for our human senses fitted. 

Then the events of this wide world I’d 
seize 

Like a strong giant, and my spirit teaze 

Till at its shoulders it should proudly see 

Wings to find out an immortality. 


Stop and consider! lifeis but a day : 

A fragile dew-drop on its perilous way 

From a tree’s summit; a poor Indian’s 
sleep 

While his boat hastens to the monstrous 
steep 

Of Montmorenci. Why so sad a moan ? 

Life is the rose’s hope while yet unblown; 

The reading of an ever-changing tale ; 

The light uplifting of a maiden’s veil ; 

A pigeon tumbling in clear summer air ; 

A laughing school-boy, without grief or 
care 

Riding the springy branches of an elm. 


O for ten years, that I may overwhelm 

Myself in poesy ; so I may do the deed 

That my own soul has to itself decreed. 

Then I will pass the countries that I see 

In long perspective, and continually 

Taste their pure fountains. First the 
realm I'll pass : 

Of Flora, and old Pan; sleep in the grass, 

Feed upon apples red, and strawberries, 

And choose each pleasure that my fancy 
Sees ; 

Catch the white-handed nymphs in 
shady places, 

To woo sweet kisses from averted 
faces,— 

Play with their fingers, touch their 
shoulders white 

Into a pretty shrinking with a bite 

As hard as lips can make it : tillagreed, 

A lovely tale of human life we’ll read. 

And one will teach a tame dove how it 
best 

May fan the cool air gently o’er my rest ; 

Another, bending o’er her nimble tread, 

Will set a green robe floating round her 
head, 

And still will dance with ever varied 


ease, 
Smiling upon the flowers and the trees : 
Another will entice me on, and on 
Through almond blossoms and rich cin- 
namon ; 
Till in the bosom of a leafy world 


376 


We rest in silence, like two gems up- 


curl’d 
In the recesses of a pearly shell. 


And can I ever bid these joys farewell ? 

Yes, I must pass them for a nobler life, 

Where I may find the agonies, the strife 

Of human hearts: for lo! I see afar, 

O’er-sailing the blue cragginess, a car 

And steeds with streamy manes—the 
charioteer 

Looks put upon the winds with glorious 
ear : 

And now the numerous tramplings 
quiver lightly 

Along a huge cloud’s ridge; and now 
with sprightly 

Wheel downward come they into fresher 
skies, 

Tipt round with silver from the sun’s 
bright eyes. 

Still downward with capacious whirl 
they glide ; 

And now I see them on a green-hill’s 
side 

In breezy rest among the nodding stalks. 

The charioteer with wond’rous gesture 
talks 

To the trees and mountains; and there 
soon appear 

Shapes of delight, of mystery, and fear, 

Passing along before a dusky space 

Made, by some mighty oaks: as they 
would chase 

Some ever-fleeting music on they sweep. 

Lo! how they murmur, laugh, and 
smile, and weep: 

Some with upholden hand and mouth 
severe ; 

Some with their faces muffled to the ear 

Between their arms; some, clear in 
youthful bloom, 

Go glad and smilingly athwart the 
gloom ; 

Some looking back, and some with up- 
ward gaze ; 

Yes, thousands in a thousand different 


ways 

Flit onward—now a lovely wreath of 
girls 

Dancing their sleek hair into tangled 
curls ; 

And now broad wings. . Most awfully 
intent 

The driver of those steeds is forward 
bent, 

And seems to listen: O that I might 
know [glow. 


All that he writes with such a hurrying 


BRITISH POETS 





The visions all are fled—the car is fled 

Into the light of heaven, and in their 
stead 

A sense of real things comes doubly 
strong, , 

And, like a muddy stream, would bear 
along 

My soul to nothingness : but I willstrive 

Against all doubtings, and will keep 
alive 

The thought of that same chariot, and 
the strange 

Journey it went. 


Is there so small a range © 
In the present strength of manhood, that 
the high 
Imagination cannot freely fly 
As she was wont of old? prepare her 


steeds, 

Paw up against the light,and do strange 
deeds 

Upon the clouds? Has she not shewn us 
all? 

From the clear space of ether, to the 
small 


Breath of new buds unfolding ? From 
the meaning 

Of Jove’s large eye-brow, to the tender 
greening 

Of April meadows ? 
shone, 

E’en in this isle ; and who could paragon 

The fervid choir that lifted up a noise 

Of harmony, to where it aye will poise 

Its mighty self of convoluting sound, 

Huge as a planet, and like that roll 
round, 

Eternally around a dizzy void? 

Ay, in those days the Muses were nigh 
cloy’d 

With honors; nor had any other care 

Than to sing out and soothe their wavy 
hair. 


Here her altar 


Could all this be forgotten? Yes, a 
schism 

Nurtured by foppery and barbarism, 

Made great Apollo blush for this his 
land. 

Men were thought wise who could not 
understand 

His glories: with a puling infant’s force 

They sway’d about upon a rocking horse, 

And thought it Pegasus. Ah dismal 


soul’d ! 
The winds of heaven blew, the ocean 
roll’d [blue 


Its gathering waves—ye felt it not. The 


KEATS 


swile 





Bared its eternal bosom, and the dew 

Of summer nights collected still to make 

The morning precious: beauty was 
awake ! 

Why were ye not awake? But ye were 
dead 

To things ye knew not of,—were closely 
wed 

_ To musty laws lined out with wretched 
rule . 

And compass vile: so that ye taught a 
school 

Of dolts to smooth, inlay, and clip, and 


fit, 
Till, like the certain wands of Jacob’s 
wit, 
Their verses tallied. Easy was the task : 
A thousand handicraftsmen wore the 


mask 

Of Poesy. Ill-fated, impious race ! 

That blasphemed the bright Lyrist to his 
face, 

And did not know it,—no, they went 
about, 


Holding a poor, decrepit standard out 

Mark’d with most flimsy mottos, and in 
large 

The name of one Boileau ! 


O ye whose charge 

It is to hover round our pleasant hills ! 

Whose congregated majesty so fills 

My boundly reverence, that I cannot 
trace 

Your hallowed names, in this unholy 
place, 

So near those common folk; 
their shames 

Affright you? Did our old lamenting 
Thames 

Delight you? 
round 

Delicious Avon, with a mournful sound, 

And weep? Or did ye wholly bid adieu 

To regions where no more the laurel 
grew ? 

Or did ye stay to give a welcoming 

To some lone spirits who could proudly 


did not 


Did ye never cluster 


sing 

Their youth away,anddie? “Twas even 
SO: 

But let me think away those times of 
woe : 

Now ‘tis a fairer season; ye have 
breathed 

Rich benedictions o’er us; ye have 
wreathed 

Fresh garlands: for sweet music has 
been heard 





In many places ;—some has been up- 
stirr’d | 

From out its crystal dwelling in a lake, 

By a swan’s ebon bill; from a thick 
brake, 

Nested and quiet in a valley mild, 

Bubbles a pipe; fine sounds are floating 
wild } 

About the earth: happy are yeand glad. 


These things are doubtless: yet in truth 
we've had | 
Strange thunders from the potency of 


song ; 

Mingled indeed with what is sweet and 
strong, 

From majesty : but in clear truth the 
themes 

Are ugly clubs, the Poets Polyphemes 

Disturbing the grand sea. A drainless 
shower 

Of light is poesy ; ’tis the supreme of 
power ; 

‘Tis might half slumb’ring on its own 
right arm. 

The very archings of her eye-lids charm 

A thousand willing agents to obey, 

And still she governs with the mildest 
sway : 

But strength alone though of the Muses 
born 

Is like a fallen angel: trees uptorn, 

Darkness, and worms, and shrouds, and 
sepulchres 

Delight it; for it feeds upon the burrs 

And thorns of life; forgetting the great 
end 

Of poesy, that it should be a friend 

To soothe the cares, and lift the thoughts 
of man. 


Yet I rejoice: a myrtle fairer than 

E’er grew in Paphos, from the bitter 
weeds 

Lifts its sweet head into the air, and feeds 

A silent space with ever sprouting green. 

All tenderest birds there find a pleasant 
screen, 

Creep through the shade with jaunty 
fluttering, 

Nibble the little cupped flowers and sing. 

Then let us clear away the choking 
thorns 

From round its gentle stem; let the 
young fawns, 

Yeanéd in after times, when we are 
flown, 

Find a fresh sward beneath it, overgrown 

With simple flowers: let there nothing be 


BRITISH® POETS 








378 

More boisterous than a lover’s bended 
knee ; 

Nought more ungentle than the placid 
look 


Of one who leans upon a closed book ; 
Nought more untranquil than the grassy 
slopes 
Between two hills. 
hopes! 

As she was wont, th’ imagination 

Into most lovely labyrinths will be gone, 

And they shall be accounted poet kings 

Who simply tell the most heart-easing 
things. 

O may these joys be ripe before I die. 


All hail delightful 


Will not some say that I presumptuously 

Have spoken? that from hastening dis- 
grace 

*Twere better far to hide my foolish 
face? 

That whining boyhood should with re- 
verence bow 

Ere the dread thunderbolt could reach ? 
How ! : 

If I do hide myself, it sure shall be 

In the very fane, the light of Poesy : 

If I do fall, at least I will be laid 

Beneath the silence of a poplar shade ; 

And over me the grass shall be smooth 
shaven ; 

And there shall be a kind 
graven. 

But off Despondence! miserable bane ! 

They should not know thee, who athirst 
to gain 

A noble end, are thirsty every hour. 

What though I am not wealthy in the 


memorial 


dower 

Of spanning wisdom; though I do not 
know 

The shiftings of the mighty winds that 
blow 

Hither and thither all the changing 
thoughts 


Of man: though no great minist’ring 
reason sorts 

Out the dark mysteries of human souls 

To clear conceiving: yet there ever rolls 

A vast idea before me, and I glean 

Therefrom my lberty ; thence too I’ve 
seen 

The end and aim of Poesy. ’Tis clear 

As anything most true ; as that the year 

Is made of the four se: asons—manifest 

As a large cross, some old cathedral’s 
crest, 

Lifted to the white clouds. 
should I 


Therefore 


Be but the essence of deformity, 

A coward, did my very eye-lids wink 

At speaking out what I have dared to 
think. 

Ah! rather let me like a madman run 

Over some precipice ; let the hot sun 

Melt my Dedalian wings, and drive me 
down 

Convuls’d and headlong ! 
ward frown 

Of conscience bids me be more calm 
awhile. 

An ocean dim, sprinkled with many an 
isle, 

Spreads awfully before me. 
toil ! 

How many days! what desperate tur- 
moll ! 

Ere I can have explored its widenesses. 

Ah, whata task! upon my bended knees, 

IT could unsay those—no, impossible ! 


Stay ! an in- 


How much 


| Impossible ! 


For sweet relief [’ll dwell 
On humbler thoughts, and let this 
strange assay 
Begun in gentleness die so away. 
EK’en now all tumult from my bosom 
fades : 
I turn full hearted to the friendly aids 
That smooth the path of honor ; brother- 


hood, 

And friendliness the nurse of mutual 
good. 

The hearty grasp that sends a pleasant 
sonnet 


Into the brain ere one can think upon it ; 
The silence when some rhymes are 
coming out; 

when they’re come, the very 
pleasant rout : 


And 


The message certain to be done to- 
morrow. 

‘Tis perhaps as well that it should be to 
borrow 

Some precious book from out its snug 
retreat, 

To cluster round it when we next shall 
meet. 


Scarce can I scribble on; for lovely airs 

Are fluttering round the room like doves 
in pairs ; 

Many delights of that glad day recalling, 

When first my senses caught their tender 
falling. 

And with these airs come forms of 
elegance 

Stooping their shoulders o’er a horse’s 
prance, 


KEATS 


ooo 


Careless, and grand—fingers soft and 
round 

Parting luxuriant curls ;—and the swift 
bound 

Of Bacchus from his chariot, when his 


eye 
Made Ariadne’s cheek look blushingly. 
Thus I remember all the pleasant flow 
Of words at opening a portfolio. 


Things such as these are ever harbingers 

To trains of peaceful images: the stirs 

Of a swan’s neck unseen among the 
rushes : 

A linnet starting all about the bushes: 

A butterfly, with golden wings broad 
parted 

Nestling a rose, convuls’d as though it 
smarted 

With over pleasure—many, many more, 

Might I indulge at large in all my store 

Of luxuries: yet I must not forget 

Sleep, quiet, with his poppy coronet : 

For what there may be worthy in these 
rhymes 

I partly owe to him: and thus, the 
chimes 

Of friendly voices had just given place 

To assweeta silence, when I’gan retrace 

The pleasant day, upon a couch at ease. 

It was a poet’s house! who keeps the keys 

Of pleasure’s temple. Round about were 
hung 

The glorious features of the bards who 
sung 

In other ages—cold and sacred busts 

Smiled at each other. Happy he who 
trusts 

To clear Futurity his darling fame! 

Then there were fauns and satyrs taking 
aim 

At swelling apples with a frisky leap 

And reaching fingers, ’mid a luscious 
heap 

Of vine leaves. 
a fane 

Of liny marble, and thereto a train 

Of nymphs approaching fairly o’er the 
sward : 

One, loveliest, holding her white hand 
toward 

The dazzling sun-rise : two sisters sweet 

Bending their graceful figures till they 
meet 

Over the trippings of a little child : 

And some are hearing, eagerly, the wild 


Then there rose to view 


1 Leigh Hunt’s. The following lines are a de- 
seription of the room in which the poem was 
written, with its decorations. 


Thrilling liquidity of dewy piping. 

See, in another picture, nymphs are 
wiping 

Cherishingly Diana’s timorous limbs ;— 

A fold of lawny mantle dabbling swims 

At the bath’s edge, and keeps a gentle 
motion 

With the subsiding crystal: as when 
ocean 

Heaves calmly its broad swelling smooth- 
ness o’er 

Its rocky marge, and balances once 
more 

The patient weeds; that now unshent 
by foam 

Feel all about their undulating home. 


Sappho’s meek head was there half 
smiling down 

At nothing ; just as though the earnest 
frown 

Of over thinking had that moment gone 

From off her brow, and left her allalone. 


Great Alfred’s too, with anxious, pity- 
ing eyes, 

As if he always listened to the sighs 

Of the goaded world ; and Kosciusko’s 
worn 

By horrid suffrance—mightily forlorn. 


Petrarch, outstepping from the shady 
green, 

Starts at the sight of Laura; nor can 
wean 

His eyes from her sweet face. 
happy they ! 

For over them was seen a free display 

Of out-spread wings, and from between 
them shone 

The face of Poesy: from off her throne 

She overlook’d things that I scarce could 
tell. 

The very sense of where Iwas might 
well 

Keep Sleep aloof: but more than that 
there came 

Thought after thought to nourish up 
the flame 

Within my breast ; so thatthe morning 
light 

Surprised me even from asleepless night; 

And upI rose refresh’d, and glad, and 
gay, 

Resolving to begin that very day 

These lines; and howsoever they be 
done, 

I leave them as a father does his son. 

? 1816. 1817. 


Most 


380 


AFTER DARK VAPORS HAVE 
OPPRESSED OUR PLAINS © 


AFTER dark vapors have oppressed our 
plains 

For a long dreary season, comes a day 

Born of the gentle South, and clears 
away 

From the sick heavens all unseemly 
stains. | pains, 

The anxious month, relievéd from its 

Takes as a long-lost right the feel of 
May. 

The eyelids with the passing coolness 
play, 

Like rose leaves with the drip of sum- 
mer rains. 

And calmest thoughts come round us— 
as, of leaves 

Budding,—fruit ripening in stillness,— 
autumn suns 

Smiling ateve upon the quiet sheaves,— 

Sweet Sappho’s cheek,—a . sleeping in- 
fant’s breath,— 

The gradual sand that through an hour- 
glass runs,— 

A woodland rivulet, a Poet’s death. 

January, 1817. February 28, 1817. 


TO LEIGH HUNT, ESQ. 
[Dedication of the volume of 1817 ] 


GLORY and loveliness have passed away ; 

For if we wander out in ‘early morn, 

No wreathed incense do we see up- 
borne 

Into the east, to meet the smiling day : 

No crowd of nymphs soft voie’d and 
young, and gay, 

In woven baskets bringing ears of 
corn, 

Roses, and pinks, and violets, to adorn 

The shrine of Flora in her early May. 

But there are left delights as high as 
these, 

And TI shall ever bless my destiny, 

That ina time, when under pleasant 
trees 

Pan is no longer sought, I feel a free 

A leafy luxury, seeing I could please 

With these poor offerings, a man like 
thee. IST Tem LOL 


ON SEEING THE ELGIN MARBLES 


My spirit is too weak—mortality 
Weighs heavily on me like unwilling 
sleep, 


BRITISH POETS 


And each imagin’d pinnacle and steep 
Of godlike hardship tells me I must die 
Like a sick Eagle looking at the sky. 
Yet ‘tis a gentle luxury to weep 
That I have not the cloudy winds to 
keep, 
Fresh for the opening of the morning’s 
eye. 
Such dim-conceivéd glories of the brain 
Bring round the heart an undescri- 
bable feud ; 
So do these wonders a most dizzy pain, 
That mingles Grecian grandeur with 
the rude 
Wasting of old Time—with a billowy 
main— 
A sun—a shadow of a magnitude. 
1817... March 9, 1817. 


ON A PICTURE OF LEANDER 


CoE hither all sweet maidens soberly, 

Down-looking aye, and with a chastened 
light 

Hid in the fringes of your eyelids white, 

And meekly let your fair hands joinéd 


be, 

As if so gentle that ye could not see, 

Untouched, a victim of your beauty 
bright, 

Sinking away to his voung spirit’s night, 

Sinking bewildered ’mid the dreary sea : 

‘Tis young Leander toiling to his death ; 

Nigh swooning, he doth purse his weary 
lips 

For Hiscae cheek, and smiles against 
her smile. 

O horrid dream! see how his body dips 

Dead-heavy ; armsand shoulders gleam 
awhile : 

He’s gone; up bubbles all his amorous 
breath ! P - ,-acysgl dean 


ON THE SEA 


Ir keeps eternal whisperings around 

Desolate shores, and with its mighty 
swell 

Gluts twice ten thousand caverns, till 
the spell 

Of Hecate leaves them their old shad- 
owy sound. 

Often ’tis in such gentle temper found, 

That scarcely will the very smallest 
shell 

Be moved for days from whence it some- 
time fell, 

When last the winds of heaven were un- 
bound. 


KEATS. 


Oh ye! who have your eye-balls vexed 
and tired, 
Feast them upon the wideness of the 


ea ; 
Oh ye! whose ears are dinned with 
uproar rude, 

Or fed too much with cloying melody ,— 
Sit ye near some old cavern’s mouth, and 
brood 

Until ye start, as if the sea-nymphs 
quired ! August, 1817. 1848. 


WHEN I HAVE FEARS THAT I 
MAY CEASE TO BE 


WHEN [have fears that I may cease to be 

Before my pen has glean’d my teeming 
brain, 

Before high piléd books, in charact’ry, 

Hold like rich garners the full-ripen’d 
grain ; 

When I behold, upon the night’s starr’d 
face, 

Huge cloudy symbols of a high romance, 

And think that I may never live to trace 

Their shadows, with the magic hand of 
chance ; 

And when I feel, fair creature of an 
hour! 

That I shall never look upon thee more, 

Never have relish in the faery power 

Of unreflecting love !—then on the 


shore 

Of the wide world I stand alone, and 
think 

Till Love and Fame to nothingness do 
sink. 1817, 1848. 


FROM ENDYMION 
BOOK I 
PROEM 


A THING of beauty is a joy for ever : 

Its loveliness increases ; it will never 

Pass into nothingness ; but still will 
keep 

A bower quiet for us, and a sleep 

Full of sweet dreams, and health, and 
quiet breathing. 

Therefore, on every morrow, 
wreathing 

A flowery band to bind us to the earth. 

Spite of despondence, of the inhuman 
dearth 

Of noble natures, of the gloomy days, 

Of all the unhealthy and o’er-darkened 
ways 


are we 


381 

Made for our searching: yes, in spite of 
all, 

Some shape of beauty moves away the 
pall 


From our dark spirits. 
the moon, 

Trees old and young, sprouting a shady 
boon 

For simple sheep ; and such are daffodils 

With the green world they live in; and 
clear rills 

That for themselves a cooling covert 
make 

’Gainst the hot season; the mid-forest 
brake, 

Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose 
blooms: 

And such too is the grandeur of the 
dooms 

We have imagined for the mighty dead ; 

All lovely tales that we have heard or 
read : 

An endless fountain of immortal drink, 

Pouring unto us from the heaven’s brink. 


Such the sun, 


Nor do we merely feel these essences 
For one short hour; no, even as the trees 
That whisper round a temple become 
soon 

Dear as the temple’s self, so does the 
moon, 

The passion poesy, glories infinite, 

Haunt us till they become a cheering 
light 

Unto our souls, and bound to us so fast, 

That, whether there be shine, or gloom 
o’ercast, 

They alway must be with us, or we die. 


Therefore, ’tis with 

that I 

Will trace the story of Endymion. 

The very music of the name has gone 

Into my being, and each pleasant scene 

Is growing fresh before me as the green 

Of our own valleys: so I will begin 

Now while I cannot hear the city’s din ; 

Now while the early budders are just 
new, 

And run in mazes of the youngest hue 

About old forests; while the willow trails 

Its delicate amber; and the dairy pails 

Bring home increase of milk. And, as 
the year 

Grows lush in juicy stalks, Pl smoothly 
steer 

My little boat, for many quiet hours, 

With streams that deepen freshly into 
bowers. 


full happiness 


382 


Many and many a verse I hope to write, 

Before the daisies, vermeil rimm’d and 
white, 

Hide in deep herbage ; and ere yet the 
bees 

Hum about globes of clover and sweet 
peas, 

I must be near the middle of my story. 

O may nowintry season, bareand hoary, 

See it half finished: but let Autumn 
bold, 

With universal tinge of sober gold, 

Be all about me when I make an end. 

And now at once, adventuresome, I send 

My herald thought into a wilderness : 

There let its trumpet blow, and quickly 
dress 

My uncertain path with green, that I 
may speed 

Kasily onward, thorough flowers and 
weed. 


HYMN TO PAN 


O THOU, whose mighty palace roof 

doth hang 

From jagged trunks, and overshadoweth 

Eternal whispers, glooms, the birth, life, 
death 

Of unseen flowers in heavy peacefulness ; 

Who lov’st to see the hamadryads dress 

Their ruffled locks where meeting hazels 
darken ; 

And through whole solemn hours dost 
sit, and hearken 

The dreary melody of bedded reeds— 

In desolate places, where dank moisture 
breeds 

The pipy hemlock to strange over- 
growth ; 

Bethinking thee, how melancholy loth 

Thou wast to lose fair Syrinx—do thou 
now, 

By thy love’s milky brow ! 

By all the trembling mazes that she ran, 

Hear us, great Pan! 


O thou, for whose soul-soothing quiet, 
turtles 
Passion their voices cooingly ’mong 
myrtles, 
What time thou wanderest at eventide 
Through sunny meadows, that outskirt 


the side 

Of thine enmossed realms: O thou, to 
whom 

Broad leaved fig trees even now fore- 
doom 

Their ripen’d fruitage; yellow girted 
bees 


BRITISH, POETS 





Their golden honeycombs; our village 
leas 

Their fairest-blossom’d beans and pop- 
pied corn ; 

The chuckling linnet its five young un- 
born, 

To sing for thee; low creeping straw- 
berries : 

Their summer coolness ; pent up butter- 
flies 

Their freckled wings; 
budding year 

All its completions—be quickly near, 

By every wind that nods the mountain 
pine, 

O forester divine ! 


yea, the fresh 


Thou, to whom every fawn and satyr 
flies 
For willing service ; whether to surprise 
The apne hare while in half sleeping 
t ; 
Or upward ragged precipices flit 
To save poor lambkins from the eagle’s 
maw ; 
Or by mysterious enticement draw 
Bewildered shepherds to their path 
again ; 
Or to tread breathless round the frothy 
main, 
And gather up all fancifullest shells 
For thee to tumble into Naiads’ cells, 
And, being hidden, laugh at their out- 
peeping ; 
Or to delight thee with fantastic leap- 


Ing, 

The while they pelt each other on the 
crown 

With silvery oak apples, and fir cones 
brown— 

By all the echoes that about thee ring, 

Hear us, O satyr king ! 


O Hearkener to the loud clapping 

shears, 

While ever and anon to his shorn peers 

A ram goes bleating: Winder of the 
horn, 

When snouted wild-boars routing tender 
corn 

Anger our huntsman: Breather round 
our farms, 

To keep off mildews, and all weather 
harms : 

Strange ministrant 
sounds, 

That come a swooning over hollow 
grounds, 

And wither drearily on barren moors : 


of undescribed 


KEATS 


Dread opener of the mysterious doors 
Leading to universal knowledge—see, 
Great son of Dryope, 


The many that are come to pay their | 


vows 
With leaves about their brows ! 


Be still the unimaginable lodge 

For solitary thinkings ; such as dodge 

Conception to the very bourne of 

heaven, 

Then leave the naked brain : 
the leaven, 

That spreading in this dull and clodded 
earth 

Gives it a touch ethereal—a new birth: 

Be still a symbol of immensity ; 

A firmament reflected in a sea ; 

An element filling the space between ; 

An unknown—but no more: we humbly 
screen 

With uplift hands our foreheads, lowly 
bending, 

And giving out a shout most heaven- 
rending, 

Conjure thee to receive our humble 
Peean, 

Upon thy Mount Lycean ! 


be still 


THE COMING OF DIAN 
[Endymion speaks, to his Sister Peona. | 


‘¢ This river does not see the naked sky, 
Till it begins to progress silverly - 
Around the western border of the wood, 
Whence, from acertain spot, its winding 
flood 

Seems at the distance like a crescent 
moon ; 

And in that nook, the very pride of June, 

Had I been used to pass my weary eves ; 

There rather for the sun unwilling leaves 

So dear a picture of hissovereign power, 

And I could witness his most kingly hour, 

When he doth lghten up the golden 
reins, 

And paces leisurely down amber plains 

His snorting four. Now when his chariot 
last 

Its beams against the zodiac-lion cast, 

There blossom’d suddenly a magic bed 

Of sacred ditamy, and poppies red: 

At which I wondered greatly, knowing 
well 

That but one night had wrought this 
flowery spell ; 

And, sitting down close by, began to 
muse 


383 


What it might mean. 
I, Morpheus, 

In passing here, his owlet pinions shook ; 

Or, it may be, ere matron Night uptook 

Her ebon urn, young Mercury, by stealth, 

Had dipt his rod in it: such garland 
wealth 

Came not by common growth. 
I thought, 

Until my head was dizzy and distraught. 

Moreover, through the dancing poppies 
stole 

A breeze, most softly lulling to my soul ; 

And shaping visions all about my sight 

Of colors, wings, and bursts of spangly 
light ; 

The which became more strange, and 
strange, and dim, 

And then were gulf’d in a tumultuous 
swim : 

And then I fell asleep. Ah, can I tell 

The enchantment that afterwards befell ? 

Yet it was buta dream: yetsucha dream 

That never tongue, although it overteem 

With mellow utterance, like a cavern 
spring, 

Could figure out and toconception bring 

All I beheld and felt. Methought I lay 

Watching the zenith, where the milky 
way 

Among the stars in virgin splendor 
pours ; 

And travelling my eye, until the doors 

Of heaven appeared to open for my flight, 

I became loth and fearful to alight 

From such high soaring by a downward 
glance: 

So kept me stedfast in that airy trance, 

Spreading imaginary pinions wide. 

When, presently, the stars began to glide, 

And faint away, before my eager view : 

At which I sigh’d that I could not pursue, 

And dropped my vision to the horizon’s 
verge $} [emerge 

And lo! from opening clouds, I saw 

The loveliest moon, that ever silver’d o’er 

A shell for Neptune’s goblet: she did 
soar 

So passionately bright, my dazzled soul 

Commingling with her argent spheres 
did roll 

Through clear and cloudy, even when 
she went 

At last into a dark and vapory tent— 

Whereat, methought, the lidless-eyed 
train 

Of planets all were in the blue again. 

To commune with those orbs, once more 
I rais’d 


Perhaps, thought 


Thus on 


384 


My sight right upward : 
dazed 

By a bright something, sailing down 
apace, 


but it was quite 


Making me quickly veil my eyes and | 


face : 

Again I look’d, and, O ye deities, 

Who from Olympus watch our destinies ! 

Whence that completed form of all com- 
pleteness ? 

Whence came that high perfection of all 
sweetness ? 

Speak, stubborn earth, 
where, O where 

Hast thou a symbol of her golden hair ? 

Not oat- sheaves drooping in the western 
sun [shun 

Not—thy Soft hand, fair sister! let me 

Such follying before thee—yet she had, 

Indeed, locks bright enough to make me 
mad ; 

And they were simply gordian’d up and 
braided, 

Leaving, in naked comeliness, unshaded, 

Her pearl round ears, white neck, and 
orbed brow ; 

The which were blended in, I know not 
how, 

With such a paradise of lips and eyes, 

Blush-tinted cheeks, half smiles, and 
faintest sighs, 


and tell me 


That, when I think thereon, my spirit 


clings 

And plays about its fancy, till the stings 

Of human neighborhood envenom all. 

Unto what awful power shall I call? 

To what high fane ?—Ah! see her hover- 
ing feet, 

More bluely vein’d, 
whitely sweet 

Than those of sea-born Venus, when she 
rose 

From out her cradle shell. 
out-blows 

Her scarf into a fluttering pavilion ; 

Tis blue, and over-spangled with a mil- 
lion 

Of little eyes, as though thou wert to 
shed, 

Over the darkest, lushest blue-bell bed, 
Handfuls of daisies.” —‘‘ Endymion, how 
strange ! 
Dream within dream 

airy range, 
And then, towards me, like a very maid, 
Came blushing, waning, willing, and 
afraid, 
And press’d me by the hand : 
too much ; 


more soft, more 


The wind 


'» 


—‘* She took an 


Ah! ’twas 


BRITISH POETS 


. 


Methought I fainted at the charmed 
touch, 

Yet held my recoHlautigen even as one 

Who dives three fathoms where the 
waters run 

Gurgling in beds of coral: for anon, 

I felt upmounted in that region 

Where falling stars dart their artillery 
forth, 

And eagles struggle with the buffeting 
north 

That balances the heavy meteor-stone ;— 

Felt too, I was not fearful, nor alone, 

But lapp’d and lull’d along the danger- 
ous sky. 

Soon, as it seem’d, we left our journey- 
ing high, 

And straightw ay into frightful eddies 
swoop’d ; 

Such as aye muster where gray time has 
scoop’d 

Huge coe and caverns in a mountain’s 
side: 

Their hollow Sonne arous’d me, and I 
sigh’d 

To faint once more by looking on my 
bliss— 


T was distracted; madly did I kiss 


The wooing arms which held me, and 
did give 

My eyes at once to death: but ’twas to 
live, 

To take in draughts of life from the gold 
fount 

Of kind and passionate looks ; to count, 
and count 

The moments, by some greedy help that 
seem’d [deem’d 

A second self, that each might be re- 

And plunder’d of its load of blessedness. 

Ah, desperate mortal! I ev’n dar’d to 
press 

Her very cheek against my crowned lip, 

And, at that moment, felt my body dip 

Into. a warmer air: a moment more, 


Our feet were soft in flowers. There 
was store 
Of newest joys upon that alp. Some- 


times 
A scent of violets, and blossoming limes, 
Loiter’d around us; then of honey cells, 
Made delicate from all white-flower 
bells ; 
And once, above the edges of our nest, 
An arch face peep’d,—an Oread as I 
guess’d. 


‘“Why did I dream that sleep o’er- 
power’d me 


KEATS 


385 





In midst of ali this heaven? 
see, 

Far off, the shadows of his pinions dark, 

And stare them from me? But no, like 
a spark 

That needs must die, although its little 

_ beam 

Reflects upon a diamond, my sweet dream 

Fell into nothing—into stupid sleep. 

And so it was, until a gentle creep, 

A careful moving caught my waking 
ears 


Why not 


And up I started: Ah! my sighs, my 
tears, 

My clenched hands ;—for lo ! the poppies 
hun [sung 


Dew-dabbled on their stalks, the ouzel 

A heavy ditty, and the sullen day 

Had chidden herald Hesperus away, 

With leaden looks: the solitary breeze 

Bluster’d, and slept, and its wild self did 
teaze 

With wayward 
thought, 

Mark me, Peona! 
brought, P 

Faint fare-thee-wells, and sigh-shrilled 
adieus !— 

Away I wander’d—all the pleasant hues 

Of heaven and earth had faded : deepest 
shades 

Were deepest dungeons ; 
sunny glades 

Were fullof pestilent light ; our taintless 
rills 

Seem’d sooty, and o’er-spread with up- 
turn’d gills 

Of dying fish ; the vermeil rose had blown 

In frightful scarlet, and its thorns out- 
grown 

Like spiked aloe. If an innocent bird 

Before my heedless footsteps stirr’d, and 
stirr’d 

In little journeys, I beheld in it 

A disguis’d demon, missioned to knit 

My soul with under darkness ; to entice 

My stumblings down some monstrous 
precipice : 

Therefore I eager followed, and did curse 

The disappointment. Time, that aged 
nurse, 

Rock’d me to patience. 
gentle heaven! 

These things, with all their comfortings, 
are given 

To my down-sunken hours, and with 
thee, 

Sweet sister, help to stem the ebbing sea 

Of weary life.” 


25 


melancholy ; and I 


that sometimes it 


heaths and 


Now, thank 


FROM BOOK II 
INVOCATION TO THE POWER OF LOVE 


O SOVEREIGN power of love! O grief! 

O balm ! 

All records, saving thine, come cool, and 

calm, 

shadowy, through the niist of 

passed years : 

For others, good or bad, hatred and tears 

Have become indolent; but touching 
thine, 

One sigh doth echo, one poor sob doth 
pine, 

One kiss brings honey-dew from buried 
days. 

The woes of Troy, towers smothering 
o’er their blaze, 

Stiff-holden shields, far-piercing spears, 
keen blades, 

Struggling, and blood, and shrieks—all 
dimly fades 

Into some backward corner of the brain ; 

Yet, in our very souls, we feel amain 

The close of Troilus and Cressid sweet. 

Hence, pageant history! hence, gilded 
cheat ! 

Swart planet in the universe of deeds! 

Wide sea, that one continuous murmur 
breeds 

Along the pebbled shore of memory ! 

Many old rotten-timber’d boats there be 

Upon thy vaporous bosom, magnified 

To goodly vessels ; many a sail of pride, 

And golden keel’d, is left unlaunch’d 
and dry. 

But wherefore this ? What care, though 
owl did fly 

About. the great Athenian admiral’s 
mast ? 

What care, though striding Alexander 


And 


past 
The Indus with his Macedonian numbers ? 
Though old Ulysses tortured from his 


slumbers 

The glutted Cyclops, what care ?—Juliet 
leaning 

Amid her window-flowers,—sighing,— 
weaning 

Tenderly her fancy from its maiden 
snow, [flow 


Doth more avail than these: the silver 

Of Hero’s tears, the swoon of Imogen, 

Fair Pastorella in the bandit’s den, 

Are things to brood on with more ardency 

Than the death-day of empires. Fearfully 

Must such conviction come upon his 
head, 


386 


Who, thus far, discontent, has dared to 
tread, 

Without one muse’s smile, or kind be- 
hest, 

The path of love and poesy. But rest, 

In chafing restlessness, is yet more 
drear 

Than to be crush’d, in striving to uprear 

Love’s standard on the battlements of 
song. 

So once more days and nights aid me 
along, 

Like legion’d soldiers. 


FROM BOOK IV 


ROUNDELAY 


‘“*O Sorrow, 
Why dost borrow 
The natural hue of health, from vermeil 
lips ? 
To give maiden blushes 
To the white rose bushes ? 
Or is it thy dewy hand the daisy tips ? 


‘“*O Sorrow, 
Why dost borrow 
The lustrous passion from a falcon-eye ?— 
To give the glow-worm lght ? 
Or, on a moonless night, 
To tinge, on siren shores, the salt sea- 
spray ? 


“O Sorrow, 
Why dost borrow 
The mellow ditties from a mourning 
tongue ?— 
To give at evening pale 
Unto the nightingale, 
That thou mayst listen the cold dews 
among ? 


““O Sorrow, 
Why dost borrow 
Heart’s, ightness from the merriment of 
May? 
A lover would not tread 
A cowslip on the head, 
Though he should dance from eve till 
peep of day— 
Nor any drooping flower 
Held sacred for thy bower, 
Wherever he may sport himself and play. 





‘*To Sorrow, 
I bade good-morrow, 
And thoughtto leave her far away be- 
hind ; 


BRITISH POETS 


- But cheerly, cheerly, 
She loves me dearly ; 
She is so constant to me, and so kind: 
I would deceive her 
And so leave her, 
But ah ! she is so constant and so kind. 


‘* Beneath my palm trees, by the river 
side, 
I sat a-weeping : in the whole world wide 
There was no one to ask me why I wept,— 
And so I kept 
Brimming the water-lily cups with tears 
Cold as my fears. 


‘Beneath my palm trees, by the river 
side, 
I sat a-weeping : what enamor’d bride, 
Cheated by shadowy wooer from the 
clouds, 
But hides and shrouds 
Beneath dark palm trees by a river side ? 


‘¢ And as I sat, over the light blue hills 
There came a noise of revellers : the rills 
Into the wide stream came of purple 
hue— 
Twas Bacchus and his crew ! 
The earnest trumpet spake, and silver 
thrills 
From kissing cymbals made a merry 
din— 
> Twas Bacchus and his kin ! 
Like to a moving vintage down they 
came, . 
Crown’d with green leaves, and faces all 
on flame ; 
All madly dancing through the pleasant 
valley, 
To scare thee, Melancholy ! 
O then, O then, thou wast a simple 
name ! 
And I forgot thee, as the berried holly 
By shepherds, is forgotten, when, in 
June, 
Tall chestnuts keep away the sun and 
moon :— 
I rush’d into the folly ! 


‘Within his car, aloft, young Bacchus 
stood, 
Trifling his ivy-dart, in dancing mood, 
With sidelong laughing ; 
And little rills of crimson wine imbrued 
His plump white arms, and shoulders, 
enough white 
For Venus’ pearly bite ; 
And near him rode Silenus on his ass, 
Pelted with flowers as he on did pass 
Tipsily quaffing. 





KEATS 


‘Whence came ye, merry Damsels! 
whence came ye! 
So many, and so many, and such glee ? 
Why have ye left your bowers desolate, 
Your lutes, and gentler fate ?— 
‘We follow Bacchus! Bacchus on the 
wing, 
A conquering ! 
Bacchus, young Bacchus! good or ill be- 


tide, 
We dance before him thorough kingdoms 
wide :— 


Come hither, lady fair, and joined be 
To our wild minstrelsy !’ 


‘* Whence came ye, jolly Satyrs ! whence 
came ye! 
So many, and so many, and such glee? 
Why have ye left your forest haunts, 
why left 
Your nuts in oak-tree cleft ?— 
‘For wine, for wine we left our kernel 
tree ; 
For wine we left our heath, and yellow 
brooms, 
And cold mushrooms ; 
For wine we follow Bacchus through the 
earth ; 
Great God of breathless cups and chirp- 
ing mirth !— 
Come hither, lady fair, and joined be 
To our mad minstrelsy ! ’ 


“Over widestreams and mountains great 
we went, [tent, 
And, save when Bacchus kept his ivy 
Onward the tiger and the leopard pants, 
With Asian elephants : 
Onward these myriads—with song and 
dance, 
With zebras striped, and sleek Arabians’ 
prance, 
Web-footed alligators, crocodiles, 
Bearing upon their scaly backs, in files, 
Plump infant laughers mimicking the 
coil 
Of seamen, and stout galley-rower’s toil : 
With toying oars and silken sails they 
glide, 
Nor care for wind and tide. 


‘*Mounted on panthers’ furs and lions’ 
manes, [plains ; 
From rear to van they scour about the 
A three days’ journey in a moment done : 
And always, at the rising of the sun, 
About the wilds they hunt with spear 
and horn, 
On spleenful unicorn. 


387 


‘*\ LT saw Osirian Egypt kneel adown 
Before the vine-wreath crown ! 
I saw parch’d Abyssinia rouse and sing 
To the silver cymbals’ ring ! 
I saw the whelming vintage hotly pierce 
Old Tartary the fierce ! 
The kings of Inde their jewel-sceptres 
vail, 
And from their treasures scatter pearled 
hail ; 
Great Brahma from his mystic heaven 
groans, 
And all his priesthood moans, 
Before young Bacchus’ eye-wink turning 
pale.— 
Inta these regions came I following 
him, 
Sick-hearted, weary—so I took a whim 
To stray away into these forests drear 
Alone, without a peer: 
And I have told thee all thou mayest 
hear. 


‘Young stranger ! 
I’ve been a ranger 
In search of pleasure throughout every 
clime: 
Alas! ’tis not for me! 
Bewitch’d I sure must be, 
To lose in grieving allmy maiden prime, 


‘Come then. Sorrow ! 
Sweetest Sorrow ! 
Like an own babe I nurse thee on my 
breast : 
I thought to leave thee 
And deceive thee, 
But now of allthe world I love thee best. 


‘““There is not one, 
No, no, not one 
But thee to comfort a poor lonely maid ; 
Thou art her mother, 
And her brother, 
Her playmate, and her wooer in the 
shade.” 


THE FEAST OF DIAN 


WHo, who from Dian’s feast would be 
away ? 
For all the golden bowers of the day 
Are empty left? Who, who away would 
be 


From Cynthia’s wedding and festivity ? 


Not Hesperus: lo! upon his silver 
wings 

He leans away for highest heaven and 
sings, 


388 





Snapping his 
Ah, Zephyrus! art here, and Flora too! 
Ye tender bibbers of the rain and dew, 
Young playmates of the rose and daffo- 
dil, 
Be careful, ere ye enter in, to fill 
Your baskets high 
With fennel green, and balm, and gold- 
en pines, 
Savory, latter-mint, and columbines, 
Cool parsley, basil sweet, and sunny 
thyme ; 


Yea, every flower and leaf of every 
clime, 
All gather’d in the dewy ue, : hie 
Away ! fly, fly !— 


Cr ystalline bees of the belt of hoa’ en, 
Aquarius! to whom king Jove has given 
Two liquid pulse streams ’stead of 
feather’d wings, 
Two fan-like fountains,—thine illumin- 
ings 
For Dian play: 
Dissolve the frozen purity of air ; 
Let thy white shoulders silvery and 
bare 
Shew cold through watery pinions ; 
make more bright 
The Star-Queen’s crescent on her mar- 
riage night: 
Haste, haste away !— 
Castor has tamed the planet Lion, see! 
And of the Bear has Pollux mastery : 
A third is in the race! who is the 
third, 
Speeding away swift as the eagle bird ? 
The tramping Centaur ! 
The Lion’s mane’s on end: the Bear 
how fierce! 
The Centaur’s arrow ready seems to 
pierce 
Some enemy : far forth his bow is bent 
Into the blue of heaven. He'll beshent, 
Pale unrelentor, 
When he shall hear the wedding lutes a- 
playing.— 
Andromeda ! sweet woman! why delay- 
ing 
Sotimidly among thestars : come hither ! 
Join this bright throng, and nimbly fol- 
low whither 
They all are going. 
Danae’s Son, before Jove newly bow’d, 
Has wept for thee, calling to Jove 
aloud. 
Thee, gentle lady, did he disenthral : 
Ye shall for ever live and love, for all 
Thy tears are flowing. 


I8iv, 1818. 


BRITISH POETS 


ROBIN HOOD 


No! those days are gone away, 
And their hours are old and gray, 
And their minutes buried all 
Under the down-trodden pall 

Of the leaves of many years: 

Many times have winter’s shears, 
Frozen North, and chilling East, 
Sounded tempests to the feast 

Of the forest’s whispering fleeces. 
Since men knew nor rent nor leases. 


No, the bugle sounds no more, 
And the twanging bow no more; 
Silent is the ivory shrill 
Past the heath and up the hill; 
There is no mid-forest laugh, 
Where lone Echo gives the half 
To some wight, amaz’d to hear 
Jesting, deep in forest drear. 


On the fairest time of June 
You may go, with sun or moon, 
Or the seven stars to light you, 
Or the polar ray to right you ; 
But you never may behold 
Little John, or Robin bold ; 
Never one, of all the clan, 
Thrumming on an empty can 
Some old hunting ditty, while 
He doth his green way beguile 
To fair hostess Merriment, 
Down beside the pasture Trent ; 
For he left the merry tale 
Messenger for spicy ale. 


Gone, the merry morris din ; 
Gone, the song of Gamelyn ; 
Gone, the tough-belted outlaw 
Idling i in the © grene shawe ; 
All are gone away and past! 
And if Robin should be cast 
Sudden from his turfed grave, 
And if Marian should have 
Once again her forest days, 
She would weep, and he would craze : 
He would swear, for all his oaks, 
Fall’n beneath the dockyard strokes, 
Have rotted on the briny seas ; 
She would weep that her wild bees 
Sang not to her-~-strange ! that honey 
Can't be got without hard money ! 


So it is: yet let us sing, 
Honor to the old bow-string ! 
Honor to the bugle-horn ! 
Honor to the woods unshorn ! 
Honor to the Lincoln green ! 


KEATS 


Honor to the archer keen! 
Honor to tight Little John, 
And the horse he rode upon ! 
Honor to bold Robin Hood, 
Sleeping in the underwood ! 
Honor to Maid Marian, 
And to all the Sherwood-clan ! 
Though their days have hurried by, 
Let us two a burden try. 
February 3, 1818. 


IN A DREAR-NIGHTED DECEMBER 


1820. 


IN a drear-nighted December, 

Too happy, happy tree, 

Thy branches ne’er remember 

Their green felicity : 

The north cannot undo them, 

With a sleety whistle through them : 
Nor frozen thawings glue them 
From budding at the prime. 


In a drear-nighted December, 
Too happy, happy brook, 

Thy bubblings ne’er remember 
Apollo’s summer look ; 

But with a sweet forgetting, 
They stay their crystal fretting, 
Never, never petting 

About the frozen time. 


Ah! would ’twere so with many * 
A gentle girl and boy! 
But were there ever any 
Writhed not at passéd joy ? 
To know the change and feel it, 
When there is none to heal it, 
Nor numbéd sense to steal it, 
Was never said in rhyme. 
F2) PUAS2O. 


TO AILSA ROCK 
HEARKEN, thou craggy ocean pyramid ! 


Give answer from thy voice, the sea- 
fowls’ screams ! 


When were thy shoulders mantled in, 


huge streams ? 
When, from the sun, was thy broad fore- 
head hid ? 
How long is’t since the mighty power bid 
Thee heave to airy sleep from fathom 


dreams ? : 
Sleep in the lap of thunder or sun- 
beams, 
Or when gray clouds are thy cold cover- 
lid. 


Thou answer’st not; for thou art dead 
asleep ; 


389 


Thy life is but two dead eternities— 

The last in air, the former in the deep, 

First with the whales, last with the 
eagle-skies— 

Drown’d wast thou till an earthquake 
made thee steep, 

Another cannot wake thy giant size. 

July, 1818. 1819. 


THE HUMAN SEASONS 


Four Seasons fill the measure of the 
year ; 

There are four seasons in the mind of 
man : 

He has his lusty Spring, when fancy clear 

Takes in all beauty with an easy span : 

He has his Summer, when luxuriously 

Spring’s honey’d cud of youthful thought 
he loves 

To ruminate, and by such dreaming high 

Is nearest unto heaven: quiet coves 

His soul has in its Autumn, when his 
wings 

He furleth close ; contented so to look 

On mists in idleness—to let fair things 

Pass by unheeded as a threshold brook. 

He has his Winter too of pale misfeature, 

Or else he would forego his mortal na- 
ture. yaa ok OLg, 


TO HOMER 


STANDING aloof in giant ignorance, 

Of thee I hear and of the Cyclades, 

As one who sits ashore and longs per- 
chance 

To visit Dolphin-coral in deep seas. 

So thou wast blind ;—but then the veil 
was rent, 

For Jove uncurtained Heaven to let thee 
live, 

And Neptune made for thee a spumy 
tent, 

And Pan made sing for thee his forest- 
hive. 

Aye, on the shores of darkness there is 
light, 

And precipices show untrodden green, 

There is a budding morrow in mid- 
night,} 

There is atriple sight in blindness keen ; 

Such seeing hadst thou, as it once 
befell 

To Dian, Queen of Earth, and Heaven, 
and Hell. 1818, 1848. 


1 Forman records in his notes that Rossetti 
considered this to he ‘‘ Keats’ finest single line 
of poetry.’ (Keats’ Works, IT., 238.) 


39? 


LINES 
ON 
THE MERMAID TAVERN 


SOULS of Poets dead and gone, 
What Elysium have ye known, 
Happy field or mossy cavern, 
Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern ? 
Have ye tippled drink more fine 
Than mine host’s Canary wine? 
Or are fruits of Paradise 

Sweeter than those dainty pies 

Of venison? O generous food ! 
Drest as though bold Robin Hood 
Would, with his maid Marian, 
Sup and bowse from horn and can. 


I have heard that on a day 
Mine host’s sign-board flew away, 
Nobody knew whither, till 
An astrologer’s old quill 
To a sheepskin gave the story, 
Said he saw you in your glory, 
Underneath a new old sign 
Sipping beverage divine, 
And pledging with contented smack 
The Mermaid in the Zodiac. 


Souls of Poets dead and gone, 
What Elysium have ye known, 
Happy field or mossy cavern, 
Choicer than the Mermaid Tavern ? 


1818. 1820. 


FANCY 


EVER let the Fancy roam, 

Pleasure never is at home : 

At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth, 

Like to bubbles when rain pelteth ; 

Then let winged Fancy wander 

Through the thought still spread beyond 
her : 

Open wide the mind’s cage-door, 

She’ll dart forth, and cloudward soar. 

O sweet Fancy ! let her loose ; 

Summer’s joys are spoilt by use, 

And the enjoying of the Spring 

Fades as does its ‘blossoming ; : 

Autumn’s red-lipp’d fruitage too, 

Blushing through the mist and dew, 

Cloys with tasting: What do then ? 

Sit thee by the ingle, when 

The sear fagot blazes bright, 

Spirit of a winter's night ; 

When the soundless earth is muffled, 

And the caked snow is shuffled 

From the ploughboy’s heavy shoon ; 


BRITISH POETS 


When the Night doth meet the Noon 

In a dark conspiracy 

To banish Even from her sky. 

Sit thee there, and send abroad, 

With a mind self-overaw’d 

Fancy, high-commission’d :—send her ! 

She has vassals to attend her: 

She will bring, in spite of frost, 

Beauties that the earth hath lost ; 

She will bring thee, all together, 

All delights of summer weather ; — 

All the buds and bells of May, 

From dewy sward or thorny spray : 

All the heaped Autumn’s wealth, 

With a still, mysterious stealth : 

She will mix these pleasures up 

Like three fit wines in a cup, 

And thou shalt quaff it:—thou shalt 
hear 

Distant harvest-carols clear ; 

Rustle of the reaped corn ; 

Sweet birds antheming the morn : 

And, in the same moment—hark ! 

’Tis the early April lark, 

Or the rooks, with busy caw, 

Foraging for sticks and straw. 


‘Thou shalt, at one glance, behold 


The daisy and the marigold ; 
White-plum’d lilies, and the first 
Hedge-grown primrose that hath burst ; 
Shaded hyacinth, alway 

Sapphire queen of the mid-May ; 
And every leaf, and every flower 
Pearled with the self-same shower. 
Thou shalt see the field-mouse peep 
Meagre from its celled sleep ; 

And the snake all winter-thin 

Cast on sunny bank its skin ; 
Freckled nest-eggs thou shalt see 
Hatching in the hawthor n-tree, 
When the henbird’s wing doth rest 
Quiet on her mossy nest ; 

Then the hurry and alarm 

When the bee-hive casts its swarm ; 
Acorns ripe down-pattering, - 

While the autumn breezes sing. 


Oh, sweet Fancy! let her loose ; 
Every thing is spoilt by use: 
Where’s the cheek that doth not fade, 
Too much gaz’d at? Where’s the maid 
Whose lip mature is ever new ? 
Where’s the eye, however blue, 
Doth not weary? Where’s the face 
One would meet in every place ? 
Where’s the voice, however soft, 
One would hear so very oft? 
At a touch sweet Pleasure melteth 
Like to bubbles when rain pelteth, 


KEATS 


Let, then, winged Fancy find 

Thee a mistress to thy mind: 

Dulcet-eyed as Ceres’ daughter, 

Ere the God of Torment taught her 

How to frown and how to chide; 

With a waist and with a side 

White as Hebe’s, when her zone 

Slipped its golden clasp, and down 

Fell her kirtle to her feet, - 

While she held the goblet sweet, 

And Jove grew languid.—Break the 
mesh 

Of the Fancy’s silken leash ; 

Quickly break her prison-string 

And such joys as these she’ll bring.— 

Let the winged Fancy roam, 

Pleasure never is at home. 18/8. 1820. 


ISABELLA 
OR 
THE POT OF BASIL 


A STORY FROM BOCCACCIO 


Farr Isabel, poor simple Isabel! 
Lorenzo, a youngpalmer in Love’s 
eye! 
They could not in the self-same mansion 
dwell 
Without some stir of heart, some 
malady ; 
They could not sit at meals but feel how 
_. well 
It soothed each to be the other by ; 
They could not, sure, beneath the same 


roof sleep 
But to each other dream, and nightly 
weep. 
With every morn their love grew ten- 
derer, 
With every eve deeper and tenderer 
still ; 
He might not in house, field, or garden 


stir, 
But her full shape would all his seeing 


And his continual voice was pleasanter 

- To her, than noise of trees or hidden 
rill ; 

Her lute-string gave an echo of hisname, 

She spoilt her half-done broidery with 
the same. 


He knew whose gentle hand was at the 
latch, 

Before the door had given her to his 
eyes ; 


SOF 


And from her chamber-window he 
would catch 
Her beauty farther than the falcon 
spies ; 
And constant as her vespers would he 
watch, 
Because her face was turn’d to the 
- game skies ; 
And with sick longing all the night out- 
wear, 
To hear her morning-step upon the stair. 


A whole long month of May in this sad 
plight 
Made their cheeks paler by the break 
of June: 
‘*To-morrow will I bow to my delight, 
To-morrow will I ask my lady’s 
boon.” — 
‘*O may I never see another night, 
Lorenzo, if thy lps breathe not 
love’s tune.” — 
So spake they to their pillows; but, alas, 
Honeyless days and days did he let pass ; 


Until sweet Isabella’s untouch’d cheek 
Fell sick within the rose’s just domain, 
Fell thin as a young mother’s, who doth 
seek 
By every lull to cool her infant’s pain : 
‘** How ill she is,” said he, ‘‘I may not 
speak, 
And yet I will, and tell my love all 
plain : 
If looks speak love-laws, I will drink 
her tears, 
And at the least twill startle off her 
cares.” 


So said he one fair morning, and all day 
His heart beat awfully against his 
side ; 
And to his heart he inwardly did pray 
For power to speak ; but still the ruddy 
tide 
Stifled his voice, and puls’d resolve 
away— 
Fever’d his high conceit of such a 
bride, 
Yet brought him to the meekness of a 
child : 
Alas! when passion is both meek and 
wild ! 


So once more he had wak’d and an- 
guished 
A dreary night of love and misery, 
If Isabel’s quick eye had not been wed 
To every symbol on his forehead high ; 


oe 


She saw it waxing very pale and dead, 
And straight all flush’d; so, lisped 


tenderly, 
‘“* Lorenzo! ”’—here she ceas’d her timid 
quest, 


But in her tone and look he read the rest. 


‘*O Isabella, I can half perceive 
That I may speak my grief into thine 
ear ; 
If thou didst ever anything believe, 
Believe how I love thee, believe how 
near 
My soul is to its doom: I would not 
grieve. 
Thy hand by unwelcome pressing, 
would not fear 
Thine eyes by gazing; but I cannot 
live 
Another night, and not my passion 
shrive. 


‘*Love! thouart leading me from wintry 


cold, 
Lady! thou leadest me to summer 
clime, 
And I must taste the blossoms that 
unfold 


In its ripe warmth this gracious 
morning time.” 

So said, his erewhile timid lips grew 
bold, 

And poesied with hers in dewy rhyme : 

Great bliss was with them, and great 
happiness 

Grew, like a lusty flower in June’s 
caress. 


Parting they seem’d to tread upon the 
air, 
Twin roses by the zephyr blown apart 
Only to meet again more close, and share 
The inward fragrance of each other’s 
heart. 
She, to her chamber gone, a ditty fair 
Sang, of delicious love and honey’d 
dart ; 
He with light steps went up a western 
hill, 
And bade the sun farewell, and joy’d 
his fill. 


All close they met again, before the dusk 
Had taken from the stars its pleasant 


veil, 

All close they met, all eves, before the 
dusk 

Had taken from the stars its pleasant 
veil, 


BRITISH POETS 


Close in a bower of hyacinth and musk, 
Unknown of any, free from whisper- 
ing tale. 
Ah! better had it been for ever so, 
Than idle ears should pleasure in their 
woe. 


Were a unhappy then ?—It cannot 
e— e 
Too many tears for lovers have been 
shed, 
Too many sighs give we to them in fee, 
Too much of pity after they are dead, 
Too many doleful stories do we see, 
Whose matter in bright gold were best 
be read ; 
Except in such a page where Theseus’ 
spouse 
Over the pathless waves towards him 
bows. 


But, for the general award of love, 
The little sweet doth kill much bitter- 
ness ; 
Though Dido silent is in under-grove, 
And Isabella’s was a great distress, 
Though young Lorenzo in warm Indian 
clove 
Was not embalm’d, this truth is not 
the less— 
Even bees, the little almsmen of spring- 
bowers, 
Know there is richest juice in poison- 
flowers. 


With her two brothers this fair lady 
dwelt, 
Enriched from ancestral merchandise, 
And for them many a weary hand did 
'  swelt 
In torched mines and noisy factories, 
And many once proud-quiver’d loins did 
melt 
In blood from stinging whip ;—with 
hollow eyes 
Many all day in dazzling river stood, 
To take the rich-ored driftings of the 
flood. 


For them the Ceylon diver held his 
breath, 
And went all naked to the hungry 
shark ; 
For them his ears gush’d blood; for 
them in death 
The seal on the cold ice with piteous 
bark 
Lay full of darts; for them alone did 
seethe 


KEATS 


393 





A thousand men in troubles wide and 


dark : 
Half-ignorant, they turn’d an easy 
wheel, 
That set sharp racks at work, to pinch 
and peel. 


Why were they proud? Because their 
marble founts 
Gush’d with more pride than do a 
wretch’s tears ?— 
Why were they proud? 
orange-mounts 
Were of more soft ascent than lazar 
stairs ?— 
Why were they proud? 
lin’d accounts 
Were richer than the songs of Grecian 


Because fair 


Because red- 


years ?— 

Why were they proud? again we ask 
aloud, 

Why in the name of Glory were they 
proud ? 


Yet were these Florentines as self-re- 
tired 

In hungry pride and gainful cowardice, 

As two close Hebrews in that land in- 





spired, 
Paled in and vineyarded from beggar- 
spies ; 
The hawks of ship-mast forests—the un- 
tired 
And pannier’d mules for ducats and 
old lies 
Quick cat’s-paws on the generous stray- 
away ,— 
Great wits in Spanish, Tuscan, and 
Malay. 


How was it these same ledger-men could 


Spy 
Fair Isabella in her downy nest ? 
How could they find out in Lorenzo’s eye 
A straying from his toil? Hot Egypt’s 
pest 
Into their vision covetous and sly ! 
How could these money-bags see east 
and west ?— 
Yet so they did—and every dealer fair . 
Must see behind, as doth the hunted hare. 


O eloquent and famed Boccaccio ! 
Of thee we now should ask forgiving 
boon, 
And of thy spicy myrtles as they blow, 
And of thy roses amorous of the moon, 
And of thy lilies, that do paler grow 
Now they can no more hear thy ghit- 
tern’s tune, 


For venturing syllables that ill beseem 
The quiet glooms of such a_ piteous 
theme. ; 


Grant thou a pardon here, and then the 
tale 
Shall move on soberly, as it is meet ; 
There is no other crime, no mad assail 
To make old prose in modern rhyme 
more sweet : 
But it is done—succeed the verse or 


fail— 
To honor thee, and thy gone spirit 
greet ; 
To stead thee as a verse in English 
tongue, 


An echo of thee in the north-wind sung. 


These brethren having found by many 
signs 
What love Lorenzo for their sister had, 
And how she lov’d him too, each uncon- 
fines 
His bitter thoughts to other, well-nigh 
mad 
That he, the servant of their trade de- 
signs, 
Should in their sister’s love be blithe 
and glad . 
When “twas their plan to coax her by 
degrees 
To some high noble and his olive-trees. 


And many a jealous conference had 
they, 
And many times they bit their lips 
alone, 
Before they fix’d upon a surest way 
To make the youngster for his crime 
atone ; 
And at the last, these men of cruel clay 
Cut Mercy with a sharp knife to the 
bone ; 
For they resolvéd in some forest dim 
To kill Lorenzo, and there bury him. 


So on a pleasant morning, as he leant 
Into the sun-rise, o’er the balustrade 
Of the garden-terrace, towards him they 

bent 
Their footing through the dews; and 
to him said, 
‘*You seem there in the quiet of con- 
tent, 
Lorenzo, and we are most loth to 
invade 
Calm speculation ; but if you are wise, 
Bestride your steed while cold is in the 
skies. 


394 


BRITISH POETS 





‘*To-day we purpose, ay, this hour we 
mount 
To spur three leagues towards the 
Apennine ; 
Come down, we pray thee, ere the hot 
sun count 
His dewy rosary on the eglantine.” 
Lorenzo, courteously as he was wont, 
Bow’d a fair greeting to these ser- 
pents’ whine ; 
And went in haste, to get in readiness, 
With belt, and spur, and bracing hunts- 
man’s dress. 


And as he to the court-yard pass’d along, 
Kach third step did he pause, and 
listen’d oft 
If he could hear his lady’s matin-song, 
Or the light whisper of her footstep 
soft ; 

And as he thus over his passion hung, 
He heard a laugh full musical aloft ; 
When, looking up, he saw her features 

bright 
Smile through an in-door lattice. all 
delight. 


‘* Love, Isabel!” said he, ‘‘ I was in pain 
Lest I should miss to bid thee a good 
morrow : 
Ah! what if I should lose thee, when 
so fain 
I am to stifle all the heavy sorrow 
Of a poor three hours’ absence ? but 
we'll gain 
Out of the amorous dark what day 
doth borrow. 
Good bye! T’ll soon be back.”—‘‘ Good 
bye!” said she :— 
And as he went she chanted merrily. 


So the two brothers and their murder’d 
man 
Rode past fair Florence, to where 
Arno’s stream 
Gurgles through straiten’d banks, and 
still doth fan 
Itself with dancing bulrush, and the 


bream 
Keeps head against the freshets. Sick 
and wan 
The brothers’ faces in the ford did 


seem, 
Lorenzo’s flush with love.—They pass’d 
the water 
Into a forest quiet for the slaughter. 


There was Lorenzo slain and buried in; 
There in that forest did his great love 
- cease ; 


Ah! when a soul doth thus its freedom 
win, 
It aches in loneliness—is ill at peace 
As the break-covert blood-hounhds of 
such sin: 
They dipp’d their swords in the water, 
and did tease 
Their horses homeward, with convulsed 
spur, 
Each richer by his being a murderer. 


They told their sister how, with sudden 
speed, 
Lorenzo had ta’en ship for foreign 
lands, 
Because of some great urgency and need 
In their affairs, requiring trusty hands. 
Poor Girl! put on thy stifling widow’s 
weed, 
And ’scape at once from Hope’s ac- 
cursed bands ; 
To-day thou wilt not see him, nor to- 
morrow, 
And the next day will bea day of sorrow. 


She weeps alone for pleasures not to be ; 
Sorely she wept until the night came 
on, 
And then, instead of love, O misery ! 
She brooded o’er the luxury alone: 
His image in the dusk she seem’d to see, 
And tothe silence madea gentle moan, 
Spreading her perfect arms upon the air, 
And on her couch low murmuring, 
‘‘Where? O where?” 


But Selfishness, Love’s cousin, held not— 
long 
Its fiery vigil in her single breast ; 
She fretted for the golden hour, and hung 
Upon the time with feverish unrest— 
Not long—for soon into her heart a 
throng 
Of higher occupants, a richer zest, 
Came tragic; passion not to be subdued, 
And sorrow for her love in travels rude. 


In the mid days of autumn,on their eves 

The breath of Winter comes from far 
away, 

And the sick west continually bereaves 

Of some gold tinge, and plays a round- 


ela 
Of death among the bushes and the 
leaves 
To make all bare before he cares to 
stray 


From his north cavern. So sweet Isabel 
By gradual decay from beauty fell, 


KEATS 


\ 


Because Lorenzo came not. Oftentimes 
She ask’d her brothers, with an eye all 
pale, . 
Striving to be itself, what dungeon 
climes 
Could keep him off so long? They 
spakeatale, | 
Time after time, to quiet her. 
crimes 
Came on them, like a smoke from 
Hinnom’s vale ; 
And every night in dreams they groan’d 
aloud, 
To see their sister in her snowy shroud. 


Their 


And she had died in drowsy ignorance, 
But i a thing more deadly dark than 
all; 
It came like a fierce potion, drunk by 
chance, 
Which saves a sick man from the 
feather’d pall 
For some few gasping moments; like a 
lance, 
Waking an Indian from his cloudy 
hall 
With cruel pierce, and bringing him 
again 
Sense of the gnawing fire at heart and 
brain. 


It was a vision.—In the drowsy gloom, 
The dull of midnight, at her couch’s 
foot 
Lorenzo stood, and wept: the forest 
tomb 
Had marr’d his glossy hair which once 
could shoot 
Lustre into the sun, and put cold doom 
Upon his lips, and taken the soft lute 
From his lorn voice, and past his loamed 
ears 
Had made a miry channel for his tears. 


Strange sound it was, when the pale 
shadow spake ; 
For there was striving, in its piteous 
tongue, 
To speak as when on earth it wasawake, 
And Isabella on its music hung : 
Languor there was in it, and tremulous 
shake, 
Asin a palsied Druid’s harp unstrung ; 
And through it moan’d a ghostly under- 


song, 
Like hoarse night-gusts sepulchral briars 
among. 


Its eyes, though wild, were stillall dewy 
bright 


ee 
_With love, and kept all phantom fear 
aloof 
From the poor. girl by magic of their 
light, 
The while it did unthread the horrid 
woof 
Of the late darken’d time,—the murder- 
ous spite ' 
Of pride and avarice, the dark pine 
roof 
In ae Te Mads the sodden turfed 
ell, 
Where, without any word, from stabs 
he fell. 


Saying moreover, ‘‘ Isabel, my sweet! 
Red whortle-berries droop above my 
head, 
And a large flint-stone weighs upon my 
feet ; 
Around me beeches and high chest- 
nuts shed 
Their leaves and prickly nuts; a sheep- 
fold bleat 
Comes from beyond the river to my 


bed : 

Go, shed one tear upon my heather- 
bloom, 

And it shall comfort me within the 


tomb. 


‘‘T am a shadow now, alas! alas! 
Upon the skirts of human-nature 
dwelling 
Alone: I chant alone the holy mass, 
While little sounds of life are round 
me knelling, 
And glossy bees at noon do fieldward 
pass, 
And many a chapel bell the hour is 
telling, 
Paining me through: 
grow strange to me, 
And thou art distant in Humanity. 


those sounds 


‘“T know what was, I feel full well what 


is, 
And I should rage, if spirits could go 
mad ; 
Though I forget the taste of earthly 
bliss, 
That paleness warms my grave, as 
though I had 
A Seraph chosen from the bright abyss 
To be my spouse: thy paleness makes 
me glad ; 
Thy beauty grows upon me, and I feel 
A greater love through all my essence 
steal.” 


396 


The Spirit mourn’d ‘ Adieu !”—dis- 
solv’d, and left 
The atom darkness in aslow turmoil; 
As when of healthful midnight sleep 
bereft, 
Thinking onrugged hours and fruit- 
less toil, 
We put our eyes into a pillowy cleft, 
And see the spangly gloom froth up 
and boil: 
It made sad Isabella’s eyelids ache, 
And in the dawn she started up awake ; 


‘“‘Ha! ha!” said she, ‘‘ I knew not this 
hard life, 
I thought the worst 
misery ; 
I thought some Fate with pleasure or 
with strife 
are us—happy days, or else to 
die 
But there is crime—a brother's bloody 
knife ! 
Sweet Spirit, thou hast school’d my 
infancy : 
Ill visit thee for this, and kiss thine 
eyes, 
And greet thee morn and even in the 
skies.” 


was simple 


When the full morning came, she had 
devised 
How she might secret to the forest hie ; 
How she might find the clay, so dearly 
prized, 
And sing to it one latest lullaby ; 
How her short absence might be un- 
surmised, 
While she the inmost of the dream 
would try. 
Resolv’d, she took with her an aged nurse, 
And went into that dismal forest-hearse. 


See, as they creep along the river side, 
How she doth whisper to that aged 
Dame, 
And, after looking round the champaign 
wide, 
Shows her a knife.—‘‘ What feverous 
hectic flame 
Burns in thee, child ?—What good can 
thee betide, 
That thou should’st smile again ?”’— 
The evening came, 
And they had found Lorenzo’s earthy bed ; 
The flint was there, the berries at his 
head. 


Who hath not loiter’d ina green church- 
yard, 


BRITISH ‘POETS 


And let his spirit, like a demon-mole, 
Work through the clayey soil and 
gravel hard, 
To see skull, 
funeral stole ; 
Pitying each form that hungry Death 
hath marr‘d, 
And filling it once more with human 
soul ? 
Ah! this is holiday to what was felt 
When Isabella by Lorenzo knelt. 


coffin’d bones, and 


She gaz’d into the fresh-thrown mould, 
as though 
One glance did fully all its secrets tell ; 
Clearly shesaw, as other eyes would know 
Pale limbs at bottom of a crystal well ; 
Upon the murderous spot she seem’d to 
grow, 
Like to a native lily of the dell : 
Then with her knife, allsudden, she began 
To dig more ferv ently than misers can. 


Soonshe turn’d upa soiled glove, whereon 
Hersilk had play’d in purple phantasies, 
She kiss’d it with alip more chill than 
stone, 
And put it in her bosom, where it dries 
And freezes utterly unto the bone 
Those dainties made to still an infant’s 
cries : 


Then ’gan she work again ; nor stay’d 
her care, 

But to throw back at times her veiling 
hair. 


That old nurse stood beside her wondering 
Until her heart felt pity to the core 
At sight of such a dismal laboring, 
And so she kneeléd, with her locks 
all hoar, 
And put her lean hands to the horrid 
thing : 
Three hours they labor’dat this travail 


sore ; 
At last they felt the kernel of the grave, 
And Isabella did not stamp and rave. 


Ah! wherefore all this wormy circum- 
stance ? 
Why linger at the yawning tomb so 
long? 
O for the gentleness of old Romance, 
The Blane plaining of a minstrel’s 
song ! 
Fair reader, at the old tale take a glance, 
For here, in truth, it doth not well 
belong 
To speak :—O turn thee to the very tale, 
And taste the music of that vision pale, 


KEATS 


With duller steel than the Perséan sword 
They cut away no formless monster’s 
head, 
But one, whose gentleness did wellaccord 
With death, as life. “The ancient 
harps have said, 
Love never dies, but lives, 
Lord : 
If Love impersonate was ever dead, 
Pale Isabella kiss’d it, and low moan’d 
’ Twas love ; cold,—dead indeed, but not 
dethroned. 


immortal 


In anxious secrecy they took it home, 
And then the prize was all for Isabel: 
She calm’d its wildhair with a golden 
comb, 
And all around each eye’s sepulchral 
cell 
Pointed each fringed lash; the smeared 
loam 
With tears,aschilly asadripping well, 
She drench’d away :—and_ still she 
comb’d, and kept 
Sighing all day—and still she kiss’d, and 
wept. 


Then ina silken scarf, sweet with the 
dews 
Of precious flowers pluck’d in Araby, 
And divine liquids come with odorous 
ooze 
Through the cold serpent pipe refresh- 
fully ,— 
She wrapp’d it up; and for its tomb did 
choose 
A garden-pot, wherein she laid it by 
And cover'd it with mould and, o’er it set 
Sweet Basil, which her tears kept ever 
wet. 


And she forgot the stars, the moon, and 
sun, 
And she forgot the blue above the trees, 
And she forgot the dells where waters 
run, 
And she forgot the chilly autumn breeze ; 
She had no knowledge when the day 
was done, 
And the new morn she saw not: but 
in peace . 
Hung over her sweet Basil evermore, 
And moisten‘d it with tears unto the core. 


And so she ever fed it with thin tears, 
Whence thick, and green, and beauti- 
ful it grew, 
Sothat it smelt more balmy than its peers 
Of Basil-tufts in Florence ;: for it drew 


ooF 


Nurture besides, and life, from human 
fears, 
From the fast mouldering head there 
shut from view : 
So that the jewel, safely casketed, 
Came forth, and in perfuméd leatits 
spread. 


O Melancholy, linger here awhile! 
O Music, Music, breathe despondingly ! 
O Echo, Echo, from some sombre isle, 
Unknown, Lethean, sigh to us—O sigh ! 
Spirits in grief, lift up your heads, and 


smile ; 
Lift up your heads, sweet Spirits, 
heavily, 
And make a pale light in your cypress 
glooms, [tombs. 


Tinting with silver wan your marble 


Moan hither, all ye syllables of woe, 
From the deep throat of sad Mel- 
pomene ! 
Through bronzed lyre in tragic order go, 
And touch thestrings into a mystery ; 
Sound mournfully upon the winds and 
low ; 
For simple Isabel is soon to be 
Among the dead: She withers, like a 
palm 
Cut by an Indian for its juicy balm. 


O leave the palm to wither by itself ; 
Let not quick Winter chill its dying 
hour !— 
It may not be--those Baiilites of pelf, 


Her brethren, noted the continual 
shower 
From her dead eyes ; and many a curious 
elf, 


Among her kindred, wonder’d that 
such dower 

Of youth and beauty should be thrown 
aside 

By one mark’d out to be a Noble’s bride. 


And, furthermore, her brethren won- 
der’d much 
Why she sat drooping by the Basil 
green, 
And why it flourish’d, as by magic touch ; 
Greatly they wonder’d what the thing 
might mean 
They could not surely give belief, that 


such 
A very nothing would have power to 
wean 
Her from her own fair youth, and 
pleasures gay, flay. 


And even remembrance of her love’s de- 


398 


BRITISHMBOETS 





Therefore they watch’d atime when they 
might sift 
This hidden whim; and long they 
watch’d in vain ; 
For seldom did she go to chapel-shrift, 
And seldom felt she any hunger-pain ; 
And when she left, she hurried back, as 
swift 
As bird on wing to breast its eggs 
again ; 
And, patient as a hen-bird, sat her there 
Beside her Basil, weeping through her 
hair. 


Yet they contriv’d to steal the Basil-pot, 
And to examine it in secret place : 
The thing was vile with green and livid 
spot, 
And yet they knew it was Lorenzo’s face ; 
The guerdon of their murder they had 


got, 
And so left Florence ina moment’s 
space, 
Never to turn again.—Away they went, 
With blood upon their heads, to banish- 
ment. 


O Melancholy, turn thine eyes away ! 

O Music, Music, breathe despondingly ! 
O Echo, Echo, on some other day, 

From isles Lethean, sigh to us—O sigh ! 
Spirits of grief, sing not your ‘‘ Well-a- 

way!” 

For Isabel, sweet Isabel, will die : 
Will die a death too lone and incomplete, 
Now they have ta’en away her Basil 

sweet. 





Piteous she look’d on dead and senseless 
things, 
Asking for her lost Basil amorously : 
And with melodious chuckle in the 
strings 
Of her lorn voice, 
would cry 
After the Pilgrim in his wanderings, 
To ask him where her Basil was ; and 
why 
*Twas hid from her: ‘‘ For cruel ’tis,” 
said she, 
‘* To steal my Basil-pot away from me.” 


she oftentimes 


And so she pined, and so she died forlorn, 
Imploring for her Basil to the last. 
No heart was there in Florence but did 

mourn 
In pity of her love, so overcast. 
And a sad ditty of this story born 
From mouth to mouth through all the 
country pass’d : 


Still is the burthen sung—* O cruelty, 
‘*To steal my Basil-pot away from 
me!” 1818. 1820. 


THE EVE OF ST. AGNES 


St. AGNES’ Eve—Ah, bitter chill it was ! 

The owl, for all his feathers, was a-cold ; 

The hare limp’d trembling through the 
frozen grass, 

And silent was the flock in woolly fold : 

Numb were the Beadsman’s fingers, 
while he told 

His rosary, and while his frosted breath, 

Like pious incense from a censer old, 

Seem’d taking flight for heaven, with- 
out a death, 

Past the sweet Virgin’s picture, while 
his prayer he saith. 


His prayer he saith, this patient, holy 
man 

Then takes his lamp, and riseth from 
his knees, 

And back returneth, meagre, barefoot, 
wan, 

Along the chapel aisle by slow degrees : 

The sculptur’d dead, on each side, seem 
to freeze, 

Emprison’d in black, purgatorial rails: 

Knights, ladies, praying in dumb ora- 
tries, 

He passeth by ; and his weak spirit fails 

To think how they may ache in icy 
hoods and mails. 


Northward he turneth through a little 
door, 

And scarce three steps, ere Music’s 
golden tongue 

Flatter’d to tears this aged man and 
poor ; 

But no —already had his deathbell rung ; 

The joys of all his life were said and 
sung : 

His was harsh penance on St. Agnes’ 
Eve: 

Another way he went, and soon among 

Rough ashes sat he for his soul’s reprieve, 

And all night kept awake, for sinners’ 
sake to grieve. 


That ancient Beadsman heard the pre- 
lude soft ; 

And so it chane’d, for many a door was 
wide, 

From hurry to and fro. Soon, up aloft, 

The silver, snarling trumpets ’gan to 
chide: | pride, 

The level chambers, ready with their 


KEATS 


Were glowing to receive a thousand 
guests : 
The carved angels, ever eager-eyed, 
Star’d where upon their heads the cor- 
nice rests, 
With hair blown back, and wings put 
cross-wise on their breasts. 


At length burst in the argent revelry, 

With plume, tiara, and all rich array, 

Numerous as shadows haunting fairily 

The brain, new stuff’d, in youth, with 
triumphs gay 

Of old romance. These let us wish 
away, 

And turn, sole-thoughted, to one Lady 


there, 

Whose heart had brooded, all that win- 
try day, 

On love, and wing’d St. Agnes’ saintly 
care, 

As she had heard old dames full many 
times declare. 


They told her how, upon St. Agnes’ Eve, 

Young virgins might have visions of 
delight, 

And soft adorings from their loves re- 
ceive 

Upon the honey’d middle of the night 

If ceremonies due they did aright ; 

As, supperless to bed they must retire, 

And couch supine their beauties, lily 
white ; 

Nor look behind, nor sideways, but re- 

. quire 

Of Heaven with upward eyes for all 
that they desire. 


Full of this whim 

: Madeline ; 

The music, yearning like a God in pain, 

She scarcely heard: her maiden eyes 
divine, 

Fix’d on the floor, saw many a sweeping 

train 

Pass by—she heeded not at all: in vain 

Came many a tiptoe, amorous cavalier, 

And back retir’d; not coold by high 
disdain, 

But she saw not: her heart was other- 
where : 

She sigh’d for Agnes’ dreams, the sweet- 
est of the year. 


was. thoughtful 


She danc’d along with vague, regardless 
eyes, 

Anxious her lips, her breathing quick 
and short: 


399 


The hallow’d hour was near at hand: 
she sighs 

Amid the timbrels, and the throng’d 
resort 

Of whisperers in anger, or in sport ; 

’Mid looks of love, defiance, hate, and 
scorn, 

Hoodwink’d with faery fancy ; allamort, 

Save to St. Agnes and her lambs un- 
shorn, 

And all the bliss to be before to-morrow 
morn, 


So, purposing each moment to retire, 

She linger’d still. Meantime, across the 
moors, 

Had come young Porphyro, with heart 
on fire 

For Madeline. Beside the portal doors, 

Buttress’d from moonlight, stands he, 
and implores 

All saints to give him sight of Madeline, 

But for one moment in the tedious hours, 

That he might gaze and worship all 
unseen ; 

Perchance speak, kneel, touch, kiss—in 
sooth such things have been. 


He ventures in: let no buzz’d whisper 
tell: 

All eyes be muffled, or a 
swords 

Will storm his heart, Love’s fev’rous 
citadel : 

For him, those chambers held barbarian 
hordes, 

Hyena foemen, and hot-blooded lords, 

Whose very dogs would execrations howl 

Against his lneage: not one_ breast 
affords 

Him any mercy, in that mansion foul, 

Save one old beldame, weak in body 
and in soul, 


hundred 


Ah, happy chance! the aged creature 
came, ’ 

Shuffling along with ivory-headed wand, 

To where he stood, hid from the torch’s 
flame, 

Behind a broad hall-pillar, far beyond 

The sound of merriment and chorus 
bland : 

He startled her; but soon she knew his 
face, 

And grasp’d his fingers in her palsied 
hand, 

Saying, ‘‘Mercy, Porphyro! hie thee 
from this place ; 

They are all here to-night, the whole 
blood-thirsty race! 


400 


Get hence! get hence! there’s dwarfish 
Hildebrand ; 

He had a fever late, and in the fit 

He cursed thee and thine, both house 
and land: 

Then there’s that old Lord Maurice, not 


a whit 

More tame for his gray hairs—Alas me ! 
flit ! 

Flit like a ghost away.”—‘‘ Ah, Gossip 
dear, 


We're safe enough; here in this arm- 
chair sit, 

And tell me how ”—*‘ 
here, not here; 

‘* Follow me, child, or else these stones 


will be thy bier.” 


Good Saints ! not 


He follow’d through alowly arched way, 
Brushing the cobwebs with his lofty 


plume ; 

And as she mutter’d ‘* Well-a—well-a- 
day!” 

He found him in a little moonlight 
room, 


Pale, lattic’d, chill, and silent as a tomb. 

‘Now tell me where is Madeline,” 
said he, 

“O tell me, Angela, by the holy loom 

Which none but secret sisterhood may 
see, 

When they St. Agnes’ wool are weaving 
piously.” 


“St. Agnes! Ah! it isSt. Agnes’ Eve— 

Yet men will murder upon holy days : 

Thou must hold water in a witch’s sieve, 

And be liege-lord of all the Elves and 
Fays, 

To venture so: it fills me with amaze 

To see thee, Porphyro !—St. Agnes’ Eve ! 

God’s help! my lady fair the conjurer 
plays 

This very night; good angels her de- 
ceive! 

But let me laugh awhile, I’ve mickle 
time to grieve.” 


Feebly she laugheth in the languid 
moon, 

While Porphyro upon her face doth look, 

Like puzzled urchin on an aged crone 

Who keepeth clos’d a wond’rous riddle- 
book, 

As spectacled she sits in chimney nook. 

But soon his eyes grew brilliant, when 
she told 

His lady’s purpose ; and he scarce could 
brook 


BRITTSHSPOETS 





Tears, at the thought of those enchant- 
ments cold, 

And Madeline asleep in lap of legends 
old. 


Sudden a thought came like a full- 
blown rose, 

Flushing his brow, and in his pained 
heart 

Made purple riot: then doth he propose 

A stratagem, that makes the beldame 
start: 

‘* A cruel man and impious thou art : 

Sweet lady, let her pray, and sleep, and 
dream 

Alone with her good angels, far apart 

From wicked men like thee. Go, go!— 
I deem 


| Thou canst not surely be the same that 


thou didst seem. 


‘*T will not harm her, 
swear,” 

Quoth Porphyro: 
grace 

When my weak voice shall whisper its 
last prayer, 

If one of her soft ringlets I displace, 

Or look with ruffian passion in her face: 

Good Angela, believe me by these tears ; 

Or I will, even in a moment’s space, 

Awake, with horrid shout, my foemen’s 


by all saints I 
‘‘O may I ne’er find 


ears, 
And beard them, though they be more 
fang’d than wolves and bears.” 


‘Ah! why wilt thou affright a feeble 
soul ? 

A poor, weak, 
yard thing 

Whose passing-bell may ere the mid- 
night toll ; 

Whose prayers for thee, each morn and 
evening, 

Were never. miss’d.” 
doth she bring 

A gentler speech }from burning Por- 

hyro ; 

So woful, and of such deep sorrowing, 

That Angela gives promise she will do 

Whatever he shall wish, betide her weal 
or woe. 


palsy ee church- 


Thus plaining, 


Which was, to lead him. in close secrecy, 

Even to Madeline’s chamber, and there 
hide 

Him in a closet, of such privacy 

That he might see her beauty unespied, 

And win perhaps that night a peerless 
bride, 


KEATS 


While legion’d fairies pac’d the coverlet, 

And pale enchantment held her sleepy- 
eyed. 

Never on such a night have lovers met, 

Since Merlin paid his Demon all the 
monstrous debt. 


‘Tt shall be as thou wishest,” said the 
Dame: 

** All cates and dainties shall be stored 
there 


Quickly on this feast-night: by the. 


tambour frame 

Her own lute thou wilt see: no time to 
spare, 

For I am slow and feeble, and scarce dare 

On such a catering trust my dizzy head. 

Wait here, my child, with patience; 
kneel in prayer 

The while: Ah! thou must needs the 
lady wed, 

Ormay I never leave my grave among 
the dead.” 


So saying, she hobbled off with busy fear. 


The lover’s endless minutes slowly 
pass’d ; 

The dame return’d, and whisper’d in his 
ear 


To follow her; with aged eyes aghast 

From fright of dim espial. Safe at last, 

Through many a dusky gallery, they 
gain 

The maiden’s chamber, silken, hush’d, 

; and chaste ; 

Where Porphyro took covert, pleas’d 
amain. 

His poor guide hurried back with agues 
in her brain. 


Her falt’ring hand upon the balustrade 
Old Angela was feeling for the stair, 
When Madeline, St Agnes’ charmed 
maid, 
Rose, like a mission’d spirit, unaware : 
With silver taper’s light, and pious care, 
She turn’d, and down the aged gossip led 
To a safe level matting. Now prepare, 
Young Porphyro, for gazing on that bed ; 
She comes, she comes again, like ring- 
dove fray’d and fled. 


Out went the taper as she hurried in ; 

Its little smoke, in pallid moonshine, 
died : 

She clos’d the door, she panted, all akin 

To spirits of the air, and visions wide: 

No uttered syllable, or, woe betide! 

But to her heart, her heart was voluble, 


26 


4or 


Paining with eloquence her balmy side ; 

As though a tongueless nightingale 
should swell 

Her throat in vain, and die, heart-stifled, 
in her dell. 


A casement high and triple arch’d there 
was, 

All garlanded with carven imag’ries 

Of fruits, and flowers, and bunches of 
knot-grass. 

And diamonded with panes of quaint 
device, 

Innumerable of stains and splendid dyes, 

As are the tiger-moth’s deep-damask’d 


wings ; 

And in the midst, ’mong thousand 
heraldries, 

And twilight saints, and dim emblazon- 
ings, 


A shielded scutcheon blush’d with blood 
of queens and kings. 


Full on this casement shone the wintry 
moon, 

And threw warm gules on Madeline’s 
fair breast, 

As down she knelt for heaven’s grace 
and boon; 

Rose-bloom fell on her hands, together 
prest, 

And on her silver cross soft amethyst, 

And on her hair a glory, like a saint : 

Sheseem’d a splendid angel, newly drest, 

Save wings, for heaven : Porphyro grew 
faint : 

She knelt, so pure a thing, so free from 
mortal taint. 


Anon his heart revives : her vespers done, 

Of all its wreathed pearls her hair she 
frees ; 

Unclasps her warmed jewels one by one 


Loosens her fragrant boddice ; by de- 
grees 

Her rich attire creeps rustling to her 
knees ; 


Half-hidden, like a mermaid in seaweed, 

Pensive awhile she dreams awake, and 
sees, 

In fancy, fair St. Agnes in her bed, 

But dares not look behind, or all the 
charm is fled. 


Soon, trembling in her soft and chilly 
nest, 

In sort of wakeful swoon, perplex’d she 
lay. 

Until the poppied warmth of sleep op- 
press’d 


4o2 


Her soothed limbs, and soul fatigued 


away ; 

Flown, like a thought, until the mor- 
row-day ; 

Blissfully haven’d both from joy and 
pain ; 

Clasp’d like a missal where swart 


Paynims pray ; 
Blinded alike from sunshine and from 


rain, 

As though a rose should shut, and be a 
bud again. 

Sto’n to this paradise, and so en- 


tranced, 


Porphyro gazed upon her empty dress, 
And listen’d to her breathing, if it 


chanced 

To wake into a slumberous tenderness ; 

Which when he heard, that minute did 
he bless, 

And breath’d himself: then from the 
closet crept, 

Noiseless as fear in a wide wilderness, 

And over the hush’d carpet, silent, 
stepped, 

And ’tween the curtains peep’d, where, 
lo !—how fast she slept. 


Then by the bed-side, where the faded 
moon 
Made a dim, silver twilight, soft he set 


A table, and, half-anguish’d, threw 
thereon 

A cloth of woven crimson, gold, and 
jet :— 


O for some drowsy Mor phean amulet ! 
The boisterous, midnight, festive cla- 


rion, 

The kettle-drum, and far-heard cla- 
rionet, 

Affray his ears, though but in dying 
tone :— 


The hall door shuts again, and all the 
noise is gone. 


And still she slept an azure-lidded sleep, 
In blanched linen, smooth, and laven- 


der’d, 

While he from forth the closet brought 
a heap 

Of candied apple, quince, and plum, and 
gourd ; 

With jellies soother than the creamy 
curd, [mon ; 


And lucent syrops, tinct with cinna- 
Manna and dates, in argosy transferr’d 
From Fez; and spiced dainties, every 

one, [banon. 
From silken Samarcand to cedar’d Le- 


BRITISH POETS 





These delicates he heap’d with glowing 
hand 

On golden dishes and in baskets bright 

Of wreathed silver: sumptuous they 
stand 

In the retired quiet of the night, 

Filling the chilly room with per fume 


hght.— 

‘* And now, my love, my seraph fair, 
awake ! 

Thou art my heaven, and I thine 


eremite : 
Open thine eyes, for meek St. Agnes’ 
sake, 
Or I shall drowse beside thee, so my 
soul doth ache.” 


Thus whispering, his‘ warm, unnerved 
arm 

Sank in her pillow. 
dream 

By the dusk curtains :—twas a mid- 
night charm 

Impossible to melt as iced stream : 

The lustrous salvers in the moonlight 
gleam : 

Broad golden fringe upon the carpet lies : 

It seem’d he never, never could redeem 

From such a stedfast spell his lady’s eyes ; 

So mus’d awhile, entoil’d in woofed 
phantasies. 


Shaded was her 


Awakening up, he took her hollow lute,— 
Tumultuous. —and, in chor ds that tend- 


erest be, 

He play’d an ancient ditty, long since 
mute, 

In Provence call’d, ‘‘ La belle dame sans 
mercy :” 


Close to her ear touching the melody ;— 

Wherewith disturb’d, she utter’d a soft 
moan : 

He ceased—she panted quick—and sud- 
denly 

Her blue affrayed eyes wide open shone: 

Upon his knees he sank, pale as smooth- 
sculptured stone. 


Her eyes were open, but she still beheld, 
Now wide awake, the vision of her sleep: 
There was a painful change, that nigh 
expell’d 
The blisses of her dream so pure and deep 
At which fair Madeline began to weep, 
And moan forth witless words with 
many a sigh ; [keep ; 
While still her gaze on Porphyro would 
Who knelt, with joined hands and 
piteous eye, [dreamingly. 
Fearing to move or speak, she look’d so 


KEATS 


‘* Ah, Porphyro!” said she, *‘ but even 
. now 
Thy voice was at sweet tremble in mine 
ear, 
Made tuneable with every sweetest vow ; 
And those sad eyes were spiritual and 
clear : 
How chang’d thouart ! how pallid, chill, 
and drear! 
Give me that voice again, my Porphyro, 
Those looks immortal, those complain- 
ings dear ! 
Oh leave me not in this eternal woe, 
For if thou diest, my Love, I know not 
where to go.” 


Beyond a mortal man impassion’d far 

At these voluptuous accents, he arose, 

Ethereal, flush’d, and like a throbbing 
star 

Seen mid the sapphire heaven’s 
repose ; 

Into her dream he melted, as the rose 

Blendeth its odor with the violet,— 

Solution sweet: meantime the frost 
wind blows 

Like Love’s alarum pattering the sharp 
sleet 

Against the window-panes; St. Agnes’ 
moon hath set. 


deep 


Tis dark: quick pattereth the flaw- 
blown sleet : 

“This is no dream, 
Madeline !” 

Tis dark: the iced gusts still rave and 
beat : 

‘““Nodream, alas! alas ! and woe is mine! 

Porphyro will leave me here to fade and 

ine.— 

Cruel! what traitor could thee hither 
bring ? 

I curse not, for my heart is lost in thine, 

Though thou forsakest a deceived 
thing ;— 

A dove forlorn and lost with sick un- 
pruned wing.” 


my bride, my 


‘“‘My Madeline! sweet dreamer! lovely 
bride ! 

Say, may I be for aye thy vassal blest ? 

Thy beauty’s shield, heart-shap’d and 
vermeil dyed ? 

Ah, silver shrine, here will I take my 
rest 

After so many hours of toil and quest, 

A famish’d pilgrim,—saved by miracle. 

Though I have found, I will not rob thy 
nest 


403 


Saving of thy sweet self; if thou 
think’st well 
To trust, fair Madeline, to no rude in- 


fidel. 


‘* Hark! ’tis an elfin-storm from faery 

land, 

Of haggard seeming, but a boon indeed: 

Arise—arise ! the morning is at hand ;— 

The bloated wassaillers will never 
heed :— 

Let usaway, my love, with happy speed ; 

There are no ears to hear, or eyes to see,— 

Drown’d allin Rhenish and the sleepy 
mead : 

Awake! arise! my love, and fearless be, 

For o’er the southern moors 1 have a 
home for thee.” 


She hurried at his words, beset with 


fears, 

For there were sleeping dragons all 
around, 

At glaring watch, perhaps, with ready 
spears— 


Down the wide stairs a darkling way 
they found.— 

In all the house was heard no human 
sound. 

A chain-droop’d lamp was flickering by 
each door ; 

The arras, rich with horseman, hawk, 
and hound, 

Flutter’d in the besieging wind’s uproar ; 

And the long carpets: rose along the 
gusty floor. 


They glide, like phantoms, into the wide 
hall ; 

Like phantoms, to the iron porch, they 
glide ; 

Where lay the Porter, in uneasy sprawl, 

With a huge empty flagon by his side: 

The wakeful bloodhound rose, and shook 
his hide, 

But his sagacious eye an inmate owns: 

By one, and one, the bolts full easy 
slide :— 

The chains lie silent on the footworn 
stones ;-—— 

The key turns, and the door upon its 
hinges groans. 


And they are gone: ay, ages long ago 

These lovers fled away into the storm. 

That night the Baron dreamt of many 
a woe, 

And all his warrior-guests, with shade 
and form 


404 

Of witch, and demon, and large coffin- 
worm, 

Were long be-nightmar’d. Angela the 
old 

Died palsy-twitch’d, with meagre face 
deform ; 


The Beadsman, after thousand aves told, 
For aye unsought for slept among his 
ashes cold, 
January, 1819. 1820. 
THE EVE OF SAINT MARK 


A FRAGMENT 


Upon a Sabbath-day it fell ; 

Twice holy was the Sabbath-bell, 

That call’d the folks to evening prayer ; 
The city streets were clean and fair 
From wholesome drench of April rains ; 
And, on the western window panes, 
The chilly sunset faintly told 

Of unmatur’d green valleys cold, 

Of the green thorny bloomless hedge, 
Of rivers new with spring-tide sedge, 
Of primroses by shelter’d rills, 

And daisies on the aguish hills. 

Twice holy was the Sabbath-bell : 

The silent streets were crowded well 
With staid and pious companies, 

Warm from their fire-side orat’ries ; 
And moving, with demurest air, 

To even-song, and vesper prayer. 

Each arched porch, and entry low, 
Was fill’d with patient folk and slow, 
With whispers hush, and shuffling feet, 
While play’d the organ loud and sweet. 


The bells had ceas’d, the prayers begun, 
And Bertha had not yet half done 

A curious volume, patch’d and torn, 
That all day long, from earliest morn, 
Had taken captive her two eyes, 
Among its golden broideries ; 

Perplex’d her with a thousand things,— 
The stars of Heaven, and angels’ wings, 
Martyrs in a fiery blaze, 

Azure saints and silver rays, 

Moses’ breastplate, and the seven 
Candlesticks John saw in Heaven, 

The winged Lion of St. Mark, 

And the Covenantal Ark, 

With its many mysteries, 

Cherubim and golden mice. 


Bertha was a maiden fair, 
Dwelling in th’ old Minster-square ; 
From her fire-side she could see, 
Sidelong, its rich antiquity, 


BRITISH SPOETS 


Far as the Bishop’s garden-wall ; 
Where sycamores and elm-trees tall, 
Full-leav’d, the forest had outstript, 

By no sharp north-wind ever nipt, 

So shelter’d by the mighty pile. 

Bertha arose, and read awhile, 

With forehead ’gainst the window-pane 
Again she try’d, and then again, 

Until the dusk eve left her dark 

Upon the legend of St. Mark. 

From plated lawn-frill, fine and thin, 
She lifted up her soft warm chin. 

With aching neck and swimming eyes, 
And daz’d with saintly imageries. 


All was gloom, and silent all, 

Save now and then the still foot-fall 
Of one returning homewards late, 
Past the echoing minster-gate. 

The clamorous daws, that all the day 
Above tree-tops and towers play, 
Pair by pair had gone to rest, 

Each in its ancient belfry nest, 
Where asleep they fall betimes, 

To music and the drowsy chimes. 


All was silent, all was gloom, 

Abroad and in the homely room: 

Down she sat, poor cheated soul ; 

And struck a lamp from the dismal coal; 

Lean’d forward, with bright drooping 
hair 

And slant look, full against the glare. 

Her shadow, in uneasy guise, 

Hover’d about, a giant size, 

On ceiling-beam and old oak chair, 

The parrot’s cage, and panel square ; 

And the warm angled winter-screen, 

On which were many monsters seen, 

Call’d doves of Siam, Lima mice, 

And legless birds of Paradise, 

Macaw, and tender A vadavat, 

And silken-furr’d Angora cat. 

Untir’d she read, her shadow still 

Glower’d about, as it would fill 

The room with wildest forms and shades, 

As though some ghostly queen of spades 

Had come to mock behind her back, 

And dance, and ruffle her garments 
black. 

Untir’d she read thelegend page, 

Of holy Mark, from youth to age, 

On land, on sea, in pagan chains, 

Rejoicing for his many pains. 

Sometimes the learned eremite, 

With golden star, or dagger bright, 

Referr’d to pious poesies 

Written in smallest crow-quill size 

Beneath the text : and thus the rhyme 


KEATS: 





Was parcel’d out from time to time : 
——‘' Als writeth he of swevens, 

Men han before they wake in bliss, 
~Whanne that hir friendes thinke him 
bound | 

In crimped shroude farre under grounde: 
And how a litling childe mote be 

A sciat er its nativitie, © 

Gif that the modre (God her blesse !) 
Kepen in solitarinesse, 

And kissen devout the holy croce. 

Of Goddes love, and Sathan’s force,— 
He writith; and thinges many mo 

Of swiche thinges I may not show. 

Bot I must tellen verilie 

Somdel of Sainte Cicilie, 

And chiefly what he auctorethe 

Of Sainté Markis life and dethe :” 


Atlength her constant eyelids come 
Upon the fervent martyrdom ; 
Then lastly to his holy shrine, 
Exalt amid the tapers’ shine 
At Venice,— 
January and September, 1819. 1848. 


ODE ON INDOLENCE 


“They toil not, neither do they spin.” 


ONE morn before me were three figures 
seen, 
With bowéd necks, and joinéd hands, 
side-faced ; 
And one behind the other stepp’d serene, 
In placid sandals, and in white robes 
gracec ; 
They pass _, like figures ona marble urn, 
When snifted round to see the other 
side ; 
They came again; as when the urn 
once more 
Is shifted round, the first seen shades 
return ; 
And they were strange to me, as may 
betide ; 
With vases, to one deep in Phidian 
lore. 


How isit. Shadows! that I knew ye not ? 
How came ye muffled in so hush a 
mask ? 
Was it a silent deep-disguised plot 
To steal away, and leave without a 


task 
My idle days? Ripe was the drowsy 
hour ; 


The blissful cloud of summer-indo- 
lence 





405 


Benumbed my eyes; my pulse grew 
less and less ; 
Pain had no sting, and pleasure’s wreath 
no flower: 
O why did ye not melt, and leave my 
sense 
Unhaunted quite of all but—noth- 
ingness ? 


A third time passed they by, and, pass- 
ing, turn’d 
Each one the face a moment whiles to 
me ; 
Then faded, and to follow them I burn’d 
And ach’d for wings, because I knew 
the three ; 
The first was a fair Maid, and Love her 
name ; 
The second was Ambition, pale of 
cheek, 
And ever watchful with fatigued 
ye; 
The last, whom I love more, the more of 
blame 
Is heap’d upon her, maiden most un- 
meek ,— 
I knew to be my demon Poesy. 


They faded, and forsooth! I wanted 
wings: 
O folly ! What is Love? and where is 
it ? 
And for that poor Ambition ! it springs 
From a man’s little heart’s short fever- 
fit ; 
For Poesy !—no,—she has not a joy,— 
At least for me,—so sweet as drowsy 
noons, 
And evenings steep’d in honied in- 
dolence ; 
O, for an age so sheltered from annoy, 
That I may never know how change 
the moons, 
Or hear the voice of busy common- 
sense ! 


And once more came they by ;—alas! 
wherefore ? 
My sleep had been embroider’d with 
dim dreams; 
My soul had been a lawn besprinkled 
o’er 
With flowers, and stirring shades, and 
baffled beams : [fell, 
The morn was clouded, but no shower 
Tho’ in her lids hung the sweet tears 
of May ; 
The open casement press’d a new- 
leav’d vine, 


BRITISH POETS 








406 
Let in the budding warmth and thros- 
tle’s lay ; 
O Shadows! ‘twas a time to bid fare- 
well! 


Upon your skirts had fallen no tears 
of mine. 
So, ye three Ghosts, adieu! Ye cannot 
raise 
My head cool-bedded in the flowery 
grass ; 
For I would not be dieted with praise, 
A pet-lamb in a sentimental farce ! 
Fade softly from my eyes, and be once 


more 
In masque-like Figures on the dreamy 
urn ; 
Farewell! I yet have visions for the 
night, 
And for the day faint visions there is 
store ; 
Vanish, ye Phantoms! from my 


idle spright, 
Into the clouds, and never more re- 
turn ! March, 1819. 1848. 


ODE 


BARDS of Passion and of Mirth. 

Ye have left your souls on earth ! 
Have ye souls in heaven too, 
Double-lived in regions new ? 

Yes, and those of heaven commune 
With the spheres of sun and moon; 
With the noise of fountains wond’rous, 
And the parle of voices thund’rous ; 
With the whisper of heaven’s trees 
And one another, in soft ease 
Seated on Elysian lawns 

Brows’d by none but Dian’s fawns ; 
Underneath large blue-bells tented, 
Where the daisies are rose-scented, 
And the rose herself has got 
Perfume which on earth is not; 
Where the nightingale doth sing 
Not a senseless, tranced thing, 

But divine melodious truth ; 
Philosophic numbers smooth ; 
Tales and golden histories 

Of heaven and its mysteries. 


Thus ye live on high, and then 
On the earth ye live again ; 
And the souls ye left behind you 
Teach us, here, the way to find you, 
Where your other souls are joying 
Never slumber’d, never cloying. 
Llere, your earth-born souls still speak 
To mortals, of their little w eek ; 


Of their sorrows and delights ; 

Of their passions and their spites ; 

Of their glory and their shame ; 

What doth strengthen and what maim. 
Thus ye teach us, every day, 

Wisdom, though fled far away. 


Bards of Passion and of Mirth, 
Ye have left your souls on earth ! 
Ye have souls in heaven too, 
Double-lived in regions new ! 


March 26, 1819. 1820. 


ODE TO PSYCHE 


O GoppEss! hear these tuneless num- 
bers, wrung 
By sweet enforcement and remem- 
brance dear, 
And pardon that thy secrets should be 
sung 
Even into thine own soft-conched ear ; 
Surely I dreamt to-day, or did I see 
The winged Psyche with awaken’d 
eyes? 
I wander’d in a forest thoughtlessly, 
And, on the sudden, fainting with 
surprise, [side 
Saw two fair creatures, couched side by 
In deepest grass, beneath the whis- 
p ring roof 
Of leaves and trembled blossoms, where 
there ran 
A brooklet, scarce espied : 
*"Mid hush’d, cool-rooted flowers, fra- 
grant-eyed, 
Blue, silver-white, and budded Tyrian, 
They lay calm-breathing on the bedded 
grass ; 
Their arms embracéd, and their pin- 
ions too; 
Their lips touch’d not, but had not 
bade adieu, 

As if disjoined by soft-handed slumber, 
And ready still past kisses to outnumber 
At tender eye-dawn of aurorean love: 
.The winged boy I knew ; 

But who wast thou, O happy, happy 
dove? 
His Psyche true! 


O latest born and loveliest vision far 
Of all Olympus’ faded hierarchy ! 
Fairer than. Phoebe’s sapphire-region’d 
star, ‘Tsky ; : 
Or Vesper, amorous glow-worm of the 
Fairer than these, though temple thou 
hast none, 
Nor altar heap’d with flowers ; 


KEATS 


Nor virgin-choir to make delicious moan 
Upon the midnight hours ; 
No voice, no lute, no pipe, no incense 
sweet é 
From chain-swung censer teeming ; 
No shrine, no grove, no oracle, no heat 
Of pale-mouth’d prophet dreaming. 


O brightest ! though too late for antique 


vows, 
Too, too late for the fond believing 
lyre, » 
When holy were the haunted forest 
boughs, 


Holy the air, the water, and the fire ; 
Yet even in these days so far retir’d 
From happy pieties, thy lucent fans, 
Fluttering among the faint Olymp- 
ians, 
I see, and sing, by my own eyes inspired. 
So let me be thy choir, and make a moan 
Upon the midnight hours ; 
Thy voice, thy lute, thy pipe, thy in- 
cense sweet 
From swinged censer teeming ; 
Thy shrine, thy grove, thy oracle, thy 
heat 
Of pale-mouth’d prophet dreaming. 


Yes, I will be thy priest, and build a fane 
In some untrodden region of my mind, 
Where branched thoughts, new grown 
with pleasant pain, 
Instead of pines shall murmur in the 


wind: 
Far, far around shall those dark-cluster’d 
trees 
Fledge the wild-ridged mountains 


steep by steep; 
And there by zephyrs, streams, and 
birds, and bees, 
The moss-lain Dryads shail be lull’d to 
sleep ; 
And in the midst of this wide quietness 
_ A rosy sanctuary will I dress 
With the wreath’d trellis of a working 
brain, 
With buds, and bells, and stars with- 
out aname, ’ 
With all the gardener Fancy e’er could 
feign, 
Who breeding flowers, will never breed 
the same : flight 
And there shall be forthee all soft de- 
That shadowy thought can win, 
A bright torch, and a casement ope at 
night, 
To let the warm Love in! 


April, 1819. 1820. 


407 


ODE ON A GRECIAN URN 


THOU still unravish’d bride of quietness, 
Thou foster-child of silence and slow 
time, 
Sylvan historian, who canst thus ex- 
press 
A flowery tale more sweetly than our 
rhyme: 
What leaf-fring’d legend haunts about 
thy shape 
Of deities or mortals, or of both, 
In Tempe or the dales of Arcady ? 
What men or gods are these?) What 
maidens loth ? 
What mad pursuit ? What struggle to 
escape ? 
What pipes and timbrels? What 
wild ecstasy ? 


Heard melodies are sweet, but those un- 
heard 
Are sweeter ; therefore, ye soft pipes, 
play on ; 
Not to the sensual ear, but, more en- 
dear'd, 
Pipe to the spirit ditties of no tone : 
Fair youth, beneath the trees, thou 
canst not leave 
Thy song, nor ever can those trees be 
bare ; 
Bold Lover, never, never canst thou 
kiss 
Though winning near the goal—yet, do 
not grieve ; 
She cannot fade, though thou hast not 
thy bliss, 
For ever wilt thou love, and she be 
fair | 


Ah, happy, happy boughs! that cannot 
shec 
Your leaves, nor ever bid the Spring 
adieu ; 
And, happy melodist, unwearied, 
For ever piping songs for ever new ; 
More happy love! more happy, happy 
love! 
For ever warm and still to be enjoy’d, 
For ever panting, and for ever 
young ; 
All breathing human passion far above, 
That leaves a heart high-sorrowfuland 
cloy’d, 
A burning forehead, and a parching 
tongue. 


Who are these coming to the sacrifice ? 
To what green altar, O mysterious 
priest, 


408 


Lead’st thou that heifer lowing at the 
skies, 
And all her silken flanks with garlands 
dressed ? 
What little town by river or sea shore, 
Or mountain-built with peaceful cit- 


adel, 
Is emptied of this folk, this pious 
morn ? 
And, little town, thy streets for ever- 


more 
Will silent be ; and nota soul to tell 
Why thou art desolate, can e’er re- 
turn. 
O Attic shape! Fair attitude! with 
brede 
Of marble men and maidens over 
wrought, 
With forest branches and the trodden 
weed ; 
Thou, silent form, dost tease us out of 
thought 
As doth eternity : Cold Pastoral! 
When old age shall this generation 
waste, 
Thou shalt remain, in midst of other 
. Woe 
Than ours, a friend to man, to whom 
thou say’st, 
‘“‘Beauty is truth, truth beauty,” — 
that is all 
Ye know on earth, and all ye need 
to know. 
1819, January, 1820. 
ODE TO A NIGHTINGALE 


My heart aches, and a drowsy numb- 
ness pains 
My sense, as though of hemlock I had 
drunk, 
Or emptied some dull opiate to the drains 
One minute past, and Lethe-wards 
had sunk : 
"Tis not through envy of thy happy lot, 
But being too happy in thine happi- 
ness.— 
That thou, light winged Dryad of 
the trees, 
In some melodious plot 


Of beechen green, and shadows 
numberless, 
Singest of summer in full-throated 


ease. 


O, for a draught of vintage! that hath 
been fearth, 
Cool’d a long age in the deep-delved 





BRITISH POETS 





Tasting of Flora and the country green, 
Dance, and Provengal song, and sun- 
burnt mirth ! 
O for a beaker full of the warm South, - 
Full of the true, the blushful Hippo- 
crene, 
With beaded bubbles winking at the 
brim, 
And purple-stained mouth ; 
That I might drink, and leave the 
world unseen, 
And with thee fade away into the 
forest dim : 


Fade far away, dissolve, and quite forget 
What thou among the leaves hast 
never known, 
The weariness, the fever, and the fret 
Here, where men sit and hear each 
other groan ; 
Where palsy shakes a few, sad, last gray 
hairs, 
Where youth grows pale, and spectre- 
thin, and dies ; 
Where but to think is to be full of 
sorrow 
And leaden-eyed despairs, 
Where Beauty cannot keep her 
lustrous eyes, 
Or new Love pine at them beyond 
to-morrow. 


Away! away ! for I will fly to thee, 
Not charioted by Bacchus and his 
pards, 
But on the viewless wings of Poesy, 
Though the dull brain perplexes and 
retards : 
Already with thee! tender is the night, 
And haply the Queen-Moon is on her 
throne, 
Cluster’d around by all her starry 
Fays; 
But here there is no light, 
Save what from heaven is with the 
breezes blown 
Through verdurous glooms 
winding mossy ways. 


and 


IT cannot see what flowers are at my 
feet, 
Nor what soft incense hangs upon the 
boughs, 
But, in embalmed darkness, guess each 
sweet 
Wherewith 
endows 
The grass, the thicket, and the fruit-tree 
wild; 


the seasonable month 


KEATS 


White hawthorn, and the pastoral 
eglantine ; 
Fast fading violets cover’d up in 
leaves ; 
And mid-May’s eldest child, 
The coming musk-rose, full of dewy 
wine, 
The murmurous haunt of flies on 
summer eves. 


Darkling I listen ; and, for many a time 
I have been half in love with easeful 
Death, 
Call’d him soft names in many a mused 
rhyme, 
To take into the air my quiet breath ; 
Now more than ever seems it rich to die, 
To cease upon the midnight with no 
pain, 
While thou art pouring forth thy 
soul abroad 
In such an ecstasy ! 
Still wouldst thou sing, and I have 
ears In vain— 
To thy high requiem become a sod. 


Thou wast not born for death, immortal 


Bird! 
No hungry generations tread thee 
down : 
The voice I hear this passing night was 
heard 


In ancient days by emperor and clown: 
Perhaps the self-same song that founda 
path 
Through the sad heart of Ruth, when, 
sick for home, 
She stood in tears amid the alien 
corn : 
The same that oft-times hath 
Charm’d magic casements, opening 
on the foam 
Of perilous seas, in faery lands for- 
lorn. 


Forlorn! the very word is like a bell 
To toll me back from thee to my sole 
self ! 
Adieu! the fancy cannot cheat so well 
As she is fam’d to do, deceiving elf. 
Adieu! adieu! thy plaintive anthem 


fades 
Past the near meadows, over the still 
stream, [deep 


Up the hill-side ; and now ‘tis buried 
In the next valley-glades : 
Was ita vision, ora waking dream ? 
Fled is that music :—Do I wake or 
sleep? May, 1819. July, 1819. 


409 





ODE ON MELANCHOLY 
No, no, go not to Lethe, neither twist 
Wolf’s-bane, tight-rooted, for its poi- 
sonous wine ; 
Nor suffer thy pale forehead to be kiss’d 
By nightshade, ruby grape of Proser- 
pine ; 
Make not your rosary of yew-berries, 
Sat the beetle, nor the death-moth 
e@ 
Your mournful Psyche, 
downy owl 
A partner in your sorrow’s mysteries ; 
For shade to shade will come _ too 
drowsily, 
And drown the wakeful anguish of 
the soul. 


nor the 


But when the melancholy fit shall fall 
Sudden from heaven like a weeping 
cloud, 
That fosters the droop-headed flowers 
all, 
And hides the green hill in an April 
shroud ; 
Then glut thy sorrow ona morning rose, 
Oron the rainbow of the salt sand- 
wave, 
Or on the wealth of globed peonies ; 
Or if thy mistress some rich anger shows, 
Emprison her soft hand, and let her 
. Tave, 
And feed deep, deep upon her peer- 
less eyes. 


She dwells with Beauty—Beauty that 
must die ; 

And Joy, whose hand is ever at his lips 

Bidding adieu; and aching Pleasure nigh, 


Turning to poison while the  bee- 
mouth sips: 
Ay. in the very temple of Delight 
Veil’d Melancholy has her sovran 
shrine, 


Though seen of none save him whose 
strenuous tongue 


Can burst Joy’s grape against his palate 


fine : 
His soul shall taste the sadness of her 
might, 
And be among her cloudy trophies 
hung. 1819. 1820. 


TO AUTUMN 
SEASON of mists and mellow fruitfulness, 


Close bosom-friend of the maturing 
sun: 


410 


Couspiring with him how to load and 
bless 
With fruit the vines that round the 
thatch-eves run ; 
To bend with apples the moss’d cottage- 
trees, 
And fill all fruit with ripeness to the 
core ; 
To swell the gourd, and plump the 
hazel shells 
With a sweet kernel; to set budding 
more, 
And still more, later flowers for the 
bees, 
Until they think warm days will never 
cease. . 
For Summer has o’er-brimm/’d their 
clammy cells. 


Who hath not seen thee oft amid thy 
store? 
Sometimes whoever seeks abroad may 
find 
Thee sitting careless on a granary floor, 
Thy hair soft-lifted by the winnowing 
wind; 
Or on a half-reap’d furrow sound asleep, 
Drows’d with the fume of poppies, 
while thy hook 
Spares the next swath and all its 
twined flowers : 
And sometimes like a gleaner thou dost 
keep . 
Steady thy laden head across a brook ; 
Or by a cider-press, with patient look, 
Thou watchest the last oozings hours 
by hours. 


Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, 
where are they ? 
Think not of them, thou hast thy mu- 
sic too,— 
While barred clouds 
dying day, 
And touch the stubble-plains with 
rosy hue ; 
Then ina wailful choir the small gnats 
mourn 
Among the river sallows, borne aloft 
Or sinking as the light wind lives or 
dies ; 
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from 
hilly bourn ; 
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with 
treble soft [croft ; 
The red-breast whistles from a garden- 
And gathering swallows twitter in 
the skies. 
September, 1819. 1820. 


bloom the soft- 


BRITISH "POETS 


HY PERION 


A FRAGMENT 
BOOK J, 


DEEP in the shady sadness of a vale 

Far sunken from the healthy breath of 
morn, 

Far from the fiery noon, and eve’s one 
star, 

Sat gray-hair’d Saturn, quiet as a stone, 

Still as the silence round about his lair ; 

Forest on forest hung about his head 

Like cloud on cloud. No stir of air was 
there, 

Not so much life as on a summetr’s day 

Robs not one light seed from the 
feather’d grass, 

But where the dead leaf fell, there did 
it rest. 

A stream went voiceless by, still dead- 
ened more 

By reason of his fallen divinity 

Spreading a shade: the Naiad ’mid her 
reeds 

Press’d her cold finger closer to her lips. 


Along the margin-sand large foot- 

marks went, 

No further than to where his feet had 
stray’d, 

And slept there since. 
ground 

His old right hand lay nerveless, listless, 
dead, 

Unsceptred ; and his 
were closed ; 

While his bow’d head seem’d list’ning 
to the Earth, 

His ancient mother, for some comfort 
yet. 


Upon the sodden 


realmless eyes 


It seem’d no force could wake him 
from his place ; 
But there came one, who with a kindred 
hand 
Touch’d his wide shoulders, after bend- 
- ing low 
With reverence, though to one who knew 
it not. 
She was a Goddess of the infant world ; 
By her in stature the tall Amazon 
Had stood a pigmy’s height : she would 
have ta’en 
Achilles by the hair and bent his neck ; 
Or with a finger stay’d Ixion’s wheel. 
Her face was large as that of Memphian 
sphinx, 
Pedestal’d haply in a palace court, 


KEATS 


AII 





ee sages look’d to Egypt for their 

ore. 

But oh! how unlike marble was that 
face : 

How beautiful, if sorrow had not made 

Sorrow more beautitul than Beauty’s 
self. 

There was a listening fear in her regard, 

As if calamity had but begun : 

Asif the vanward clouds of evil days 

Had spent their malice, and the sullen 
rear 

Was with its stored thunder laboring up. 

One hand she press’d upon that aching 


spot 

Where beats the human heart, as if just 
there, 

Though an immortal, she felt cruel pain ; 

The other upon Saturn’s bended neck 

She laid, and to the level of his ear 

Leaning with parted lips, some words 
she spake 

In solemn tenor and deep organ tone: 

Some mourning words, which in our 
feeble tongue 

Would come in these like accents; O 
how frail 

To that large utterance of the early 
Gods ! 

‘‘Saturn, look up!—though wherefore, 
poor old King? 

I have no comfort for thee, no not one: 

I cannot say, ‘O wherefore sleepest 
thou?’ [earth 

For heaven is parted from thee, and the 

Knows thee not, thus afflicted, for a 
God ; 

And ocean too, with all its solemn noise, 

Has from thy sceptre pass’d; and all 
the air 

Is emptied of thine hoary majesty. 

Thy thunder, conscious of the new com- 
mand, 

Rumbles reluctant o’er our fallen house : 

And thy sharp lightning in unpractised 
hands . 

Scorches and burns our once serene 
domain. 

O aching time! O moments big as years ! 

All as ye pass swell out the monstrous 
truth, 

And press it so upon our weary griefs 

That unbelief has not a space to breathe. 

Saturn, sleep on:—O thoughtless, why 
did I 

Thus violate thy slumbrous solitude ? 

Why should I ope thy melancholy eyes? 

Saturn, sleep on! while at thy feet I 
weep.” 





As when, upon a tranced summer- 

night, 

Those green-rob’d senators of mighty 
woods, 

Tall oaks, branch-charmed by _ the 
earnest stars, 

Dream, and so dream all night without 
a Btirt 

Save from one gradual solitary gust 

Which comes upon the silence, and dies 
off, : 

As if the ebbing air had but one wave ; 

So came these words and went; the 
while in tears 

She touch’d her fair large forehead to 
the ground, 

Just where her falling hair might be 
outspread 

A soft and silken mat for Saturn's feet. 

One moon, with alteration slow, had 
shed 

Her silver seasons four upon the night, 

And still these two were postured mo- 
tionless, 

Like natural sculpture in cathedral cay- 


ern ; 

The frozen God still couchant on the 
earth, 

And the sad Goddess weeping at his feet : 

Until at length old Saturn lifted up 

His faded eyes, and saw his kingdom 
gone, 

And all the gloom and sorrow of the 
place. 

And that fair kneeling Goddess; and 
then spake, 

As with a palsied tongue, and while his 
beard 

Shook horrid with such aspen-malady : 

‘* O tender spouse of gold Hyperion, 

Thea, I feel thee ere I see thy face ; 

Look up, and let me see our doom in it ; 

Look up, and tell me if this feeble shape 

Is Saturn’s ; tell me, if thou hear’st the 
voice 

Of Saturn; tell me, if this wrinkling 
brow, 

Naked and bare of its great diadem, 

Peers like the front of Saturn. Who 
had power 

To make me desolate? whence came the 
strength ? 

How was it nurtur’d to such bursting 
forth, 

While Fate seem’d strangled in my 
nervous grasp? 

But it is so; and Iam smother’d up, 

And buried from all godlike exercise 

Of influence benign on planets pale, 


412 


BRITISH. POETS 





Of admonitions to the winds and seas, 

Of peaceful sway above man’s harvest- 
ing, 

And all those acts which Deity supreme 

Doth ease its heart of love in.—Iam gone 

Away from my own bosom: I have left 

My strong identity, my real self, 

Somewhere between the throne, and 
where I sit 

Here on this spot of earth. 
Thea, search ! 

Open thine eyes eterne, and sphere them 
round 

Upon all space: space starr’d, and lorn 
of light ; 

Space region’d with life-air ; and barren 
void ; 

Spaces of fire, and all the yawn of hell.— 

Search, Thea, search! and tell me, if 
thou seest 

A certain shape or shadow, making way 

With wings or chariot fierce to repossess 

A heaven he lost erewhile: it must—it 


Search, 


must 
Be of ripe progress—Saturn must be 
King. 


Yes, there must be a golden victory ; 

There must be Gods thrown down, and 
trumpets blown 

Of triumph calm, and hymns of festival 

Upon the gold clouds metropolitan, 

Voices of soft proclaim, and silver stir 

Of strings in hollow shells; and there 
shall be 

Beautiful things made new, for the sur- 


prise 
Of the sky-children; I will give com- 
mand : 


° } 9°: 
Thea! Thea! Thea! where is Saturn ?” 


This passion lifted him upon his feet, 
And made his hands to struggle in the air, 
His Druid locks to shake and ooze with 

sweat, 
His eyes to fever out, his voice to cease. 
He stood, and heard not Thea’s sobbing 
deep ; 
A little time, and then again he snatch’d 
Utterance thus.—‘* But cannot I create? 
Cannot I form? Cannot I fashion forth 
Another world, another universe, 


To overbear and crumble this to nought ?* 


Where is another chaos? Where ?’’— 
That word [quake 

Found way unto Olympus, and made 

The rebel three.—Thea was startled up, 

And in her bearing was a sort of hope, 

As thus she quick-voice’d spake, yet full 
of awe, 


‘* This cheers our fallen house: come 

to our friends, 

O Saturn! come away, and give them 
heart : 

I know the covert, for thence came I 
hither.” 

Thus brief; then with beseeching eyes 
she went 

With backward footing through the 
shade a space : 

He follow’d, and she turn’d to lead the 
way 

Through aged boughs, that yielded like 
the mist 

Which eagles cleave upmounting from 
their nest. 


Meanwhile in other realms big tears 
~ were shed, 

More sorrow like to this, and such like 
woe, 

Too huge for mortal tongue or pen of 
scribe : 

The Titans fierce, self-hid, or prison- 
bound. 

Groan’d for the old allegiance once more, 

And listen’d in sharp pain for Saturn’s 
voice, 

But one of the whole mammoth-brood 
still kept 

His sow’reignty, and rule, and majesty ;— 

Blazing Hyperion on his orbed fire 

Still sat, still snuff’d the incense, teeming 

up 

man to the 

unsecure : 

For as among us mortals omens drear 

Fright and perplex, so also shuddered 
he— 

Not at dog’s howl, or gloom-bird’s hated 
screech, 

Or the familiar visiting of one 

Upon the first toll of his passing-bell, 

Or prophesyings of the midnight lamp ; 

But horrors. portion’d to a giant nerve, 

Oft made Hyperion ache. His palace 
bright 

Bastion’d with pyramids of glowing gold, 

And touch’d with shade of bronzed 
obelisks, 

Glar’d a blood-red through all its thou- 
sand courts, 

Arches, and domes, and fiery galleries ; 

And all its curtains of Aurorian clouds 

Flush’d angerly : while sometimes eagle’s 
wings, 

Unseen before by Gods or wondering 
men, [were heard, 

Darken’d the place ; and neighing steeds 


From sun’s God; yet 


KEATS 


413 





Not heard before by Gods or wondering 


men, 
Also, when he would taste the spicy 
wreaths 
Of incense, breath’d aloft from sacred 
hills, 


Instead of sweets, his ample palate took 

Savor of poisonous brass and metal sick : 

And so, when harbor’d in the sleepy 
west, 

After the full completion of fair day,— 

For rest divine upon exalted couch 

And slumber in the arms of melody, 

He pac’d away the pleasant hours of ease 

With stride colossal, on from hall to hall ; 

While far within each aisle and deep 
recess, 

His winged minions in close clusters 
stood, 

Amaz’d and full of fear ; like anxious men 

Who on wide plains gather in panting 
troops, 

When earthquakes jar their battlements 
and towers. 

Even now, while Saturn, rous’d from icy 
trance, 

Went step for step with Thea through 
the woods, 

Hyperion, leaving twilight in the rear, 

Came slope upon the threshold of the 
west ; 

Then, as was wont, his palace-door flew 
ope 

In smoothest silence, save what solemn 
tubes, 

Blown by the serious Zephyrs, gave of 
sweet 

And wandering sounds, slow-breathed 
melodies ; 

And likea rose in vermeil tint and shape, 

In fragrance soft, and coolness to the eye, 

That inlet to severe magnificence 

Stood full blown, for the God to enter in. 


He enter’d, but he enter’d full of wrath; 

His flaming robes stream’d out beyond 
his heels, 

And gave a roar, as if of earthly fire. 

That scar’d away the meek ethereal 

Hours 

made their dove-wings tremble. 

On he flared, 

From stately nave to nave, from vault 
to vault, 

Through bowers of fragrant and en- 
wreathed light, 

And diamond-paved lustrous long ar- 
cades, 

Until he reach’d the great main cupola; 


And 


There standing fierce beneath, he 
stamped his foot, 

And from the basements deep to the high 
towers 

Jarr’d his own golden region ; and before 

The quavering thunder thereupon had 


ceas’d, ' 

His voice leapt out, despite of godlike 
curb, 

To this result: ‘‘O dreams of day and 
night ! 


O monstrous forms! O effigies of pain! 

O spectres busy in a cold, cold gloom ! 

O lank-ear’d Phantoms of black-weeded 
pools ! 

Why do I know ye? why have I seen 
ye? why 

Is my eternal essence thus distrauglit 

To see and to behold these horrors new ? 

Saturn is fallen, am I too to fall ? 

Am I to leave this haven of my rest, 

This cradle of my glory, this soft clime, 

This calm luxuriance of blissful light, 

These crystalline pavilions, and pure 
fanes, 

Of all my lucent empire? It is left 

Deserted, void, nor any haunt of mine. 

The blaze, the splendor, and the sym- 
metry, 

I cannot see—but darkness, death and 
darkness. 

Even here, into my centre of repose, 

The shady visions come to domineer, 

Insult, and blind, and stifle up my 

omp.— 

Fall !—No, by Tellus and her briny robes! 

Over the fiery frontier of my realms 

I will advance a terrible right arm 

Shall scare that infant thunderer, rebel 


Jove, 

And bid old Saturn take his throne 
again,” — 

He spake, and ceas’d, the while a heavier 
threat 


Held struggle with his throat but came 
not forth ; 

For as in theatres of crowded men 

Hubbub increases more they call out 
Sp iush hy? 

So. at Hyperion’s words the Phantoms 
pale 

Bestirr’d themselves, thrice horrible and 
cold ; 

And from the 
stood 

A mist arose, as from ascummy marsh, 

At this, through all his bulk an agony 

Crept gradual, from the feet unto the 
crown, 


mirror’d level where he 


414 





Like a lithe serpent vast and muscular 

Making slow way, with head and neck 
convuls’d 

From over-strained might. 
fled 

To the eastern gates, and full six dewy 
hours 

Before the dawn in season due should 
blush, 

He breath’d fierce breath against the 
sleepy portals. 

Clear’d them of heavy vapors, 
them wide 

Suddenly on the ocean’s chilly streams. 

The planet orb of fire, whereon he rode 

Each day from east to west the heavens 
through, 

Spun round in sable curtaining of clouds: 

Not therefore veiled quite, blindfold, 

and hid, 

But ever and anon the glancing spheres, 

Circles, and arcs, and broad-belting 
colure, 

Glow’d through, and wrought upon the 
muffling dark 

Sweet-shaped lightnings from the nadir 
deep 

Up to the zenith,—hieroglyphics old, 

Which sages and keen-eyed astrologers 

Then living on the earth, with laboring 
thought 

Won from the gaze of many centuries : 

Now lost, save what we find on remnants 
huge 

Of stone, or marble swart ; their import 
gone, 

Their wisdom long 
wings this orb 

Possess’d for glory, 
wings, 

Ever exalted at the God’s approach : 

And now, from forth the gloom their 
plumes immense 

Rose, one by one, till all outspreaded 
were ; 

While still the dazzling globe maintain’d 
eclipse, 

Awaiting for Hyperion’s command. 

Fain would he have commanded, fain 
took throne 

And bid the day begin, if but for change. 

He might not :—No, though a primeval 


Releas’d, he 


burst 


since fled.—Two 


two fair argent 


God : 
The sacred seasons might not be 
disturb’d. 


Therefore the operations of the dawn 
Stay’d in their birth, even as here ’tis told. 
Those silver wings expanded sisterly, 
Kager to sail their orb; the porches wide 


BRITISH POETS 


Open’d upon the dusk demesnes of night ; 

And the bright Titan, phrenzied with 
new woes, 

Unus’d to bend, by hard compulsion bent 

His spirit to the sorrow of the time ; 

And all along a dismal rack of clouds, 

Upon the boundaries of day and night, 

He stretch’d himself in grief and radi- 
ance faint. 

There as he lay, the Heaven with its 
stars 

Look’d down on him with pity, and the 
voice 

Of Coelus, from the universal space, 

Thus whisper’d low and solemn in his 
ear. 

‘‘O brightest of my children dear, earth- 
born 

And sky-engendered, Son of Mysteries 

All unrevealed even to the powers 

Which met at thy creating ; at whose joy 

And palpitations sweet, and pleasures 
soft, 

I, Coelus, wonder, how they came and 
whence ; 

And at the fruits thereof what shapes 
they be, 

Distinct, and visible ; symbols divine, 

Manifestations of that beauteous life 


Diffus’d unseen throughout eternal 
space ; 
Of these new-form’d art thou, oh 


brightest child ! 

Of these, thy brethren and the God- 
desses ! 

There is sad feud among ye, and rebel- 
lion 

Of son against his sire. I saw him fall, 

I saw my first-born tumbled from his 
throne! 

To me his arms were spread,.to me his 
voice 

Found way from forth the thunders 
round his head ! 

Pale wox I and in vapors hid my face. 

Art thou, too, near such doom? vague 
fear there is: 

For I have seen my sons most unlike 
Gods. 

Divine ye were created, and divine 

In sad demeanor, solemn, undisturb’d, 

Unruffled, like high Gods, ye liv’d and 
ruled : 

Now I behold in you fear, hope, and 
wrath; 

Actions of rage and passion ; even as 

I see them, on the mortal world beneath, 

In men who die.—This is the grief, O 
Son ! 


KEATS 


Sad sign of ruin, sudden dismay, and 
fall! 

Yet do thou strive; as thou art capable, 

As thou canst move about, an evident 
God ; 

And canst oppose to each malignant hour 

Ethereal presence :—I am but a voice; 

My life is but the life of winds and tides, 

No more than winds and tides can I 


avail :— 

But thou canst.—Be thou therefore in 
the van 

Of circumstance ; yea, seize the arrow’s 
barb 


Before the tense string murmur.-—To 
the earth ! 

For there thou wilt find Saturn, and 
his woes. 

Meantime I will keep watch on thy 
bright sun, 

And of thy seasons 
nurse.” — 

Ere half this region-whisper had come 
down, 

Hyperion arose, and on the stars 

Lifted his curved lids, and kept them 
wide 

Until it ceas’d; and still he kept them 
wide: , 

And still they were the same bright, 
patient stars. 

Then with aslow incline of his broad 
breast, 

Like to a diver in the pearly seas, 

Forward he stoop’d over the airy shore, 

And plung’d all noiseless into the deep 
night. 


be a_ careful 


BOOK II 


Just at the self-same beat of Time’s wide 
wings 

Hyperion slid into the rustled air, 

And Saturn gain’d with Thea that sad 

lace 

Where Cybele and the bruised Titans 
mourn’d. 

It was a den where no insulting light 

Could glimmer on their tears; where 
their own groans 

They felt, but heard not, for the solid 


roar 

Of thunderous waterfalls and torrents 
hoarse, 

Pouring a constant bulk, uncertain 
where, 


Crag jutting forth to crag, and rocks 
that seem’d 


Ever as if just rising from a sleep, 


415 


Forehead to forehead held their mon- 
strous horns ; 

And thus in thousand hugest phantasies 

Made a fit roofing to this nest of woe, 

Instead of thrones, hard flint they sat 
upon, 

Couches of rugged stone, and slaty ridge 

Stubborn’d with iron. All were not as- 
sembled : 

Some chain’d in torture, and some wan- 
dering. 

Coeus, and Gyges, and Briareiis, 

Typhon, and Dolor, and Porphyrion, 

With many more, the brawniest in as- 
sault, 

Were pent in regions of laborious breath ; 

Dungeon’d in opaque element, to keep 

Their clenched teeth still clench’d, and 
all their limbs © 

Lock’d up like veins of metal, crampt 
and screw’d ; 

Without a motion, save of their big 
hearts 

Heaving in pain, and horribly convuls’d 

With sanguine feverous boiling gurge 
of pulse. 

Mnemosyne was straying in the world ; 

Far from her moon had Phoebe wan- 
dered ; 

And many else were free to roam abroad, 

But for the main, here found they covert 
drear. 

Scarce images of life, one here, one there, 

Lay vast and edgeways; like a dismal 
cirque 

Of Druid stones, upon a forlorn moor, 

When the chill rain begins at shut of 
eve, 

In dull November, and their chancel 
vault, 

The Heaven itself, is blinded throughout 
night. 

Each one kept shroud, nor to his neigh- 
bor gave 

Or word, or look, or action of despair. 

Creiis was one ; his ponderous iron mace 

Lay by him, and a shatter’d rib of rock 

Told of his rage, ere he thus sank and 
pined. 

Taipetus another ; in his grasp, 

A serpent’s plashy neck; its barbed 
tongue 

Squeez’d from the gorge, and all its 
uncurl’d length 

Dead; and because the creature could 


not spit 
Its poison in the eyes of conquering 
Jove. [most, 


Next Cottus: prone he lay, chin upper- 


416 

As though in pain; for still upon the 
flint 

He ground severe his skull, with open 
mouth 

And eyes at horrid working. Nearest 
him 


Asia, born of most enormous Caf, 

Who cost her mother Tellus keener 
pangs, 

Though feminine, than any of her sons: 

More thought than woe wasin her dusky 
face, 

For she was prophesying of her glory ; 

And in her wide imagination stood 

Palm-shaded temples, and high rival 
fanes, 

By Oxus or in Ganges’ sacred isles. 

Even as Hope upon her anchor leans, 

So leant she, not so fair, upon a tusk 

Shed from the broadest of her elephants. 

Above her, on a crag’s uneasy shelve, 

Upon his elbow rais’d, all prostrate else, 

Shadow’d Enceladus; once tame and 
mild 

As grazing ox unworried in the meas ; 

Now  tiger-passion’d, lion-thoughted, 
wroth, 

He meditated, plotted, and even now 

Was hurling mountains in that second 
war, 

Not long delay’d, that scar’d the younger 
Gods 

To hide themselves in forms of beast and 
bird. 

Nor far hence Atlas; and beside him 
prone 

Phorcus, the sire of Gorgons. 
bor’d close 

Oceanus, and Tethys, in whose lap 

Sobb’d Clymene among her tangled hair. 

In midst of all lay Themis, at the feet 

Of Ops the queen all clouded round 
from sight ; 

No shape distinguishable, 
when 

Thick night confounds the pine-tops with 
the clouds : 

And many else whose names may not be 
told. 

For when the Muse’s wings are air-ward 
spread, 

Who shall delay her flight ? 
must chant 

Of Saturn, and his guide, who now had 
climb’d [depth 

With damp and slippery footing from a 

More horrid still. Above a sombre cliff 

Their heads appear’d, and up their 
stature grew 


Neigh- 


more than 


And she 





BRITISH RPOE TS 





Till on the level height their steps found 
ease : 

Then Thea spread abroad her trembling 
arms 

Upon the precincts of this nest of pain, 

And sidelong fix’d her eye on Saturn’s 
face : 

There saw she direst strife ; the supreme 
(rod 

At war with all the frailty of grief, 

Of rage, of fear, anxiety, revenge, 

Remorse, spleen, hope, but most of all 


despair. 
Against these plagueshe strove in vain ; 
for Fate 


Had pour’d a mortal oil upon his head, 

A disanointing poison :so that Thea, 

Affrighted, kept her still, and let him 
pass 

First onwards in, among the fallen 
tribe. 


As with us mortal men, the laden 

heart 

Is persecuted more, and fever’d more, 

When it is nighing tothe mournful house 

Where other hearts are sick of the same 
bruise ; 

So Saturn, as he walk’d into the midst, 

Felt faint, and would have sunk among 
the rest, 

But that he met Enceladus’s eye, 

Whose mightiness, and awe of him, at 

once 

like an 

shouted, 

‘Titans, behold your God!” at which 
some groan’d ; 

Some started on their feet; some also 
shouted ; 

Some wept, some wail’d, all bow’d with 
reverence ; 

And Ops, upifting her black folded veil, 

Show’d her pale cheeks, and all her 
forehead wan, s 

Her eye-brows thin and jet, and hollow 


Came inspiration; and he 


eyes. . 

There a a roaring in the bleak-grown 
pines 

When Winter lifts his voice ; there is a 
noise 

Among immortals when a God gives 
sign, 

With hushing finger, how he means to 
load 


His tongue with the full weight of utter- 
less thought, 

With thunder, and with music, and with 
pomp : 


KEATS 





Such noise is like the roar of bleak- 
grown pines ; 

Which, when it ceases in this mount- 
ain’d world, 

No other sound succeeds; but ceasing 
here, 

Among these fallen, Saturn’s voice there- 
from 

Grew up like organ, that begins anew 

Its strain, when other harmonies, stopt 
short, 

Leave the dinn’d air vibrating silverly. 

Thus grew it up—‘‘ Not in my own sad 
breast, 

Which is its own great judge and 
searcher out, 

Can I find reason why ye should be thus: 

Not in the legends of the first of days, 

Studied from that old spirit-leaved book 

Which starry Uranus with finger bright 

Sav’d from the shores of darkness, when 
the waves 

Low-ebb’d still hid it up in shallow 
gloom ;— 

And the which book ye know I ever kept 

For my firm-based footstool :—Ah, in- 
firm ! 

Not there, nor in sign, symbol, or portent 

Of element, earth, water, air, and fire,— 

At war, at peace, or inter-quarrelling 

One against one, or two, or three, or all 

Each several one against the other three, 

As fire with air loud warring when rain- 
floods 

Drown both, and press them both against 
; earth’s face, 
Where, finding sulphur, a quadruple 


wrath 

Unhinges the poor world ;—not in that 
strife, 

Wherefrom I take strange lore, and read 
it deep, 


Can I find reason why ye should be thus ; 

No, no-where can unriddle, though I 
search,— 

And pore on Nature’s universal scroll 

Even to swooning, why ye, Divinities, 

The first-born of all shap’d and palpable 


ods, 

Should cower beneath what, in com- 
parison, 

Is untremendous might. 
here, 

O’erwhelm’d, and spurn’d, and batter’d, 
ye are here ! 

O Titans, shall I say ‘ Arise !’—Ye groan; 

Shall I say ‘Crouch!’—Ye = groan. 
What can I then ? 

O Heaven wide! O unseen parent dear ! 


27 


Yet ye are 


417 

What can I! Tell me, all ye brethren 
Gods, 

How we can war, how engine our great 
wrath ! 


O speak your counsel now, for Saturn’s 


ear 
Ts all a-hunger’d. Thou, Oceanus, 
Ponderest high and deep ; and in thy face 
I see, astonied, that severe content 
Which comes of thought and musing ; 
give us help!” 


So ended Saturn; and the God of the 
Sea, 
Sophist and sage, from no Athenian 
grove, 
But cogitation in his watery shades, 
Arose, with locks not oozy, and began, 
In murmurs, which his first-endeavor- 
ing tongue 
Caught infant-like from the far foamed 
sands. 
‘O ye, whom wrath consumes! who, 
passion-stung, 
Writhe at defeat, 
agonies ! 
Shut up your senses, stifle up your ears, 
My voice is not a bellows unto ire. 
Yet listen, ye who will, whilst I bring 
proof 
How ye, perforce, must be content to 
stoop ; 
And in the proof much comfort will 
ive, 
If ye will take that comfort in its truth. 
We fall by course of Nature’s law, not 
force 
Of thunder, or of Jove. 
thou 
Hast sifted well the atom-universe ; 
But for this reason, that thou art the 
King, 
And only blind from sheer supremacy, 
One avenue was shaded from thine eyes, 
Through which I wandered to eternal 
truth. 
And first, as thou wast not the first of 
powers, 
So art thou not the last ; it cannot be; 
Thou art not the beginning nor the end. 
From chaos and parental darkness came 
Light, the first fruits of that intestine 
broil 


and nurse your 


Great Saturn, 


That sullen ferment, which for wondrous 
ends 

Was ripening in itself. The ripe hour 
came, 

And with it light, and light, engender- 
ing 


418 


Upon its own producer, forthwith 
touch’d 

The whole enormous matter into life. 

Upon that very hour, our parentage, 

The Heavens and the Earth, were mani- 
fest : 

Then thou first-born, and we the giant- 
race, 

Found ourselves ruling new and beau- 
teous realms. 

Now comes the pain of truth, to whom 
tis pain ; 

O folly ! for to bear all naked truths, 

And to envisage circumstance, all calm, 


That is the top of sovereignty. Mark 
well ! 

As Heaven and Earth are fairer, fairer 
far 


Than Chaos and blank Darkness, though 
once chiefs ; 

And as we show beyond that Heaven 
and Earth 

In form /and shape compact and beau- 
tiful, 

In will, in action free, companionship, 

And thousand other signs of purer life ; 

So on our heels a fresh perfection treads, 

A power more strong in beauty, born 
of us 

And fated to excel us, aS we pass 

In glory that old Darkness: nor are we 

Thereby more conquer’d, than by us the 
rule 

Of shapeless Chaos. 
soil 

Quarrel with the proud forests it hath 
fed, 

And feedeth still, more comely than 
itself ? 

Can it deny the chiefdom of green 
groves ? 

Or shall the tree be envious of the dove 

Because it cooeth, and hath snowy wings 

To wander wherewithal and find itsjoys ? 

We are such forest-trees, and our fair 
boughs 

Have bred forth, not pale solitary doves, 

But eagles golden-feather’d, who do 
tower 

Above us in their beauty, and must reign 

In right thereof ; for ‘tis the eternal law 

That first in beauty should be first in 
might : 

Yea, by that law, another race may drive 

Our conquerors to mourn as we do now. 

Have ye beheld the young God of the 
Seas, 

My dispossessor ? Have yeseen his face ? 

Have ye beheld his chariot, foam’d along 


Say, doth the dull 


BRITISH POETS 


By noble winged creatures he hath 
made ? 

I saw him on the calmed waters scud, 

With such a glow of beauty in his eyes, 

That it enfore’d me to bid sad farewell 

To all my empire: farewell sad I took, 

And hither came, to see how dolorous 
fate 

Had wrought upon ye; and how I might 
best 

Give consolation in this woe extreme. 

Receive the truth, and let it be your 
balm.” 


Whether through poz’d conviction, or 

disdain, 

They guarded silence, when Oceanus 

Left murmuring, what deepest thought 
can tell? | 

But so it was, 
space, 

Save one whom none regarded, Cly- 
mene ; 

And yet she answer’d not, only com- 
plain’d, 

With hectic lips, and eyes up-looking 
mild, 

Thus wording timidly among the fierce : 

‘‘O Father, Iam here the simplest 
voice, 

Andallmy knowledge is that jov is gone, 

And this thing woe crept in among our 
hearts, 

There to remain for ever, as I fear: 

I would not bode of evil, if I thought 

So weak a creature could turn off the help 

Which by just right should come of 
mighty Gods ; 

Yet let me tell my sorrow, let me tell 

Of what I heard, and how it made me 


none answer’d for a 


weep, 

And know that we had parted from all 
hope. 

I stood upon a shore, a pleasant shore, 

Where a sweet clime was breathed from 
a land 

Of fragrance, quietness, and trees, and 
flowers. 

Full of calm joy it was, as I of grief ; 

Too full of joy and soft delicious 
warmth ; 

So that I felt a movement in my heart 

To chide, and to reproach that solitude 

With songs of misery, music of our woes ; 

And sat me down, and took a mouthed 
shell 

And murmur’d into it, and made me- 
lody— 

O melody no more! for while I sang, 


KEATS 


And with poor skill let pass into the 
breeze 

The dull shell’s echo, from a bowery 
strand 

Just opposite, an island of the sea, 

There came enchantment with the shift- 
ing wind, 

That did both drown and keep alive my 
ears. 

I threw my shell away upon the sand, 

Anda wave fill’dit, as my sense was fill’d 

With that new blissful golden melody. 

A living death was in each gush of 
sounds, 

Each family of rapturous hurried notes, 

That fell, one after one, yet all at once, 

Like pearl beads dropping sudden from 
their string : 

And then another, then another strain, 

Each like a dove leaving its olive perch, 

With music wing’d instead of silent 


plumes, 

To hover round my head, and make me 
sick 

Of joy and grief at once. Grief over- 
came, 


And I was stopping up my frantic ears, 

When, past all hindrance of my trem- 
bling hands, 

A voice came sweeter, sweeter than all 
tune, 

And still it cried, 
Apollo ! 

The morning-bright Apollo! 
Apollo!’ 

I fled, it follow’d me, 
‘ Apollo!’ 

O Father, and O Brethren, had ye felt 

Those pains of mine; O Saturn, hadst 
thou felt, 

Ye would not call this too indulged 
tongue 


Presumptuous, in thus venturing to be 
heard.” 


‘Apollo! young 


young 


and _ cried 


So far her voice flow’d on, like timo- 

rous brook 

That, lingering along a pebbled coast, 

Doth fear to meet the sea: but sea it 
met, 

And shudder’d; for the overwhelming 
voice 

Of huge Enceladus swallow’d it in wrath: 

The ponderous syllables, like sullen 
waves 

In the half glutted hollows of reef-rocks, 

Came booming thus, while still upon 
his arm [contempt. 

He lean’d; not rising, from supreme 


419 


‘* Or shall we listen to the over-wise, 

Or to the over-foolish giant, Gods ? 

Not thunderbolt on thunderbolt, till all 

That rebel Jove’s whole armory were 
spent, 

Not world on world upon these shoulders 
piled. 

Could agonize me more than baby-words 

In midst of this dethronement horrible. 

Speak! roar! shout! yell! ye sleepy 
Titans all. 

Do ye forget the blows, the buffets vile ? 

Are ye not smitten by ayoungling arm? 

Dost thou forget, sham Monarch of the 
Waves, 

Thy scalding in the seas? 
I rous’d 

Your spleens with so few simple words 
as these? 

O joy ! for now I see ye are not lost : 

O joy! for now I see a thousand eyes 

Wide glaring for revenge !””—As this he 
said, 

He lifted up his stature vast, and stood, 

Still without intermission speaking thus: 

‘* Now ye are flames, I'll tell you how 
to burn, 

And purge the ether of our enemies ; 

How to feed fierce the crooked stings of 
fire, 

And singe away the swollen clouds of 
Jove, 

Stifling that puny essence in its tent. 

O let him feel the evil he hath done ; 

For though I scorn Oceanus’s lore, 

Much pain have I for more than loss of 
realms :. 

The days of peace and slumberous ,calm 
are fled ; 

Those days. all innocent of scathing war, 

When all the fair Existences of heaven 

Came open-eyed to guess what we would 
speak :— 

That was before our brows were taught 
to frown, 

Before our lips knew else but solemn 
sounds ; 

That was before we knew the winged 
thing, 

Victory, might be lost, or might be won. 

And be ye mindful that Hyperion, 

Our brightest brother, still is undis- 
graced— 

Hyperion, lo! his radiance is here!” 


What, have 


All eyes were on Enceladus’s face, 
And they beheld, while still Hyperion’s 
name 
Flew from his lips up to the vaulted rocks, 


420 





BRITISH’ POETS 





A pallid gleam across his features stern : — 


Not savage, for he saw full many a God 

Wroth as himself. He look’d upon 
them all, 

And in each face he saw a gleam of 


light, 

But splendider in Saturn’s, whose hoar 
locks 

Shone like the bubbling foam about a 
keel 

When the prow sweeps into a midnight 
cove. 


In pale and silver silence they remain’d, 

Till suddenly a splendor, like the morn, 

Pervaded all the beetling gloomy steeps, 

All the sad spaces of oblivion, 

And every gulf, and every chasm old, 

And every height, and every sullen 
depth, 

Voiceless, or hoarse with loud tormented 
streams : 

And all the everlasting cataracts, 

And all the headlong torrents far and 

‘ near, ' 

Mantled before in darkness and huge 
shade, 

Now saw the light and made it terrible. 

It was Hyperion—a granite peak 

His bright feet touch’d, and there he 
stay’d to view 

The misery his brilliance had betray’d 

To the most hateful seeing of itself. 

Golden his hair of short Numidian curl, 

Regal his shape majestic, a vast shade 

In midst of his own brightness, like the 
bulk 

Of Memnon’s image at the set of sun 

To one who travels from the dusking 
Kast : 

Sighs, too, as mournful as that Mem- 
non’s harp [tive 

He utter’d, while his hands contempla- 

He press’d together, and in silence 
stood. 

Despondence seiz’d again the fallen Gods 

At sight of the dejected King of Day, 

And many hid their faces from the 
light : 

But fierce Enceladus sent forth his eyes 

Among the brotherhood ; and, at their 
glare, 

Uprose Iapetus, and Creiis too, 

And Phoreus, sea-born, and together 
strode 

To where he towered on his eminence. 

There those four shouted forth old 
Saturn’s name ; 

Hyperion from the peak loud answered, 
‘* Saturn !” 


Saturn sat near the Mother of the Gods, 

In whose face was no joy, though all the 
Gods 

Gave from their hollow throats the name 
of ‘‘ Saturn !” 


BOOK III 


THUS in alternate uproar and sad peace, 

Amazed were those Titans utterly. 

O leave them, Muse! O leave them to 

their woes; 

For oe art weak to sing such tumults 
Itek 

A solitary sorrow best befits 

Thy lips, and antheming a lonely grief. 

Leave ee O Muse! for thou anon wilt 
nc 

Many a fallen old Divinity 

Wandering in vain about bewildered 


shores. 

Meantime touch piously the Delphic 
harp : 

And not a wind of heaven but will 
breathe 


In aid soft warble from the Dorian flute ; 

For lo! ’tis for the Father of all verse. 

Flush every thing that hath a vermeil 
hue, 

Let the rose glow intense and warm the 
air, 

And let the clouds of even and of morn 

Float in voluptuous fleeces o’er the hills ; 

Let the red wine within the goblet boil, 

Cold as a bubbling well; let faint-lipp’d 


shells, 

On sands, or in great deeps, vermilion 
turn 

Through all their labyrinths ; and let the 
maid 

Blush keenly, as with some warm kiss 
surpris’d. 

Chief isle of the embowered Cyclades, 

Rejoice, O Delos, with thine olives 
green, 


And poplars, and lawn-shading palms, 
and beech, 

In which the zephyr breathes the loud- 
est song, 

And hazels thick, dark-stemm/’d beneath 
the shade: 

Apollo is once more the golden theme! 

NARS was he, when the Giant of the 

un 

Stood bright, amid the sorrow of his 
peers? 

Together had he left his mother fair 

And his twin-sister sleeping in their 
bower, 


KEATS 





_And in the morning twilight wandered 
forth 

Beside the osiers of a rivulet, 

Full ankle-deep in lilies of the vale. 

The nightingale had ceas’d, and a few 


stars 

Were lingering in the heavens, while the 
thrush 

Began calm-throated. Throughout all 
the isle 


There was no covert, no retired cave 
Unhaunted by the murmurous noise of 


waves, 

Though scarcely heard in many a green 
recess. 

He listen’d, and he wept, and his bright 
tears 

Went pone down the golden bow he 

eld. 
Thus with half-shut suffused eyes he 


stood, 

While from beneath 
boughs hard by 

With solemn step an awful Goddess 
came, 

And there was purport in her looks for 
him, 

Which he with eager guess began to read 

Perplex’d, the while melodiously he 


some cumbrous 


said : 

‘* How cam’st thou over the unfooted 
sea ? 

Or hath that antique mien and robed 
form 


Mov’d in these vales invisible till now ? 
Sure I have heard those vestments 
sweeping o’er . 

The fallen leaves, when I have sat alone 
In cecol mid-forest. Surely I have traced 
The rustle of those ample skirts about 

These grassy solitudes, and seen the 


flowers 
Lift up their heads, as still the whisper 
pass’d. [ fore, 


Goddess! I have beheld those eyes be- 

And their eternalcalm, and all that face, 

Or I have dream’d.”—‘ Yes,” said the 
supreme shape, 

‘**Thou hast dream’d of me; and awak- 
ing up 

Didst find a lyre all golden by thy side, 

Whose strings touch’d by thy fingers, 
all the vast 

Unwearied ear of the whole universe 

Listen’d in pain and pleasure at the birth 

Of such new tuneful wonder. Is’t not 

strange 

That thou shouldst weep, so gifted? 
Tell me, youth, 


421 





What sorrow thou canst feel; for I am 
sad 

When thou dost shed a tear: explain 
thy griefs 

To one who in this lonely isle hath been 

The pane? of thy sleep and hours of 
ife, 

From the young day when first thy in- 
fant hand 

Pluck’d witless the weak flowers, till 
thine arm 

Could bend that bow heroic to all times. 

Show thy heart’s secret to an ancient 
Power 

Who hath forsaken 
thrones 

For prophecies of thee, and for the sake 

Of loveliness new born.’”—Apollo then, 

With sudden scrutiny and gloomless eyes, 

Thus answer’d, while his white melodi- 
ous throat 

Throbb’d with the syllables.—‘‘ Mne- 
mosyne ! 

Thy name is on my tongue, I know not 
how ; . 

Why should I tell thee what thou so 
well seest ? 

Why should I strive to show what from 
thy lips 

Would come no mystery ? For me, dark, 
dark, 

And painful vile oblivion seals my eyes : 

I strive to search wherefore I am so sad, 

Until a melancholy numbs my limbs ; 

And then upon the grass I sit, and moan, 

Like one who once had wings.—O why 
should I 

Feel curs’d and thwarted, when the 
liegeless air 


old and sacred 


Yields to my step aspirant? why 
should I 
Spurn the green turf as hateful to my 


feet ? 

Goddess benign, point forth some un- 
known thing : 

Are there not other regions than this 
isle? 

What are the stars? There is the sun, 
the sun ! 

And the most patient brilliance of the 
moon ! 

And stars by thousands! 
the way 

To any one particular beauteous star, 

And I will flit into it with my lyre, 

And make its silvery splendor pant with 
bliss. 

I. have heard the cloudy thunder; 
Where is power ? 


Point me out 


422 


BRITISH POETS 





Whose hand, whose what 
divinity 

Makes this alarum in the elements, 

While I here idle listen on the shore 

In fearless yet in aching ignorance ? 

O tell me, lonely Goddess, by thy harp, 

That waileth every morn and eventide, 

Tell me why thus I rave, about these 
groves! - 

Mute thou remainest—Mute ! yet I can 
read 

A wondrous lesson in thy silent face : 

Knowledge enormous makes a God of 
me. 

Names, deeds, gray legends, dire events, 
rebellions, 

Majesties, sovran voices, agonies, 

Creations and destroyings, all at once 

Pour into the wide hollows of my brain, 

And deify me, as if some blithe wine 

Or bright elixir peerless I had drunk, 

And so become immortal.”—Thus the 


essence, 


od, 
While his enkindled eyes, with level 
glance 
Beneath his white soft temples, steadfast 
kept 
Trembling with light upon Mnemosyne. 
Soon wild commotions shook him, and 
made flush 
All the immortal fairness of his limbs ; 
Most like the struggle at the gate of 


death ; 

Or liker still to one who should take 
leave 

Of pale immortal death, and witha 


pang 
As hot as death’s is chill, with fierce 
convulse 
Die into life : so young Apollo anguish'd ; 
His very hair, bis golden tresses famed 
Kept undulation round his eager neck. 
During the pain Mnemosyne upheld 
Her arms as one who prophesied. —At 


length 
Apollo shriek’d ;—and lo! from all his 
limbs “7 
Celestial (i% 8" *) etaIe Canes Ex)! 7 
ta a ke 


September, 18 18—September, 1819. 1820. 


LA BELLE DAME SANS MERCI 


BALLAD 


O WHAT can ail thee, knight-at-arms, 
Alone and palely loitering ! 

The sedge has wither’d from the lake, 
And no birds sing. 


O what can ail thee, knight-at-arms ! 
So haggard and so woe-begone ? 
The squirrel’s granary is full, 
And the harvest’s done. 


I see a lily on thy brow 
With anguish moist and fever dew, 
And on thy cheeks a fading rose 
Fast withereth too. 


I met a lady in the meads, 
Full beautiful— a faery’s child, 

Her hair was long, her foot was light, 
And her eyes were wild. 


I made a garland for her head, 

And bracelets too, and fragrant zone ; 
She look’d at me as she did love, 

And made sweet moan. 


I set her on my pacing steed, 
And nothing else saw all day long. 
For sidelong would she bend, and sing 
A faery’s song. 


She found me roots of relish sweet, 
And honey wild, and manna dew, 

And sure in language strange she said— 
‘*T love thee true.” 


She took me to her elfin grot, 
And there she wept, and sigh’d full 
sore, 
And there I shut her wild wild eyes 
With kisses four. 


And there she lulléd me asleep, 

And there I dream’d—Ah ! woe betide ! 
The latest dream I ever dream’d 

On the cold hill’s side. 


I saw pale kings and princes too, 
Pale warriors, death-pale were they 
ale 
They cr ied—‘ La Belle Dame sans Merci 
Hath thee in thrall!” 


I saw their stary’d lips in the gloam, 
With horrid warning gaped wide, 

And I awoke and found me here, 
On the cold hill’s side. 


And this is why I sojourn here, 
Alone and palely loitering, 
Though the sedge is wither’d from the 
“lake 
And no birds sing. 


1819, May 10, 1820. 


KEATS 


ON FAME 
I 


FAME, like a wayward girl, will still be 
coy . 

To those who woo her with too slavish 
knees, 

But makes surrender to some thought- 
less boy, 

And dotes the more upon a heart at ease ; 

She is a Gipsy,—will not speak to those 

Who have not learnt to be content with- 
out her ; 

A Jilt, whose ear was never whisper’d 
close, 

Who thinks they scandal her who talk 
about her ; 

A very Gipsy is she, Nilus-born, 

Sister-in-law to jealous Potiphar ; 

Ye love-sick Bards! repay her scorn for 
scorn ; 

Ye Artists lovelorn! madmen that ye 
are ! 

Make your best bow to her and bid adieu, 

Then, if she likes it, she will follow you. 


II 
How fever’d is the man, who cannot 
look 
Upon his mortal days with temperate 
blood, 


Who vexes all the leaves of his life’s book, 

And robs his fair name of its maiden- 
hood ; 

It is as if the rose should pluck herself, 

Or the ripe plum finger its misty bloom, 

As if a Naiad, like a meddling elf, 

Should darken her pure grot with muddy 
gloom : 

But the rose leaves herself upon the briar, 

For winds to kiss and grateful bees to 
feed, 

And the ripe plum still wears its dim 
attire, 

The undisturbed lake has crystal space ; 

Why then should man, teasing the world 
for grace, 

Spoil his salvation for a fierce miscreed ? 

1819. 1848. 


423 


TO SLEEP 


O SOFT embalmer of the still midnight, 


Shutting with careful fingers and 
benign, 
Our gloom-pleased eyes, embowered 


from the light, 

Enshaded in forgetfulness divine : 

O soothest Sleep! if soit please thee, 
close, 

In midst of this thine hymn, my willing 
eyes, 

Or wait the amen, ere thy poppy throws 

Around my bed its lulling charities ; 

Then save me,or the passéd day will 
shine 

Upon my pillow, breeding many woes,— 

Save me from curious conscience, that 
still lords 

Its strength for darkness, burrowing like 
a mole; 

Turn the key deftly in the oiléd wards, 

And seal the hushed casket of my soul. 

1819. 1848. 


BRIGHT STAR! WOULD I WERE 
STEADFAST AS THOU ART 


BRIGHT star! would I were steadfast as 
thou art— 

Not in lone splendor hung aloft the 
night, 

And watching, with eternal lids apart, 

Like Nature’s patient sleepless Eremite, 

The moving waters at their priestlike 
task 

Of pure ablution round earth’s human 
shores, 

Or gazing on the new soft fallen mask 

Of snow upon the mountains and the 


moors— 

No—yet still steadfast, still unchange- 
able, 

Pillow’d upon my fair love’s ripening 
breast, 


To feel for ever its soft fall and swell, 
Awake for ever in a sweet unrest, 


Still, still to hear her tender-taken 
breath, 
And so live ever—or else swoon to death. 


1820. 1848. 


LANDOR 


LIST OF REFERENCES 
EpITIons 


Works, 8 volumes, Chapman & Hall, London, 1874-76. Works, 10 vol- 
umes, edited by C. G. Crump, The Macmillan Co. Poems, Dialogues in 
Verse, and Epigrams, 2 volumes, edited by C. G. Crump, the Macmillan Co. 
Letters and other unpublished Writings, edited by 8. Wheeler, London, 
1897. Letters, Private and Public, edited by 8. Wheeler, London, 1899. 
Selections from Landor, edited by Sidney Colvin (Golden Treasury 
Series). 

BioGRAPHY 


* Forster (John), W. 8. Landor: A Biography, 2 volumes, 1869; also 
(abridged) as Vol. I. of Works, 1874. * Corvin (Sidney), Landor (Eng- 
lish Men of Letters Series). 


REMINISCENCES AND EARLY CRITICISM 


Rosinson (HH. C.), Diary, Vol. II, Chap. XII, etc. Muirrorp (M. R.), 
Recollections of a Literary Life. Brownrne (Elizabeth Barrett), in Horne’s 
New Spirit of the Age. Emerson, Natural History of Intellect. Dz 
QuincEy, Masson’s edition, Vol. XI. Durry (C. Gavan), Conversations 
with Carlyle. Hunt (Leigh), Lord Byron and his Contemporaries. BLEss- 
1nGTON (Marguerite), The Idler in Italy. Mapprn (R. R.), The Literary 
Life and Correspondence of the Countess of Blessington. See also the 
Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning. 


Later Criticism 


* Boynton (H. W.), Poetry of Landor, in the Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 90, 
page 126, July, 1902. * Coxnvin (Sidney), Preface to the volume of Se- 
lections in the Golden Treasury Series. * Dowprn (Edward), Studies in 
Literature. Evans (EK. W.), A Study of Landor. Hentey (W. H.), Views 
and Reviews. Ler (Vernon), Studies in Literary Psychology : The Rhe- 
toric of Landor, in the Contemporary Review, Vol. 84, Page 856, 1905. 
Lowe tt (J. R.), Latest Literary Essays and Addresses. Oxrpnantr (Mar- 
garet), Victorian Age of English Literature. Sainrspury (George), 
Essays in English Literature, Second Series. ScuppEr (H. E.), Men and 
Letters: Landor as a Classic. *Srrepman (E. C.), Victorian Poets. 
STEPHEN (Leslie), Hours in a Library, Vol. Il. * Swrysurne, Miscella- 
nies. * Woopserry (G. E.), Studies in Letters and Lite. 

Brooks (S. W.), English Poets. Dr Vere (Aubrey), Essays, chiefly on 
Poetry, Vol. II. Drvey (J.), Comparative Estimate of Modern English 
Poets. Dixon (W. M.), English Poetry. Dowprn (Edward), French 


424 


LANDOR 425 


Revolution and English Literature. Evans (EK. Waterman, Jr.), Walter 
Savage Landor: A Critical Study. Hurron (Lawrence), Landmarks of 
Florence. Mircnery (D. G.), England’s Lands, Letters and Kings. Nrn- 
ciont (E.), Letteratura inglese: Colvin, Biografia di Landor. Sarrazrn 
(G.), Poétes modernes de Angleterre. ScuuyLer (E.), Italian Influences. 


TRIBUTES IN VERSE; Mrmorrat VERSES, ETC. 


* * Watson (W.), Landor’s Hellenics. Japp (A. H.), Landor, in Sted- 
man’s Victorian Anthology. * * Swrvspurne, Poems and Ballads, First 
Series: In Memory of Walter Savage Landor. * Swinsurne, Studies in 
Song : Song for the Centenary of Walter Savage Landor. 


BreLioGRAPHY 


WuEELER (8.), in Letters and Other Unpublished Writings of Landor. 


LANDOR 


GEBIR Nor shield immense nor coat of massive 
mail, 

BOOK I But that upon their towering heads they 
bore . 


Each a huge stone, refulgent as the stars. 

This told she Dalica. then cried aloud, 

‘*Tf on your bosom laying down my head 

I sobb’d away the sorrows of a child, 

If I have always, and Heav’n knows I 
have, 


THE INVASION. THE MEETING OF GEBIR 
AND CHAROBA. THE LOVES OF Ta- 
MAR AND THE SEA-NYMPH. THE SEA- 
SHELL. THE WRESTLING-MATCH. — 


I sine the fates of Gebir. He had 


dwelt Next toa mother’s held a nurse’s name, 
Among those mountain-caverns which | Succor this one distress, recall those 
retain days, 
His labors yet, vast halls and flowing | Love me, tho’ ’twere because you lov’d 
wells, me then.” 
Nor have forgotten their old master’s But whether confident in magic rites 
name . Or touched with sexual pride to stand 
Though sever’d from his people: here, implor’d, 
incensed Dalica smiled, then spake: ‘‘ Away 


By meditating on prinieval wrongs, 

He blew his battle-horn, at which uprose 

Whole nations; here, ten thousand of 
most might 

He call’d aloud; and soon Charoba saw 

His dark helm hover o’er the land of 
Nile. 

What should the virgin do? should 

royal knees 

Bend suppliant? or defenceless hands 
engage 


those fears, 

Though stronger than the strongest of 
his kind, 

He falls; on me devolve that charge; 
he falls. 

Rather than fly him, stoop thou to al- 
lure ; 

Nay, journey to his tents. A city stood 

Upon that coast, they say, by Sidad 
built, [ground 

Whose father Gad built Gadir; on this 

Men of gigantic force, gigantic arms ? Perhaps he sees an ample room for war. 

For ’twas reported that nor sword suf- | Persuade him to restore the walls him- 
ficed, self 


a tp ste eel et eee er, “Pn aaneeeieercions 


426 


In honor of his ancestors, persuade .. . 
But wherefore this advice? young, un- 
espoused, 
Charoba want 
queen !”’ 
A). Dalical” 
exclaim’d, 
‘“Could I encounter that fierce frightful 
man ? 
Could I speak? no, nor sigh.” 
canst thou reign ?” 
Cried Dalica; ‘‘ Yield empire or com- 
] mae 
Unfixed, though seeming fixed, her 
eyes downcast, 
The wonted buzz and bustle of the court 
From far through sculptured galleries 
met her ear; 
Then lifting up her head, the ‘evening 
sun 
Pour’d a fresh splendor on her burnished 
throne: 
The fair Charoba, the young queen, com- 
plied. 
But Gebir, when he heard of her ap- 
proach, 


persuasions! and a 


the shuddering maid 


“And 


Laid by his orbed shield ; his vizor-helm, 


His buckler and his corset he laid by, 


And bade that none attend him: at his 
side 

Two faithful dogs that urge the silent 
course, 

Shaggy, deep-chested, crouched; the 
crocodile, 

Crying, oft made them raise their flaccid 
ears 


And push their heads within their mas- 
ter’s hand. 

There was a brightening paleness in his 
face, 

Such as Diana rising o’er the rocks 

Shower’d on the lonely Latmian ; on his 
brow 

Sorrow there was, yet nought was there 
severe. 

But when the royal'damsel first he saw, 

Faint, hanging on her hand-maid, and 
her knees 

Tottering, as from the motion of the 
car, 

His eyes looked earnest on her, 
those eyes 

Show’d, if they had not, that they might 
have, lov’d, 

For there was pity in them at that hour. 

With gentle speech, and more with 
gentle looks, 

He sooth’d her ; but lest Pity go beyond 

And crost Ambition lose her lofty aim 


and 


BRITISH POETS 


Bending, he kissed her garment, and 
retired. 

He went, nor slumber’d in the sultry 
noon, e 

When viands, couches, generous wines, 
persuade, 

And slumber most refreshes; nor at night, 

When heavy dewsare laden with disease; 

And blindness waits not there for linger- 


ing age. 

Ere morning dawn’d behind him, he 
arrived 

At those rich meadows where young 
Tamar fed 


The royal flocks entrusted to his care. 

‘* Now,” said he to himself,‘* will I repose 

At least this burthen on a_ brother’s 
breast.” 

His brother stood before him: he, amazed, 

Rear’d suddenly his head, and thus began. 

“Tsit thou, brother! Tamar, is it thou! 

Why, standing on the valley’s utmost 
verge, 

Lookest thou on that dull and dreary 
shore 

Where beyond sight Nile blackens all 
the sand? 

And why that sadness? When I past our 
sheep 

The dew-drops were not shaken off the 
bar, 

Therefore if one be wanting, ’tis untold.” 


“Yes, one is wanting, nor is that 
untold,” 
Said Tamar ; ‘‘and this dull and dreary 
shore 


Is neither dull nor dreary at all hours.” 

Whereon the tear stole silent down his 
cheek, 

Silent, but not by Gebir unobserv’d : 

Wondering he prey awhile, and pitying 
spake. 

‘‘ Let me approach thee ; does the morn- 
ing light 

Scatter this wan purocien o’er thy brow, 

This faint blue lustre under both thine 
eyes ?”’ 

‘¢O brother, is this pity or reproach ?” 
Cried Tamar, ‘“‘ cruel if it be reproach, 
If pity, O how vain!” ‘*Whate’er it be 
That grieves thee, I will pity, thou but 

eak, 
And I ee tell thee, Tamar, pang for 
yang.’ 

$f Gebirl ! then more than brothers are 

we now ! 
Everything (take my hand) will I confess. 
I neither feed the flock nor watch the 
fold ; 


LANDOR 





How can I, lostin love? But, Gebir, why 
That anger which has risen to your 
cheek ? 
Can other men? could you? what, no 
reply ! 
And still more anger, and still worse 
conceal’d ! 
Are these your promises ? 
this?” 
**Tamar, I well may pity what I feel— 
Mark me aright—TI feel for thee — 
proceed— 
Relate me all.” ‘‘ Then will I all relate,” 
Said the young shepherd, gladden’d 
from his heart. 
“-Twas evening, though not sunset, and 
the tide 
Level with these green meadows, seem’d 
yet higher : 
*Twas pleasant ; and I loosen’d from my 
neck 
The pipe you gave me, and began to play. 
O that I ne’er had learnt the tuneful art ! 
It always brings us enemies or love. 
Well, I was playing, when above the 
waves 
Some swimmer’s head methought I saw 
ascend ; 
I, sitting still, survey’d it, with my pipe 
Awkwardly held before my lips half- 
closed, 
Gebir! it was a Nymph! 
_ divine ! 
I cannot wait describing how she came, 
How I was sitting, how she first assum’d 
The sailor; of what happen’d there re- 
mains 
Enough to say, and too much to forget. 
The sweet deceiver stepped upon this 
bank 
Before I was aware; for with surprise 
Moments fly rapid as with love itself, 
Stooping to tune afresh the hoarsen’d 
reed, 
Theard a rustling, and where that arose 
My glance first lighted on her nimble 


your pity 


a Nymph 


feet. 

Her feet resembled those long shells 
explored 

By him who to befriend his steed’s dim 
sight 

Would blow the pungent powder in the 
eye. 

Her eyes too! O immortal Gods! her 
eyes 

Resembled—what could they resemble ? 
what 


Ever resemble those? Even her attire 
Was not of wonted woof nor vulgar art: 


427 


Her mantle show’d the yellow samphire- 
pod, 

Her girdle the dove-color’d wave serene. 

‘*Shepherd,” said she, ‘‘and will you 
wrestle now, 

And with the sailor’s hardier race en- 
gage?” 

I was rejoiced to hear it, and contrived 

How to keep up contention : could I fail 

By pressing not too strongly, yet to 
press ? 

‘‘Whether a shepherd, as indeed you 
seem, 

Or whether of the hardier race you boast, 

Iam not daunted ; no; I will engage.” 

‘* But first,” said she, ‘‘ what wager will 
you lay?” 

‘A sheep,” I answered : ‘‘add whate’er 
you will.” 

‘*T can not,” she replied, ‘‘ make that 
return : 

Our hided vessels in their pitchy round 

Seldom, unless from rapine, hold a sheep, 

But I have sinuous shells of pearly hue 

Within, and they that lustre have im- 
bibed 

In the sun’s palace-porch, where when 
unyoked 

His chariot-wheel stands midway in the 
wave: 

Shake one and it awakens, then apply 

Its polisht lips to your attentive ear, 

And it remembers its august abodes, 

And murmurs as the ocean murmurs 


there. 

And I have others given me by the 
nymphs, 

Of sweeter sound than any pipe you 
have; 

But we, by Neptune! for no pipe con- 
tend, 


This timea sheep I win, a pipe the next.” 
Now came she forward eager to engage, 
But first her dress, her bosom then sur- 


vey’d, 

And heav’d it, doubting if she could 
deceive. 

Her bosom seem’d, inclos’d in haze like 
heav’n, 

To baffle touch, and rose forth unde- 
fined : 

Above her knee she drew the robe suc- 
cinct, 

Above her breast, and just below her 
arms. 


‘This will preserve my breath when 
tightly bound, 

If struggle and equal strength should so 
constrain.” 


428 


Thus, pulling hard to fasten it, she spake, 
And, rushing at me, closed: I thrill’d 


throughout 

And seem’d to lessen and shrink up with 
cold. 

Again with violent impulse gushed my 
blood, 

And hearing nought external, thus ab- 
sorb’ d, 

I heard it, rushing through each turbid 
vein, 

Shake my ‘unsteady swimming sight in 
air. 

Yet with unyielding though uncertain 
arms 

I clung around her neck; the vest be- 
neath 

Rustled against our slippery limbs en- 
twined 


Often mine springing with eluded force 
Started aside and trembled till replaced : 
And when I most succeeded, asI thought, 
My bosom and my throat felt so com- 


pressed 

That life was almost quivering on my 
lips, 

Yet nothing was there painful: these 
are signs 


Of secret arts and not of human might ; 
What arts I cannot tell; I only know 
My eyes grew dizzy and my strength 


decay’d; 

I was indeed o’ercome ... with what 
regret, 

And more, with what confusion, when 
I reached 

The fold, and yielding up the sheep, she 
cried, 

‘‘This pays a shepherd to a conquering 
maid.” 

She smiled, and more of pleasure than 
disdain 


Was in her dimpled chin and liberal lip, 
And eyes that languished, lengthening, 
just like love. 
She went away; I on the wicker gate 
Leant, and could follow with my eyes 
alone. 
The sheep she carried easy as a Cloak ; 
But when | heard its bleating, as I did, 
And saw, she hastening on, its hinder 
feet [slip, 
Struggle, and from her snowy shoulder 
One shoulder its poor efforts had un- 
veil’d, [tears ; 
Then all my passions mingling fell in 
Restless then ran I to the highest ground 
To watch her ; she was gone; gone down 
the tide ; 


BRITISH POETS 


And the long moonbeam on the hard 
wet sand 
Lay like a jasper column half up-rear’d.” 
‘‘ But, Tamar! tell me, will she not 
return ?” 
“She will return, yet not before the 
moon 
Again is at the full: she promised this, 
Tho’ when she promised I could not 
reply. ” 
‘* By all the Gods I pity thee! go on, 
Fear not my anger, look not on my 
shame, 
For when a lover only hears of love 
He finds his folly out, and is ashamed. 
Away with watchful nights and lonely 
days, 
Contempt of earth and aspect up to 
heaven, 
With contemplation, with humility, 
A tatter’d cloak that pride wears when 
deform’d, 
Away with all that hides me from my- 
self, 
Parts me from others, whispers I am 
wise: 
From our own wisdom less is to be reapt 
Than from the barest folly of our friend. 
Tamar! thy pastures, large and rich, 
afford 
Flowers to thy bees and herbage to thy 
sheep, 
But, battened on too much, the poorest 
croft 
Of thy poor neighbor yields what thine 
denies.” 
They hasten’d to the camp, and Gebir 
there 
Resolved his native country to forego, 
And order’d from those ruins to the right 
They forthwith raise .a city. Tamar 
heard [told, 
With wonder, tho’ in passing ’twas half- 
His brother’s love, and sigh’d upon his 
own. 1798.2 09 


ROSE AYLMER 


AH what avails the sceptred race, 
Ah what the form divine! 

What every virtue, every grace! 
Rose Aylmer, all were thine. 


1 The exact dates of writing, for nearly all of 
Landor’s poems, are unknown; and the same is 
true for Browning, and, on the’ whole, for all of 
the following poets. From this point on, there- 
fore, the poems of each author will be arranged 
chronologically according to the dates of publi- 
cation, and the dates of writing (if known) will 
be given only when especially important, 


— “a 


LANDOR 


Rose Aylmer, whom these wakeful eyes 
May weep, but never see, 

A night of memories and of sighs 
I consecrate to thee. 1806. 


REGENERATION 2 


WE are what suns and winds and waters 
make us ; [the rills 
The mountains are our sponsors, and 
Fashion and win their nursling with 
their smiles. 
But where the land is dim from tyranny, 
There tiny pleasures occupy the place 
Of glories and of duties; as the feet 
Of fabled fairies when the sun goes down 
Trip o’er the grass where wrestlers 
strove by day. [above, 
Then Justice, 
Is more inconstant than the buoyant form 
That burst into existence from the froth 
_Of ever-varying ocean: what is best 
Then becomes worst; what loveliest, 
most deformed. 
The heart is hardest in the softest climes, 
The passions flourish, the affections die. 
O thou vast tablet of these awful truths, 
That fillest all the space between the seas, 
Spreading from Venice’s deserted courts 
To the Tarentine and Hydruntine mole, 
What lifts thee up ? what shakes thee ? 
tis the breath [life ! 
Of God. Awake, ye nations! spring to 
Let the last work of his right hand appear 
Fresh with his image, Man. Thou 
recreant slave 
That sittest afar off and helpest not, 
O thou degenerate Albion! 3 with what 
shame 
1 Rose Aylmer, the daughter of Henry, fourth 
Baron Aylmer, was Landor’s companionin his 
walks about Swansea (‘‘ Abertawy”’ ) in Wales. 
She went to India, and died there in 1800. Lan- 
dor speaks of her again in two poems written 
late in life: The Three Roses, 1858, (see page 
457); and Abertawy, 1859, the concluding lines of 
which almost equal in beauty this early lyric, 
usually considered the most beautiful of his 
poems: 
Where is she now? Call’d far away, 
By one she dared not disobey, 
To those proud halls, for youth unfit, 
Where princes stand and judges sit. 
Where Ganges rolls his widest wave 
She dropped her blossom in the grave ; 
Her noble name she never changed, 
Nor was her nobler heart estranged. 
2 Inspired by the struggle of the Greek people 
for independence. 
3** What those amongst us who are affected by 
a sense of national honor most lament, is, that 
England, whose generosity would cost her noth- 
ing and whose courage would be unexposed to 
fatality, stands aloof.’ (Landor, in the Dedica- 
tion ot Imaginary Conversations, 1829. ) 


% 


eall’d the Eternal One’ 


Do I survey thee, pushing forth the 
sponge 

At thy spear’s length, in mockery at the 
thirst 

Of holy Freedom in his agony, 

And prompt and keen to pierce the 
wounded side ! 

Must Italy then wholly rot away 

Amid her slime, before she germinate 

Into fresh vigor, into form again ? 

What thunder bursts upon mine ear! 
some isle 

Hath surely risen from the gulfs pro: 
found, 

Eager to suck the sunshine from the 
breast 

Of beauteous Nature, and to catch the 
gale 

From golden Hermus and Melena’s brow. 

A greater thing than isle, than continent, 

Than earth itself, than ocean circling 
earth, 

Hath risen there ; regenerate Man hath 
risen. 

Generous old bard of Chios ! not that Jove 

Deprived thee in thy latter days of sight 

Would I complain, but that no higher 
theme 

Than a disdainful youth, a lawless king, 

A pestilence, a pyre, awoke thy ‘song, 

When on the Chian coast, one javelin’s 


throw 

From where thy tombstone, where thy 
cradle, stood, 

Twice twenty self-devoted Greeks as- 
sail’d 


The naval host of Asia, at one blow} 

Scattered it into air... and Greece 
was free... 

And ere these glories beam’d, thy day 
had closed. 

Let all that Elis ever saw, give way, 

All that Olympian Jove e’er smiled 
upon : 

The Marathonian columns never told 

A tale more glorious, never Salamis, 

Nor, faithful in the centre of the false, 

Platea, nor Anthela, from whose mount 

Benignant Ceres wards the blessed Laws, ° 

And sees the Amphictyon dip his weary 
foot 

In the warm streamlet of the strait be- 
low. ; 

Goddess! altho’ thy brow was never 
rear’d [sail’d 

Among the powers that guarded or as- 

1 Alluding to the victory of Canaris over the 


Turkish fleet. Compare the poem of Victor 
Hugo on the same battle, in Les Orientales. 


430 


Perfidious Ilion, parricidal Thebes, 
Or other walls whose war-belt e’er in- 


closed 
Man’s congregated crimes and vengeful 
pain, 


Yet hast thou touched the extremes of 
grief and joy ; 

Grief upon Enna’s mead and Hell’s as- 
cent, 

A solitary mother ; joy beyond, 

Far beyond, that thy woe, in this thy 
fane: 

The tears were human, but the bliss 
divine. 

I, in the land of strangers, and depressed 

With sad and certain presage for my 


own, 

Exult at hope’s fresh dayspring, tho’ 
afar, 

There where my youth was not unexer- 
cised 

By chiefs in willing war and faithful 


song: 

Shades as they were, they were not 
empty shades, 

Whose bodies haunt our world and blear 
our sun, 

Obstruction worse than swamp and 
shapeless sands. 

Peace, praise, eternal gladness, to the 
souls 

That, rising from the seas 
heavens, 

Have ransom’d first their country with 
their blood ! 

O thou immortal Spartan! at whose 
name 

The marble table sounds beneath my 
palins, 

Leonidas ! even thou wilt not disdain 

To mingle names august as these with 
thine ; 

Nor thou, twin-star of glory, thou whose 
rays 

Stream’d over Corinth on the double 
sea, 

Achaian and Saronic; whom the sons 

Of Syracuse, when Death removed thy 
light, 

Wept more than slavery ever made them 
weep, 

But shed (if gratitude is sweet) sweet 
tears. 

The hand that then pour’d ashes o’er 
their heads 

Was loosen’d from its desperate chain 
by thee. 

What now can press mankind into one 
mass, 


into the 


BRITISH POETS 


For Tyranny to tread the more secure ? 
From gold alone is drawn the guilty 
wire {tone 
That Adulation trills: she mocks the 
Of Duty, Courage, Virtue, Piety, 
And under her sits Hope. O how unlike 
That graceful form in azure vest array’d, 
With brow serene, and eyes on heaven 


alone 

In patience fixed, in fondness unob- 
scured ! 

What monsters coil beneath the spread- 
ing tree 


Of Despotism! what wastes extend 
around ! 

What poison floats upon the distant 
breeze ! 

But who are those that cull and deal its 
fruit ? 

Creatures that shun the light and fear 
the shade, 

Bloated and fierce, Sleep’s mien and. 
Famine’s cry. 

Rise up again, rise in thy dignity, 

Dejected Man! and scare this brood 
away. 1824. 


CHILD OF A DAY, THOU KNOWEST 
NOT 


CHILD of a day, thou knowest not 

The tears that overflow thine urn, 
The gushing eyes that read thy lot, 

Nor, if thou knewest, couldst return ! 
And why the wish! the pure and blessed 

Watch like thy mother o’er thy sleep. 
O peaceful night! O envied rest ! 

Thou wilt not ever see her weep. 

1831. 


LYRICS, TO IANTHE 


AWAY my verse; and never fear, 

As men before such beauty do ; 
On you she will not look severe, 

She will not turn her eyes from you. 
Some happier graces could I lend 

That in her memory you should live, 
Some little blemishes might blend, 
' For it would please her to forgive. 





When Helen first saw wrinkles in her 


face 

(‘Twas when some fifty long had settled 
there 

And intermarried and branched off 


awide) 


LANDOR 431 


She threw herself upon her couch and 
wept: ; 

On this side hung her head, and over 
that 


Listlessly she let fall the faithless brass 
That made the men as faithless. 
But when you 
Found them, or fancied them, and would 
not hear 
That they were only vestiges of smiles, 
Or the impression of some amorous hair 
Astray from cloistered curls and roseate 
band, [perhaps 
Which had been lying there all night 
Upon a skin so soft, ‘‘ No, no,” you said, 
‘Sure, they are coming, yes, are come, 
are here: 
Well, and what matters it, while thou 
art too!” 





Ianthe! you are call’d to cross the sea! 
A path forbidden me / 
Remember, while the Sun his blessing 
sheds 
Upon the mountain-heads, 
How often we have watched him laying 
down 
His brow, and dropped our own 
Against each other’s, and how faint and 
short ° 
And sliding the support ! 
What will succeed it now? 
unblessed, 
Janthe! nor will rest 
But on the very thought that swells with 
pain. 
O bid me hope again ! 
O give me back what Earth, what (with- 
out you) 
Not Heaven itself can do, 
One of the golden days that we have 
past ; 
And let it be my last! 
Or else the gift would be, however sweet, 
Fragile and incomplete. 


Mine is 





Theld her hand, the pledge of bliss, 
Her hand that trembled and with- 
drew ; 
She bent her head before my kiss . . 
My heart was sure that hers was true. 


Now I have told her I must part, 
She shakes my hand, she bids adieu, 
Nor shuns the kiss. Alas, my heart ! 
Hers never was the heart for you. 





Pleasure ! why thus desert the heart 
In its spring-tide ? 

IT could have seen her, I could part, 
And but have sigh’d ! 


O’er every youthful charm to stray, 
To gaze, to touch . . 

Pleasure! why take so much away, 
Or give so much ! 


Mild is the parting year, and sweet 
The odor of the falling spray ; 

Life passes on more rudely fleet, 
And balmless is its closing day. 


I wait its close, I court its gloom, 

But mourn that never must there fall 
Or on my breast or on my tomb 

The tear that would have sooth’d it all. 


Past ruin’d [lion Helen lives, 
Alcestis rises from the shades ; 
Verse calls them forth; tis verse that 
gives 
Immortal youth to mortal maids. 


Soon shall Oblivion’s deepening veil 
Hide all the peopled hills you see, 
The gay, the proud, while lovers hail 
These many summers you and me. 
1831. 


FIESOLAN IDYL 


HERE, where precipitate Spring, with 
one light bound 

Into hot Summer’s lusty arms, expires, 

And where go forth at morn, at eve, at 
night, 

Soft airs that want the lute to play with 
"em, 

And softer sighs that know not what 
they want, 

Aside a wall, beneath an orange-tree, 

Whose tallest flowers could tell the low- 
lier ones 

Of sights in Fiesolé right up above, 

While I was gazing a few paces off 

At what they seem’d to show me with 
their nods, 

Their frequent whispers and their point- 
ing shoots, 

A gentle maid came down the garden- 
steps [lap. 

And gathered the pure treasure in her 


432 


I heard the branches rustle, and stepped 
forth 

To drive the ox away, or mule or goat, 

Such I believed it must be. How could I 

Let beast o’erpower them? When hath 
wind or rain 

Borne hard upon weak plant that wanted 
me, 

AndI (however they might bluster 

- round) 

Walked off? ’Twere most ungrateful: 
for sweet scents 

Are the swift vehicles of still sweeter 
thoughts, 

And nurse and pillow the dull memory 

That would let drop without them her 
best stores. 

They bring me tales of youth and tones 
of love. 

And ’tis and ever was my wish and way 

To let all flowers live freely, and all die 

(Whene’er their Genius bids their souls 
depart) 

Among their kindred in their native 
place. 

I never pluck the rose ; the violet’s head 

Hath shaken with my breath upon its 
bank 

And not reproached me : the ever-sacred 
cup 

Of the pure lily hath between my hands 

Felt safe, unsoil’d, nor lost one grain of 


gold. 

Isaw the light that made the glossy 
leaves 

More glossy; the fair arm, the fairer 
cheek 


Warmed by the eye intent on its pursuit ; 

I saw the foot that, altho’ half-erect 

From its gray slipper, could not lift her 
up 

To what she wanted: 
branch 

And gather’d her some blossoms; since 
their hour 

Was come, and bees had wounded them, 
and flies 

Of harder wing were working their way 
thro’ 

And scattering them in fragments under- 
TOO 

So crisp were some, they rattled un- 
evolved, 

Others, ere broken off, fell into shells, 

For such appear the petals when de- 


I held down a 


tached 
Unbending, brittle, lucid, white like 
snow, [sun : 


And like snow not seen thro’, by eye or 


BRITISH®POETS 


Yet every one her gown received from 


me 

Was fairer than the first. Ithought not 
SO, 

But soshe praised them to reward my 
care. 


I said, ‘‘ You find the largest.” 
‘This indeed,” 
Cried she, ‘‘is large and sweet.” 
held one forth, 
Whether for meto look at or to take 
She knew not, nor did I; but taking it 
Would best have solved (and this she 
felt) her doubt. 
I dared not touch it; for it seemed a 
part 
Of her own self; fresh, full, the most 
mature 
Of blossoms, yet a blossom ; with a touch 
To fall, andyet unfallen. Shedrew back 
The boon she tender’d, and then, finding 
not 
The ribbon at her waist to fix it in, 
Dropped it, as loth to dropit, on the rest. 
1831. — 


She 


FOR AN EPITAPH AT FIESOLE 


Lo! where the four mimosas blend their 
shade 

In calm repose at last is Landor laid, 

For ere he slept he saw them planted 
here 

By her his soul had ever held most dear, 

And he had lived enough when he had 
dried her tear. 1831. 


UPON A SWEET-BRIAR 


My briar that smelledst sweet 
When gentle spring’s first heat 
Ran through thy quiet veins,— 
Thou that wouldst injure none, 
But wouldst be left alone, 
Alone thou leavest me, and nought of 
thine remains. 


What! hath no poet’s lyre 
O’er thee, sweet-breathing briar, 
Hung fondly, ill or well? 
And yet methinks with thee 
A poet’s sympathy, 
Whether in weal or woe, in life or death, 
might dwell. 


Hard usage both must bear, 

Few hands your youth will rear, 
Few bosoms cherish you; 

Your tender prime must bleed 


LANDOR 


Ere you are sweet, but freed 
From life, you then are prized; thus 
prized are poets too. 


ose ee eee 


And art thou yet alive? 
And shall the happy hive 
Send out her youth to cull 
Thy sweets of leaf and flower, 
And spend the sunny hour 
With thee, and thy faint heart with 
murmuring music lull? 


Tell me what tender care, 
Tell me what pious prayer, 

Bade thee arise and live. 
The fondest-favored bee 
Shall whisper nought to thee 

Move loving than the song my grateful 
muse shall give. 
1834.1 


THE MAID’SS LAMENT 


I LOVED him not ; and yet now he is gone 
I feel I am alone. 
I check’d him while hespoke ; yet could 
he speak, 
Alas! I would not check. 
For reasons not to love him once I 
sought, 
And wearied all my thought 
To vex myself and him: I now would 
give 
My love, could he but live 
Who lately lived for me, and when he 
found 
*Twas vain, in holy ground 
He hid his face amid the shades of 
death. 
I waste for him my breath 
Who wasted his for me: but mine re- 
turns, 
And this lorn bosom burns 
With stifling heat, heaving it up in sleep, 
And waking me to weep 
Tears that had melted his soft heart: 
for years 
Wept he as bitter tears. 
Merciful God! such was _ his latest 
prayer, | 
These may she never share. 
Quieter is his breath, his breast more 
cold, 
Than daisies in the mould, 
Where children spell, athwart 
churchyard gate, 


the 


1This and the following poem are from the 
Citation of William Shakespeare. 


28 


433 


His name and life’s brief date. 


Pray for him, gentle souls, whoe’er you 


be, 
And oh! pray too for me. 
1834. 


THE SHADES OF AGAMEMNON 
AND IPHIGENEIA 1 


Iphigeneia. Father! I now may lean 
upon your breast, 
And you with unreverted eyes will grasp 
Iphigeneia’s hand. 
We are not shades 
Surely ! for yours throb yet. 
And did my blood 
Win Troy for Greece ? 
Ah! ’twas ill done, to shrink ; 
But the sword gleam’dso sharp ; and the 
good priest 
Trembled, and Pallas frown’d above, 


severe. 

Agamemnon. . Daughter! 

Iphigeneia. Beloved father! is the 
blade 


Again to pierce my bosom ? ‘tis unfit 
For sacrifice ; no blood is in its veins, 
No God requires it here: here are no 
wrongs 
To vindicate, no realms to overthrow. 
You standing as at Aulis in the fane, 
With face averted, holding (as before) 
My hand; but yours burns not, as then 
it burn’d. 
This alone shows me we are with the 
Blessed, 
Nor subject to the sufferings we have 
borne. 
I will win back past kindness. 
Tell me then, 
Tell how my mother fares who loved me 


so, 
And grievd, as ’twere for you, to see me 
part. . 


Frown not, but pardon me for tarrying 

Amid too idle words, nor asking how 

She prais’d us both (which most ?) for 
what we did. 

Agamemnon. Ye Gods who 

here! do human pangs 

Reach the pure soul thus far below ? do 
tears 

Spring in these meadows? 


govern 


1“T jmagine Agamemnon to descend from his 
horrible death, and to meet instantly his daugh- 
ter. By the nature of things, by the suddenness 
of the event, Iphigeneia can have heard nothing 
of her mother’s double crime, adultery and 
murder.’’ Aspasia to Cleone, introducing the 
poem as first given in Pericles and Aspasia, 1836. 


434 


Iphigeneia. No, sweet father, no. . 
I could have answered that; why ask 
the Gods? 
Agamemnon. Iphigeneia! O 
child ! the Earth 
Has gendered crimes unheard of hereto- 
fore, 
And Nature may have changed in her 
last depths, 
Together with the Gods and all their 
laws. 
Iphigeneia. Father! we must not let 
you here condemn ; 
Not, were the day less joyful: recollect 
We have no wicked here; no king to 
judge. 
Poseidon, we have heard, with bitter 
rage 
Lashes his foaming steeds against the 
skies, 
And, laughing with loud yell at winged 
fire, 
Innoxious to his fields and palaces 
Affrights the eagle from the sceptred 
hand ; 
While Pluto, gentlest brother of the 
three 
And happiest in obedience, views sedate 
His tranquil realm, nor envies theirs 
above. 
No change have we, not even day for 
night 
Nor spring for summer. 
All things are serene, 
Serene too be yourspirit ! None on earth 
Ever was half so kindly in his house, 
And so compliant, even to a child. 
Never was snatch’d your robe away from 
me, [man 
Though going to the council. The blind 
Knew his good king was leading him 
indoors, 


my 


Before he heard the voice that marshal’d 


« Greece. 
Therefore all prais’d you. 
Proudest men themselves 
In others praise humility’ and most 
Admire it in the sceptre and the sword. 
What then can make you speak thus 
rapidly 
And briefly ? in your step thus hesitate ? 
Are you afraid to meet among the good 
Incestuous Helen here ? 


Agamemnon. O! gods of hell! 

Iphigeneia. She hath not past the 
river. 

We may walk 

With our hands link’d nor feel our 


house’s shame. 


BRITISH POETS 


Agamemnon, Never mayst thou, Iphi- 
geneia, feel it! 
Aulis had no sharp sword, thou wouldst 


exclaim, 
Greece no avenger—I, her chief so late, 
Through Erebos, through Elysium, 


writhe beneath it. 
Iphigeneia. Come, I have better dia- 

dems than those 

Of Argos and Mycenai: come away, 

And I will weave them for you on the 
bank. 

You will not look so pale when you have 
walk’d 

A little in the grove, and have told all 

Those sweet fond words the widow sent 
her child. 

Agamemnon. O Earth! 

less upon thy shores ! 

(Aside.) The bath that bubbled with 
my blood, the blows 

That spilt it (O worse torture!) must 
she know? 

Ah! the first woman coming from My- 
cenal 

Will pine to pour this poison in her ear, 

Taunting sad Charon for his slow ad- 


I suffered 


vance. 
Iphigeneia ! 
Iphigeneia. Why thus turn away ? 
Calling me with such fondness! I am 
here, 


Father! and where you are, will ever be. 

Agamemnon. Thou art my child ; yes, 
yes, thou art my child. 

All was not once what all now is! Come 


on, 

Idol of love and truth! my child! my 
child ! 

(Alone.) Fell woman! ever false! 


false was thy last 

Denunciation, as thy bridal vow ; 

And yet even that found faith with me! 
The dirk 

Which sever’d flesh from flesh, where 
this hand rests, 

Severs not, as thou boastedst in thy 
scoffs, 

Iphigeneia’s love from Agamemnon : 

The wife’s a spark may lght, a straw 
consume, 

The daughter’s not her heart’s whole 
fount hath quench’d, 

Tis worthy of the Gods. and lives for 
ever, 

Iphigeneia. What spake my father 

to the Gods above ? 

Unworthy am I then to join in prayer? 

If, on the last, or any day before, 


LANDOR 435 


Of my brief course on earth, I did amiss, 
Say it at once, and let me be unblessed ; 
But, O my faultless father! why should 
you? 
And shun so my embraces ? 
Am I wild 

And wandering in my fondness ? 

We are shades ! 
Groan not thus deeply ; blight not thus 


the season 

Of full-orb’d gladness! Shades we are 
indeed, 

But mingled, let us feel it, with the 
blessed. | 


I knew it, but forgot it suddenly, 

Altho’ I felt it all at your approach. 

Look on me; smile with me at 
illusion. 

You are so like what you have ever been 

(Except in sorrow !) I might well forget 

I could not win you as I used to do. 

It was the first embrace since my de- 
scent 

IT ever aim’d at: those who love me live, 

Save one, who loves me most, and now 
would chide me. 

Agamemnon. We want not, O Iphi- 

geneia, we 

Want not embrace, nor kiss that cools 
the heart [more 

With purity, nor words that more and 

Teach what we know, from those we 
know, and sink 

Often most deeply where they fall most 


my 


light. 

Time was when for the faintest breath 
of thine 

Kingdom and life were little, 

Iphigeneia. Value them 
As little now. 
‘Agamemnon. Were life and kingdom 

all ! 


Iphigeneia. Ah! by our death many 
are sad who loved us. 

The little fond Electra, and Orestes 

So childish and so bold! O that mad 

boy ! 

They will be happy too. 

Cheer! king of men! 

Cheer! there are voices, songs—Cheer ! 

arms advance. 
Agamemnon, Come to me, soul of 
peace! These, these alone, 

These are not false embraces, 
Iphigeneia. Both are happy ! 
Agamemnon. Freshness breathes 

round me from some breeze above. 

What are ye, winged ones! with golden 

urns ? 


The Hours 


(Descending.) To each an urn we bring : 
Earth’s purest gold 
Alone can hold 
The lymph of the Lethean spring. 
We, son of Atreus ! we divide 
The dulcet from the bitter tide 
That runs athwart the paths of 
men. 
No more our pinions shalt thou see. 
Take comfort! We have done with 
thee, 
And must away to earth again. 
(Ascending.) Where thou art, thou 
Of braided brow, 
Thou cull’d too soon from Argive bowers, 
Where thy sweet voice is heard among 
The shades that thrill with choral song, 
None can regret the parted Hours. 


(As the Hours depart, the shades of the Argive 
warriors who had fought at Troy approach and 
chant in chorus the praises of Agamemnon and 
his daughter. ) 


Chorus of Argives 


Maiden! be thou the spirit that breathes 
Triumph and joy into our song! 


Wear and bestow these amaranth- 
wreaths, 
Iphigeneia—they belong 





To none but thee and her who reigns 
(Less chanted) on our bosky plains. 


Semi-chorus 


Iphigeneia ! ’tis to thee 

Glory we owe and victory. 

Clash, men of Argos, clash your 
arms, 

To martial worth and virgin charms. 


Other Semi-chorus 


Ye men of Argos! it was sweet 
To roll the fruits of conquest at the feet 
Whose whispering sound made bravest 
hearts beat fast. 
This we have known at home ; 
But hither we are come 
To crown the king who ruled us first 
and last. 


Chorus 


Father of Argos! king of men ! 
We chant the hymn of praise to 
thee. 
In serried ranks we stand again, 
Our glory safe, our country free. 


BRITISH “POETS 





436 
Clash, clash the arms we bravely 
bore 
Against Scamander’s God-defended 
shore. 


Semi-chorus 


Blessed art thou who hast repell’d 
Battle’s wild fury, Ocean’s whelming 


foam ; 
Blessed o’er all, to have beheld 
Wife, children, house avenged, and 


peaceful home ! 


Other Semi-chorus 


We, too, thou seest, are now 
Among the happy, though the 
aged brow 
From sorrow for us we could not 
protect, 
Nor, on the polished granite of the 
well - 
Folding our arms, of spoils and 
perils tell, 
Nor lift the vase on the lov’d head 
erect. 


Semi-chorus 


What whirling wheels are those 
behind ? 
What plumes come flaring through 
the wind, 
Nearer and nearer? 
car 
He who defied the 
Powers of war 
Pelides springs ! Dust, dust are we 
To him, O king, who bends the knee, 
Proud only to be first in reverent praise 
of thee. 


Other Semi-Chorus 


Clash, clash the arms! None other race 

Shall see such heroes face to face. 

We toohave fought ; and they have seen 

Nor sea-sand gray nor meadow green 

Where Dardans_ stood against their 
men. 

Clash! Io Paean! clash again ! 

Repinings for lost days repress. 

The flames of Troy had cheer’d us less. 


From his 


heaven-born 


Chorus 


Hark! from afar more war-steeds neigh, 
Thousands o’er thousands rush this way. 
Ajax is yonder! ay, behold 

The radiant arms of Lycian gold ! 
Arms from admiring valor won, 


Tydeus! and worthy of thy son. 
"Tis Ajax wears them now; for he 
Rules over Adria’s stormy sea. 


He threw them to the friend who lost 
(By the dim judgment of the host) 
Those wet with tears which Thetis gave 
The youth most beauteous of the brave. 
In vain! the insatiate soul would go 
For comfort to his peers below. 

Clash! ere we leave them all the plain, 
Clash! Io Paean ! onceagain.! 1836. 


THE DEATH OF ARTEMIDORA 2 


‘* ARTEMIDORA ! Gods invisible, 

While thou art lying faint along the 
couch, 

Have tied the sandal to thy slender feet 

And stand beside thee, ready to convey 

Thy weary steps where other rivers flow. 

Refreshing shades will waft thy weari- 
ness 

Away, and voices like thy own come near 

And nearer, and solicit an embrace.” 

Artemidora sigh’d, and would have 

pressed 

The hand now pressing hers, but was too 
weak. 


| Iris stood over her dark hair unseen 


While thus Elpencr spake. He looked-into 

Eyes that had given light and life ere- 
while 

To those above them, but now dim with 
tears 

And wakefulness. Again he spake of joy 

Eternal. At that word, that sad word, 


JOY, 

Faithful and fond her bosom heav’d once 
more: 

Her head fell back ; and now a loud deep 
sob 

Swell’d thro’ the darken’d chamber ; 
‘twas not hers. 


CORINNA TO TANAGRA, FROM 
ATHENS 


TANAGRA ! think not I forget 

Thy beautifully storied streets ; 
Be sure my memory bathes yet 

In clear Thermodon, and yet greets 
The blithe and liberal shepherd-boy, 


1 See Landor’s own comment on this poem, p. 


440). 

21836, in Pericles and Aspasia. Slightly altered 
and included in the Hellenics, 1846, ete., from 
which the present text is taken. See Colvin’s 
comment on the poem, in his Life of Landor, 
pp. 193-4, 





LANDOR 437 


Whose sunny bosom swells with joy 
When we accept his matted rushes 
Upheav’d with sylvan fruit ; away he 

bounds, and blushes. 


A gift I promise : one I see 
Which thou with transport wilt re- 
ceive, 
The only proper gift for thee, 
Of which no mortal shall bereave 
In later times thy mouldering walls, 
Until the last old turret falls ; 
A crown, a crown from Athens won, 
A crown no God can wear, beside La- 
tona’s son. 


There may be cities who refuse 
To their own child the honors due, 
And look ungently on the Muse ; 
But ‘ever shall those cities rue 
The dry, unyielding, niggard breast, 
Offering no nourishment, no rest, 
To that young head which soon shall 
rise 
Disdainfully, in might and glory, to the 
skies. 


Sweetly where cavern’d Dirce flows 
Do white-arm’d maidens chant my 
lay, . 
Flapping the while with laurel-rose 
The honey-gathering tribes away ; 
And sweetly, sweetly Attic tongues 
Lisp your Corinna’s early songs ; 
To her with feet more graceful come 
The verses that have dwelt in kindred 
breasts at home. 


O let thy children lean aslant 
Against the tender mother’s knee, 
And gaze into her face, and want 
To know what magic there can be 
In words that urge some eyes to dance, 
While others as in holy trance 
Look up to heaven : be such my praise ! 
Why linger? Imust haste, or lose the 
Delphic bays. 1836. 


SAPPHO TO HESPERUS 


I HAVE beheld thee in the morning hour 

A solitary star, with thankless eyes, 

Ungrateful as Lam! who bade thee rise 

When sleepall night had wandered from 
my bower. 


Can it be true that thou art he 
Who shines now above the sea 
Amid a thousand, but more bright ? 


Ah yes! the very same art thou 

That heard me thenand hearest now... 

Thou seemest, star of love! to throb with 
light. 1836. 


LITTLE AGLAE 


TO HER FATHER, ON HER STATUE BEING 
CALLED LIKE HER 


FATHER ! the little girl we see 
Is not, I fancy, so like me ; 
You never hold her on your knee. 


When she came home, the other day, 
You kiss’d her; but I cannot say 
She kiss’d you first and ran away. 

1836. 


DIRCE 


STAND close around, ye Stygian set, 
With Dirce in one boat conveyed, 
Or Charon, seeing, may forget 
That he is old, and she a shade. 
1856. 


CLEONE TO ASPASTA 


WE mind not how the sun in the mid- 


sky 
Is hastening on; but when the golden 
orb 


Strikes the extreme of earth, and when 
the gulfs 

Of air and ocean open to receive him, 

Dampness and gloom invade us; then 

we think 

thus is it with Youth. 

feet 

Run on for sight; hour follows hour; 
fair maid 

Succeeds fair maid; bright eyes bestar 
his couch ; 

The cheerful horn awakens him; the 
feast, 

The revel, the entangling dance, allure, 

And voices mellower than the Muse’s 
own 

Heave up his buoyant bosom on their 
wave. 

A little while, and then—Ah Youth! 
Youth! Youth! 

Listen not to my words—but stay with 
me! 

When thou art gone, Life may go too; 
the sigh 

That rises is for thee, and not for Life. 

1836. 


Ah! Too fast his 


438 


ON LUCRETIA BORGIA’S HAIR 


BorGia, thou once wert almost too 


august 

And high for adoration; now thou’rt 
dust ; 

All that remains of thee these plaits 
unfold, 

Calm hair meandering in pellucid gold. 


1837. 
TO WORDSWORTH 


THOSE who have laid the harp aside 
And turn’d to idler things, 
From very restlessness have tried 
The loose and dusty strings, 
And, catching back some favorite strain, 
Run with it o’er the chords again. 


But Memory is not a Muse, 
O Wordsworth! though ’tis said 
They all descend from her, and use 
To haunt her fountain-head : 
That other men should work for me 
In the rich mines of Poesie, 


Pleases me better than the toil 

Of smoothing under hardened hand, 
With attic emery and oil, 

The shining point for Wisdom’s wand, 
Like those thou temperest ’mid the rills 
Descending from thy native hills. 
Without his governance, in vain, 

Manhood is strong, and Youth is bold. 


If oftentimes the o’er-piled strain, 

Clogs in the furnace and grows cold 
Beneath his pinions deep and frore, 
And swells and melts and flows no 

more, 
That is because the heat beneath 

Pants in its cavern poorly fed. 

Life springs not from the couch of 
Death, 
Nor Muse nor Grace can raise the 
dead ; 
Unturn’d then let the mass remain, 
Intractable to sun or rain. 


A marsh, where only flat leaves le, 
And showing but the broken sky, 

Too surely is the sweetest lay 

That wins the ear and wastes the day, 
Where youthful Fancy pouts alone 
And lets not Wisdom touch her zone. 


He who would build his fame up high, 
The rule and plummet must apply. 
Nor say, ‘‘ Tll do what I have plann’d,” 


BRIPISH POETS 


Before he try if loam or sand 

Be still remaining in the place 
Delved for each polished pillar’s base. 
With skilful eye and fit device 

Thou raisest every edifice, : 
Whether in sheltered vale it stand, 
Or overlook the Dardan strand, 

Amid the cypresses that mourn 
Laodameia’s love forlorn. 


We both have run o’er half the space 
Listed for mortal’s earthly race ; 

We both have crossed life’s fervid line, 
And other stars before us shine: 

May they be bright and prosperous 

As those that have been stars for us! 
Our course.by Milton’s light was sped, 
And Shakespeare shining overhead : 
Chatting on deck was Dryden too, 

The Bacon of the rhyming crew ; 
None ever cross’d our mystic sea 

More richly stored with thought than he; 
Tho’ never tender nor sublime, 

He wrestles with and conquers Time. 
To learn my lore on Chaucer’s knee, 

I left much prouder company ; 

Thee gentle Spenser fondly led, 

But me he mostly sent to bed. 


I wish them every joy above 

That highly blessed spirits prove, 

Save one: and that too shall be theirs, 

But after many rolling years, 

When ’mid their light thy light appears. 
1833. 1837. 


TO JOSEPH ABLETT 


Lorp of the Celtic dells, 
Where Clwyd listens as his minstrel 
tells 
Of Arthur, or Pendragon, or perchance 
The plumes of flashy France, 
Or, in dark region far across the main, 
Far as Grenada in the world of Spain, 


Warriors untold to Saxon ear, 

Until their steel-clad spirits reappear ; 
How happy were the hours that held 
Thy friend (long absent from his native 

home) ; 
Amid thy scenes with thee! how wide 
afield 
From all past cares and all to come! 


What hath Ambition’s feverish grasp, 
what hath 
Inconstant Fortune, panting Hope ; 
What Genius, that should cope 





LANDOR 


439 





With the heart-whispers in that path 
Winding so idly, where the idler stream 
Flings at the white-haired poplars 

gleam for gleam ? 


Ablett ! of all the days 
My sixty summers ever knew, 
Pleasant as there have been no few, 
Memory not one surveys 


Like those we spent together. Wisely 
spent 

Are they alone that leave the soul con- 
tent. 


Together we have visited the men 
Whom Pictish pirates vainly would 
have drowned ; 
Ah, shall we ever clasp the hand again 
That gave the British harp its truest 
sound ? 
Live, Derwent’s guest! and thou by 
Grasmere’s springs ! 
Serene creators of immortal things. 


And live too thou for happier days 
Whom Dryden’s force and Spenser’s fays 
Have heart and soul possess’d : 2 
Growl in Grim London he who will, 
Revisit thou Maiano’s hill, 
And swell with pride his sunburnt 
breast. 


Old Redi in his easy-chair 
With varied chant awaits thee there, 
And here are voices in the grove 
Aside mv house, that make me think 
Bacchus is coming down to drink 
To Ariadne’s love. 


But whither am I borne away 
From thee, to whom began my lay ? 
Courage ! T am not yet quite lost ; 
I stepped aside to greet my friends ; 
Believe me, soon the greeting ends, 
I know but three or four at most. 


Deem not that Time hath borne too hard 
Upon the fortunes of thy bard, 
Leaving me only three or four: 
’Tis my old number ; dost thou start 
At such a tale ?-in what man’s heart 
Is there fireside for more? 


I never courted friends or Fame ; 
She pouted at me long, at last she came, 
And threw her arms around my neck 

and said, 


1Southey and Wordsworth. 2 Leigh Hunt. 


‘*Take what hath been for years delay’d, 
And fear not that the leaves will fall 
One hour the earlier from thy coronal.” 


Ablett! thou knowest with what even 
hand 
I waved away the offer’d seat 
Among the clambering, clattering, stilt- 
ed great, 
The rulers of our land ; 
Nor crowds nor kings can lift me up, 
Nor sweeten Pleasure’s purer cup. 


Thou knowest how, and why, are dear 

to me 
My citron groves of Fiesole, 

My chirping Affrico, my beechwood 
nook, 

My Naiads, with feet only in the brook, 

Which runs away and giggles in their 
faces, 

Yet there they sit, nor sigh for other 
places. 


‘Tis not Pelasgian wall, 
By him made sacred whom alone 
*Twere not profane to call 
The bard divine, nor (thrown 
Far under me) Valdarno, nor the crest 
Of Vallombrosa in the crimson east. 


Here can I sit or roam at will: 
Few trouble me, few wish me ill, 

Few come across me, few too near ; 
Here all my wishes make their stand ; 
Here ask I no one’s voice or hand ; 

‘ . P 

Scornful of favor, ignorant of fear. 


Yon vine upon the maple bough 
Flouts at the hearty wheat below ; 
Away her venal wines the wise man 

sends, 
While those of lower stem he brings 
From inmost treasure vault, and sings 
Their worth and age among his chosen 
friends. 


Behold our Earth, most nigh the sun 
Her zone least opens to the genial heat, 
But farther off her veins more freely 
run : 
Tis thus with those who whirl about 
the great ; [mote 
The nearest shrink and shiver, we re- 
May open-breasted blow the pastoral oat. 
1884. 1887.1 


1This poem had been printed in an earlier 
form, containing lines to Coleridge, in Leigh 
Hunt’s London Journal, December 3, 1834. See 
Colvin’s Life of Landor, note to p, 142. 


440 


TO MARY LAMB 


CoMFORT thee, O thou mourner, yet 
awhile ! 
Again shall Elia’s smile 
Refresh thy heart, where heart can ache 
no more. 
What is it we deplore ? 


He leaves behind him, freed from griefs 
and years, 
Far worthier things than tears. 
The ‘love of friends without a single foe : 
Unequalled lot below ! 


His gentle soul, his genius, these are 
thine ; 
For these dost thou repine ? 
He may have left the lowly walks of 
men ; 
Left them he has; what then ? 


Are not his footsteps followed by the 
eyes 
Of all the good and wise ? 
Tho’ the warm day is over, yet they 
seek 
Upon the lofty peak 


Of his pure mind the roseate light that 
glows 
O’er death’s perennial snows. 
Behold him! from the region of the 
blessed 
He speaks: he bids thee rest. 
18384. 18837. 


ON HIS OWN IPHIGENEIA AND 
AGAMEMNON 


From eve to morn, from morn to part- 
ing night 
Father and daughter stood within my 
sight. {they said, 
I felt the looks they gave, the words 
And reconducted each serener shade. 
Ever shall these to me be well-spent 
days, 
Sweet fell the tears upon them, sweet 
the praise. [throne, 
Far from the footstool of the tragic 
I am tragedian in that scene alone. 
1837. 


FAREWELL TO ITALY 


I LEAVE thee, beauteous Italy ! no more 

From the high terraces, at eventide, 

To look supine into thy depths of sky, 

Thy golden moon between the cliff and 
me, 


BRITISH APOETS 


Or thy dark spires of fretted cypresses 

Bordering the channel of the milky-way. 

Fiesole and Valdarno must be dreams 

Hereafter, and my own lost Affrico 

Murmur to me but in the poet’s song. 

I did believe (what have I not believed?) 

Weary with age, but unoppressed by 
pain, 

To close in thy soft clime my quiet day 

And rest my bones in the Mimosa’s 
shade. 

Hope! Hope! few ever cherished thee 
so little; 

Few are the heads thou hast so rarely 
raised ; ies 

But thou didst promise this, and all was 

For we are fond of thinking where to lie 

When every pulse hath ceased, when the 
lone heart 

Can lift no aspiration—reasoning 

Asif the sight were unimpaired by death, 

Were unobstructed by the coffin-lid, 


And the sun cheered corruption! Over 
all 

The smiles of nature shed a _ potent 
charm, 

And light us to our chamber at the 
grave. 1835, 1846. 


WHY, WHY REPINE 


WHY, why repine, my pensive friend, 
At pleasures slipped away ? 

Some the stern Fates will never lend, 
And all refuse to stay. 


I see the rainbow in the sky, 
The dew upon the grass. 

I see them, and I ask not why 
They glimmer or they pass. 


With folded arms I linger not 
To call them back ; ’twere vain ; 
In this, or in some other spot, 
I know they’ll shine again. 
1846. 


MOTHER, I CANNOT MIND MY 
WHEEL 


MoTHER, I cannot mind .my wheel ; 
My fingers ache, my lips are dry: 
Oh! if you felt the pain I feel ! 
But oh, who ever felt as I? 
No longer could I doubt him true— 
All other men may use deceit ; 
He always said my eyes were blue, 
And often swore my lips were ea 








TO A BRIDE 


FEBRUARY 17, 1846 1 


A STILL, serene, soft day ; enough of sun 
To wreathe the cottage smoke like pine- 
. tree snow, 

Whiter than those white flowers the 
bride-maids wore ; 

Upon the silent boughs the lissom air 

Rested ; and, only when it went, they 
moved, 

Nor morethan under linnet springing off. 

Such was the wedding morn: the joy- 
ous Year 

Leapt over March and April up to May. 

Regent of rising and of ebbing hearts, 

Thyself borne on in cool serenity, 

All heaven around and bending over 
thee, 

All earth below and watchful of thy 
course ! 

Well hast thou chosen, after long demur 

To aspirations from more realms than 
one. 

Peace be with those thou leavest ! peace 
with thee ! 

Is that enough to wish thee? not enough, 

But very much : for Love himself feels 

ain, 

While brighter plumage shoots, to shed 
last year’s ; 

And one at home (how dear that one !) 
recalls * 

Thy name, and thou recallest one at 
home. 

Yet turn not back thine eyes; the hour 
of tears 

Is over; nor believe thou that Romance 

Closes against pure Faith her rich do- 
main, 

Shall only blossoms flourish 
Arise, 

Far sighted bride! 
clearer views 

And higher hopes lie under calmer skies. 

Fortune in vain call’d out to thee ; in 


there ? 


look forward ! 


vain 
Rays from high regions darted ; Wit 
pour’d out 


His sparkling treasures ; Wisdom laid 
his crown 

Of richer jewels at thy reckless feet. 

Well hast thou chosen. I repeat the 
words, 


1For the marriage of the daughter of Rose 
Aylmer’s half-sister. Called by Landor ‘‘ my 
tenderest lay.”’ See The Three Roses, p. 457, and 
note there. 


LANDOR 


441 





Adding as true ones, not untold before, 
That incense must have fire for its as- 
cent, 

Else ’tis inert and can not reach the idol. 

Youth is the sole equivalent of youth. 

Enjoy it while it lasts; and last it will; 

Love can prolong it in despite of Years. 
1846. 


LYRICS 


‘*Do you remember me? or are you 
roud ?” 
Lightly advancing thro’ her star-trimm’d 
crowd, 

Ianthe said, and looked into my eyes. 
A yes, a yes, to both: for Memory 
Where you but once have been must ever 

be, 

And at your voice Pride from his 

throne must rise.” 





No, my own love of other years! 
No, it must never be. 

Much rests with you that yet endears, 
Alas! but what with me? 

Could those bright years o’er me revolve 
So gay, o’er you so fair, 

The pearl of life we would dissolve 
And each the cup might share. 

You show that truth can ne’er decay, 
Whatever fate befalls ; 

I, that the myrtle and the bay 
Shoot fresh on ruin’d walls. 





ONE year ago my path was green, 

My footstep light, my brow serene ; 

Alas! and could it have been so 
One year ago? 


There is a love that is to last 

When the hot days of youth are past: 

Such love did a sweet maid bestow 
One year ago. 


I took a leaflet from her braid 

And gave it to another maid. 

Love ! broken should have been thy bow 
One year ago. 





Yrs; I write verses now and then, 

But blunt and flaccid is my pen, 

No longer talked of by young men 
As rather clever : 


442 





In the last quarter are my eyes, 
You see it by their form and size ; 
Is it not time then to be wise ? 

Or now or never, 


Fairest that ever sprang from Eve! 

While Time allows the short reprieve, 

Just look at me! would you believe 
‘Twas once a lover? 

I cannot clear the five-bar gate, 

But, trying first its timbers’ state, 

Climb stiffly up, take breath, and wait 
To trundle over. 


Thro’ gallopade I cannot swing 
The entangling blooms of Beauty’s 
spring : 

I cannot say the tender thing, 
Be’t true or false, 

And am beginning to opine 

Those girls are only half-divine 

Whose waists yon wicked boys entwine 
In giddy waltz. 


I fear that arm above that shoulder, 
I wish them wiser, graver, older, 
Sedater, and no harm if colder 
And panting less. 
Ah! people were not half so wild 
In former days, when, starchly mild, 
Upon her high-heel’d Essex smiled 
The brave Queen Bess. 


With rosy hand a little girl pressed down 

A boss of fresh-cull’d cowslips in a rill : 

Often as they sprang up again, a frown 

Show’d she disliked resistance to her 
will: 

But when they droop’d their heads and 
shone much less, 

She shook them to and fro, and threw 
them by, 

And tripped away. 
heaviness 

Ye love to cause, 
thought I, 

‘*And what had shone for you, by you 
must die.” 


‘““Ye loathe the 


¢ 99 


my little girls! 


You smiled, you spoke, and I believed, 
By every word and smile deceived. 
Another man would hope no more; 
Nor hope I what I hoped before : 

But let not this last wish be vain ; 
Deceive, deceive me once again ! 


BRITISH POETS 





Remain, ah not in youth alone, 
Tho’ youth, where you are, long will 
stay, 
But when my summer days are gone, 
And my autumnal haste away. 
‘Can I be always by your side ?” 
No; but the hours you can, you must, 
Nor rise at Death’s appr oaching stride, 
Nor go when dust is gone to dust. 





Soon, O Ianthe! life is o’er, 

And sooner beauty’s heavenly smile : 
Grant only (and I ask no more), 

Let love remain that little while. 





TO A CYCLAMEN 


T come to visit thee again, 

My little flowerless cyclamen ; 

To touch the hand, almost to press, 
That cheered thee in thy loneliness. 
What could thy careful guardian find 
Of thee in form, of me in mind, 
What is there in us rich or rare, 

To make us claim a moment’s care? 
Unworthy to be so caressed, 

We are but withering leaves at best. 





Give me the eyes that look on mine, 
And, when they see them dimly shine, 
Are moister than.they were. 
Give me the eyes that fain would find 
Some relics of a youthful mind 
Amid the wrecks of care. 
Give me the eyes that catch at last 
A few faint glimpses of the past, 
And, like the arkite dove, 
Bring back a long-lost clive-bough, 
And can discover even now 
A heart that once could love. 


Twenty years hence my eyes may grow 

If not quite dim, yet rather so, 

Still yours from others they shall know 
Twenty years hence. 


Twenty years hence tho’ it may hap 

That I be call’d to take a nap 

In a cool cell where thunder-clap 
Was never heard, 


LANDOR 


443 





There breathe but o’er my arch of grass 

A not too sadly sigh’d Alas, 

And I shall catch, ere you Can pass, 
That wingéd word. 


Proud word you never spoke, but you 
will speak 
Four not exempt from pride some 
future day. 
Resting on one white hand a warm wet 
cheek 
Over my open volume you will say, 
‘“This man loved me!” then rise and 
trip away. 





Alas, how soon the hours are over 

Counted us out to play the lover! 

And how much narrower is the stage 

Allotted us to play the sage! 

But when we play the fool, how wide, 

The theatre expands! beside, 

How long the audience sits before us ! 

How many prompters! what a chorus! 
1846. 


QUATRAINS 


ON the smooth brow and clustering hair 
Myrtle and rose! your wreath com- 
bine, 
The duller olive I would wear, 
Its constancy, its peace, be mine. 





My hopes retire ; my wishes as before 


Struggle to find their resting-place in 
vain ; 

The ebbing sea thus beats against the 
shore ; 


The shore repels it; it returns again. 





Various the roads of life; in one 
All terminate, one lonely way. 
We go; and “Is he gone?” 
Is all our best friends say. 





Is it not better at an early hour 
In its calm cell to rest the weary 
’! head, 
While birds are singing 
blooms the bower, 
Than sit the fire out and go starv’d to 
bed? 1846, 


and while 


I KNOW NOT WHETHER I AM 
PROUD 


I KNOW not whether I am proud, 

But this I know, I hate the crowd: 
Therefore pray let me disengage 

My verses from the motley page, 
Where others far more sure to please 
Pour out their choral song with ease. 


And yet perhaps, if some should tire 
With too much froth or too much fire, 
There is an ear that may incline 
Even to words so dull as mine. 

1846. 


THE DAY RETURNS, MY NATAL 
DAY 


THE day returns, my natal day, 
Borne on the storm and pale with 
snow, 
And seems to ask me why I stay, 
Stricken by Time and bowed by Woe. 


Many were once the friends who came 
To wish me joy ; and there are some 
Who wish it now ; but not the same ‘ 
They are whence friend can never 
. come. 


Nor are they you my love watched o’er 
Cradled in innocence and sleep ; 
You smile into my eyes no more, 
Nor see the bitter tears they weep. 
1846. 


HOW MANY VOICES GAILY SING 


How many voices gaily sing, 

aS, happy morn, oO happy spring 

Of life!’ Meanwhile there comes o’er 
me 

A softer voice from Memory, 

And says, ‘If loves and hopes have 


flown 
With years, think too what griefs are 
gone!” 1846. 


TO ROBERT BROWNING 


THERE is delight in singing, tho’ none 
hear 

Beside the singer ; and there is delight 

In praising, tho’ the praiser sit alone 

And see the prais’d far off him, far 
above. 

Shakespeare is not our poet, 
world’s, 


but the 


444 


Therefore on him no speech! and brief 
for thee, 

Browning! Since Chaucer 
and hale, 

No man hath walked along our roads 
with step 

‘ So active, so inquiring eye, or tongue 

So varied in discourse. But warmer 
climes 

Give brighter plumage, stronger wing : 
the breeze 

Of Alpine heights thou playest with, 
borne on 

Beyond Sorrento and Amalfi, where 

The Siren waits thee, singing song for 
song. 1846. 


was alive 


ON THE HELLENICS} 


ComME back, ye wandering Muses, come 
back home, 
Ye seem to have forgotten where it lies: 
Come, let us walk upon the silent sands 
Of Simois, where deep footmarks show 
long strides ; 
Thence we may mount, perhaps, to 
higher ground, 
Where Aphrodité from Athené won 
The golden apple, and from Here too, 
And happy Ares shouted far below. 
Or would ye rather choose the grassy 
vale 
Where flows Anapos thro’ anemones, 
Hyacinths, and narcissuses, that bend 
To show their rival beauty in the 
stream ? 
Bring with youeach her lyre, and each 
in turn 
Temper a graver with a lighter song. 
1847, 


THRASYMEDES AND EUNOE 


Who will away to Athens with me? 
who 

Loves choral songsand maidens crown’d 
with flowers, 

Unenvious? mount the pinnace ; hoist 
the sail. 

I promise ye, as many as are here, 


1 Prefixed to the second edition of Landor’s 
Hellenics, 1847. Itis here given slightly out of 
the exact chronological order, that it may stand 
as an introduction to the chief poems from the 
Hellenics, those of 1846 as well as those of 1847. 

Other poems of Landor’s, such as The Death of 
Artemidora, Cleone to Aspasia, The Shades of 
Agamemnon and Iphigeneia, ete., though orig- 
inally published in other collections, and there- 
fore not given here with the Hellenics, were ul- 
timately included by Landor among them. 


BRITISH POETS 


Ye shall not, while ye tarry with me, 
taste 

From unrinsed barrel the diluted wine 

Of a low vineyard or a plant ill-pruned, 

But such as anciently the Agean isles 

Pour’d in libation at their solemn feasts : 

And the same goblets shall ye grasp, 


embossed 
With no vile figures of loose languid 
boors, 
But such as gods have lived with and 
have led. 
The sea smiles bright beforeus. What 
white sail 
Plays yonder? What pursues it? Like 


two hawks 
Away they fly. Let us away in time 
To overtake them. Are they menaces 
We hear? And shall the strong repulse 
the weak, . 
Enraged at her defender ? Hippias! 
Art thou theman? ’Iwas Hippias. He 
had found 
His sister borne from the Cecropian port 
By Thrasymedes. And reluctantly ? 
Ask, ask the maiden; Ihave no reply. 
‘¢‘ Brother! O brother Hippias! O, if 
love, 
If pity, ever touch’d thy breast, forbear ! 
Strike not the brave, the gentle, the be- 
loved, 
My Thrasymedes, with his cloak alone 
Protecting his own head and mine from 
harm.” 
‘‘Didst thou not once before,” cried 
Hippias, 
Regardless of his sister, hoarse 
wrath 
At Thrasymedes, ‘‘ didst not thou, dog: 
eyed, 
Dare, as she walk’d up tothe Parthenon, 
On the most holy of all holy days, 
In sight of all the city, dare to kiss 
Her maiden cheek ?” 
‘‘ Ay, before all the gods, 
Ay, before Pallas, before Artemis, 
Ay, before Aphrodité, before Heré, 
I dared; and dare again. Arise, my 
spouse ! 
Arise! and let my lips quaff purity 
From thy fair open brow.” 
The sword was up, 
And yet he kiss’d her twice. Some God 
withheld 
The arm of Hippias; his proud blood 
seeth’d slower 
And smote his breast less angrily ; he 
laid [spake thus: 
His hand on the white shoulder, and 


with 





LANDOR 


“Ye must return with me. <A second 
time 

Offended, will our sire Peisistratos 

Pardon the affront? Thou shouldst 
have ask’d thyself 

This question ere the sail first flapp’d.the 
mast.” 

‘* Already thou hast taken life from me ; 

Put up thy sword,” said the sad youth, 
his eyes 

Sparkling ; but whether love or rage or 


grie 

They sparkled with, the Gods alone could 
see. 

Pireeeus they re-entered, and their ship 

Drove up the little waves against the 
quay, 

Whence was thrown out a rope from one 
above, 

And Hippias caught it. From the virgin’s 
waist 

Her lover dropped his arm, and blushed 
to think 

He had retain’d it there in sight of rude 

Irreverent men: he led her forth, nor 
spake. 

Hippias walked silent too, until they 
reached 

The mansion of Peisistratos her sire. 

Serenely in his sternness did the prince 

Look on them both awhile : they saw not 


him, 

For both had cast their eyes upon the 
ground. 

** Are these the pirates thou hast taken, 
son?” 

Said he. ‘*Worse, father! worse than 


pirates they, 
Who thus abuse thy patience, thus abuse 
Thy pardon, thus abuse the holy rites 
Twice over.” 
‘* Well hast thou performed thy duty,” 
Firmly and gravely said Peisistratos. 
‘* Nothing then, rash young man! could 
turn thy heart 
From Eunoe, my daughter ?’”’ 
** Nothing, sir, 
Shall ever turn it. I can die but once 
And lovebut once. O Eunoe! farewell!” 
** Nay, she shall see what thou canst bear 
for her.” 
*‘O father! shut me in my chamber, 
shut me 
In my poor mother’s tomb, dead or alive, 
But never let me see what he can bear ; 
I know how much that is, when borne 
for me.” 
** Not yet: come on. 
behind, 


And lag not thou 


445 


Pirate of virgin and of princely hearts ! 

Before the people and before the Goddess 

Thou hadst evinced the madness of thy 
passion, 

And now wouldst bear from home and 
plenteousness 

To poverty and exile this my child.” 

Then shuddered Thrasymedes, and ex- 
claim’d, 

‘* T see my crime; I saw it not before. 
The daughter of Peisistratos was born 
Neither for exile nor for poverty, 

Ah! nor for me!” He would have wept, 
but one 

Might see him, and weep worse. 
prince unmoved 

Strode on, and said, ‘‘ To-morrow shall 
the people, 

All who beheld thy trespasses, behold 

The justice of Peisistratos, the love 

He bears his daughter, and the reverence 

In which he holds the highest law of 
God.” 

He spake; and on the morrow they 

were one. 1846. 


The 


IPHIGENEIA AND AGAMEMNON 


IPHIGENEIA, when she heard her doom 

At Aulis, and when all beside the King 

Had gone away, took his right hand, and 
said, 

‘‘O father! Tam young and very happy. 

I do not think the pious Calchas heard 


Distinctly what the Goddess spake. 
Old-age 

Obscures the senses. If my nurse, who 
knew 

My voice so well, sometimes misunder- . 
stood 

While I was resting on her knee both 
arms 

And hitting it to make her mind my 
words, 


And looking in her face, and she in mine, 
Might he not also hear one word amiss, 
Spoken from so far off, even from Olym- 


pus ?” 

The father placed his cheek upon her 
head, 

And tears dropped down it, but the king 
of men 


Replied not. Then the maiden spake 
once more. [thou not 

‘‘O father! sayst thou nothing? Hear’st 

Me, whom thou ever hast, until this hour, 

Listened to fondly, and awakened me 

To hear my voice amid the voice of 
birds, 


4.46 


BRITISH) POETS 





When it was inarticulate as theirs, 

And the down deadened it within the 
nest?” 

He moved her gently from him, silent 
still, 

And this, and this alone, brought tears 
from her. 

Although she saw fate nearer : then with 


sighs, 

‘*T thought to have laid down my hair 
before 

Benignant Artemis, and not have 
dimmed 


Her polished altar with my virgin blood ; 

| thought to have selected the white 
flowers 

To please the Nymphs, and to have 
asked of each 

By name, and with no sorrowful regret, 

Whether, since both my parents willed 
the change, 

I might at Hymen’s feet bend my clipped 
brow; 

And (after those who mind us girls the 
most, ) 

Adore our own Athena, that she would 

Regard me mildly with her azure eyes, 

But father! to see you no more, and see 


Your love, O father! go ere I am 
gone. .” 

Gently he moved her off, and drew her 
back, 


Bending his lofty head far over hers, 

And the dark depths of nature heaved 
and burst. 

He turn’d away; not far, but silent 


still. 

She now first shuddered ; for in him, so 
nigh, 

So long a silence seemed the approach of 
death, 

And like it. Once again she raised her 
voice, 

‘‘O father! if the ships are now de- 
tained, 

And all your vows move not the Gods 
above, 


When the knife strikes me there will be 
one prayer 

The less to them: and purer can there 
be 

Any, or more fervent than the daugh- 
ter’s prayer 

For her dear father’s safety and suc- 
cess?” [resolve. 

A groan that shook him shook not his 

An aged man now entered, and without 

One word, stepped slowly on, and took 
the wrist 


Of the pale maiden. She looked up and 
saw 

The fillet of the priest and calm cold 
eyes. j 

Then turned she where her 
stood, and cried 

‘‘O father! grieve no more: the ships 
can sail.” 1846. 


parent 


THE HAMADRYAD! 


RHAICOS was born amid the hills where- 
from 

Gnidos the light of Caria is discern’d, 

And small are the white-crested that 
play near, 

And smaller onward are the purple 
waves. 

Thence festal choirs were visible, all 
crown’d 

With rose and myrtle if they were in- 
born ; 

If from Pandion sprang they, on the 
coast 

Where stern Athené raised her citadel, 

Then olive was intwined with violets 

Cluster’d in bosses, regular and large. 

For various men wore various coronals ; 

But one was their devotion; ‘twas to 
her 

Whose laws all follow, her whose smile 
withdraws 

The sword from Ares, thunderbolt from 
Zeus, 

And whom in his chill caves the mu- 
table 

Of mind, Poseidon, the sea-king, re- 
veres, 

And whom his brother, stubborn Dis, 
hath pray’d 

To turn in pity the averted cheek 

Of her he bore away, with promises, 

Nay, with loud oath before dread Styx 


itself, 

To give her daily more and sweeter 
flowers 

Than he made drop from her on Enna’s 
dell. 

Rhaicos was looking from his father’s 

door 

At the long trains that hastened to the 
town 

From all the valleys, like bright rivu- 
lets 


Gurgling with gladness, wave outrun- 
ning wave, 


1 Compare Lowell’s poem, Rhacus, which gives 
a somewhat different version of the same story. 





LANDOR 


And thought it hard he might not also 


go 
And offer up one prayer, and press one 


hand, 

He knew not whose. The father call’d 
him in, 

And said, ‘‘Son Rhaicos! those are idle 
games ; 

Long enough I have lived to find them 


so. 

And ere he ended sighed ; as old men do 

Always, to think how idle such games 
are. 

‘*T have not yet,” thought Rhaicos in 
his heart, 

And wanted proof. 

‘* Suppose thou go and help 

Kcheion at the hill, to bark yon oak 

And lop its branches off, before we 
delve 

About the trunk and ply the root with 
axe: 

This we may do in winter.” 

Rhaicos went ; 

For thence he could see farther, and see 
more 

Of those who hurried to the city-gate. 

Echeion he found there with naked arm 

Swart-hair’d, strong-sinew’d, and his 
eyes intent 

Upon the place where first the axe 
should fall : 

He held it upright. 
about, 

Or wasps, or hornets,” said the cautious 
eld, 

‘* Look sharp, O son of Thallinos!” The 
youth 

Inclined his ear, afar, and warily, 

And cavern’d in his hand. He heard a 
buzz 

At first, and then the sound grew soft 
and clear, 

And then divided into what seem’d tune, 

And there were words upon it, plaintive 


‘There are bees 


‘words. 
He turn’d, and said, ‘‘ Echeion! do not 
strike 
That tree: it must be hollow; for some 
od 
Rete: from within. Come _ thyself 
near.” Again 


Both turn’d toward it: and behold! 
there sat 
Upon the moss below, with her two 


palms yee) 
Pressing it, on each side, a maid in 
form. [pale 


Downcast were her long eyelashes, and 


447 


Her cheek, but never mountain-ash dis- 
play’d 

Berries of color like her lip so pure, 

Nor were the anemones about her hair 

Soft, smooth and wavering like the face 
beneath. 

‘“* What dost thou here?” Echeion, half- 
afraid, 

Half-angry cried. She lifted up her eyes, 

But nothing spake she. Rhaicos drew 
one step 

Backward, for fear came likewise over 
him, 

But not such fear: he panted, gasp’d, 
drew in 

His breath, and would have turn’d it 
into words, 

But could not into one. 

‘*O send away 
said she. The old 


999 


That sad old man! 
man went 
Without a warning from his master’s 
son, 
Glad to escape, for sorely he now fear’d, 
And the axe shone behind him in their 
eyes, 
Hamad. And wouldst thou too shed 
the most innocent 
Of blood? No vow demands it; no god 
wills 
The oak to bleed. 
Rhaicos. Who 
why here? 
And whither wouldst thou go?) Among 
the robed 
In white or saffron, or the hue that most 
Resembles dawn or the clear sky, is none 
Array’d as thou art. What so beautiful 
As that gray robe which clings about 
thee close, 
Like moss to stones adhering, leaves to 
trees, 
Yet lets thy bosom rise and fall in turn, 
As, touch’d by zephyrs, fall and rise the 
boughs 
Of graceful platan by the river-side ? 
Hamad, Lovest thou well thy father’s 
house ? 
Rhaicos. Indeed 
I love it, well I love it, yet would leave 
For thine, where’er it be, my father’s 


art thou? whence? 


house, 

With all the marks upon the door, that 
show 

My growth at every birthday since the 
third, 

And all the charms, o’erpowering evil 


eyes, 
My mother nail’d for me against my bed, 


448 





“And the Cydonian 
shalt see) 
Won in my race last spring from Euty- 
chos. 
Hamad. Bethink thee what it is to 
leave a home 
Thou never yet hast left, one night, one 
day. 
Rhaicos. No, ’tis not hard to leave 
it; ’tis not hard 
To leave, O maiden, that paternal home, 
If there be one on earth whom we may 


bow (which thou 


love 

First, last, for ever; one who says that 
she 

Will love for ever too. To say which 
word, 


Only to say it, surely is enough. . 
It shows such kindness. . if ’twere 
possible 
We at the moment think she would in- 
deed. 
Hamad. Who taught thee all this 
folly at thy age? 
Rhaicos. Ihave seen lovers and have 
learned to love. 


Hamad, But wilt thou spare the 
tree? 
Rhaicos. My father wants 
The bark: the tree may hold its place 
awhile. 
Hamad. Awhile! thy father num- 


bers then my days? 
Fhaicos. Are there no others where 
the moss beneath 
Is quite as tufty? Who would send 
thee forth 
Or ask thee why thou tarriest? Is thy 


flock 
Anywhere near? 
Hamad. Ihave no flock: I kill 


Nothing that breathes, that stirs, that 
feels the air, 

The sun, the dew. 
beautiful 

(And thou art beautiful) disturb the 
source 

Whence springs all beauty ? Hast thou 
never heard 

Of Hamadryads ? 

Rhaicos. Heard of them I have: 
Tell me some tale about them. May I 


Why should the 


sit 
Beside thy feet? Art thou not tired? 
The herbs 
Are very soft ; I will not come too nigh ; 
Do but sit there, nor tremble so, nor 
doubt. [plore 
Stay, stay an instant: let me first ex- 


BRITISH“ POETS 


If any acorn of last year be left 
Within it; thy thin robe too ill protects 
Thy dainty limbs against the harm one 
small 
Acorn may do. 
day 
Trust me; till then let me sit opposite. 
Hamad. I seat me; be thou seated, 
and content. 
Rhaicos. O sight for gods! ye men 
below ! adore 
The Aphrodité. Js she there below ? 
Or sitS she here before me? as she sate 
Before the shepherd on those heights 
that shade 
The Hellespont, and brought his kindred 
woe. 
Hamad. Reverence the 
Powers ; nor deem amiss 
Of her who pleads to thee, and would 
repay— 


Here’s none. Another 


higher 


Ask not how much—but very much. 
Rise not ; 

No, Rhaicos, no! Without the nuptial 
vow 


Love is unholy. Swear to me that none 
Of mortal maids shall ever taste thy kiss, 
Then take thou mine ; then take it, not 
before. ; 
Rhaicos. Hearken, all gods above! 
O Aphrodite ! i 
O Here! Let my vow be ratified ! 
But wilt thou come into my father’s 
house ? 
Hamad. Nay: and of mine I cannot 
give thee part. 


Rhaicos. Where is it? 
Hamad. In this oak. 
Rhaicos. Ay; now begins 


The tale of Hamadryad ; tell it through. 
Hamad. Pray of thy father never to 

to cut down 

My tree; and promise him, as well thou 
mayst, 

That every year he shall receive from me 

More honey than will buy him nine fat 
sheep, 

More wax than he will burn to all the 
gods. 

Why fallest thou upon thy face ? 
thorn 

May scratch it, rash young man! 
up; for shame ! 

Rhaicos. For shame ican notrise. O 

pity me! 

I dare not sue for love.. but do not hate! 

Let me once more behold thee. .not once 
more, [loved ! 

But many days: let me love on.. un- 


Some 


Rise 


LANDOR 


Iaimed too high: on my head the bolt 
Falls back, and pierces to the very 
brain. 
Hamad. Go.. rather go, than make 
me say I love. 
Rhaicos. If happiness is immortality, 
(And whence enjoy it else the gods 
above ?) 
Iam immortal too: my vow is heard : 
Hark! onthe left .. Nay, turn not from 
me now, 
I claim my kiss, 
Hamad. Do men take first, 
claim ? 
Do thus the seasons run their course with 
them ? 


then 


Her lips were seal’d, her head sank on 
his breast. 
’Tis said that laughs were heard within 
the wood : 
But who should hear them ?. . and whose 
laughs? and why? 
Savory was the smell, and long past 
noon, 
Thallinos ! in thy house : for marjoram, 


‘Basil and mint, and thyme and rose- 


mary 


Were sprinkled on the kid’s wellroasted 
length, 

Awaiting Rhaicos. Home he came at 
last, 


Not hungry, but pretending hunger keen, 
With head and eyes just o’er the maple 


plate. f 
**Thou seest but badly, coming from the 
sun, 
Boy Rhaicos!” said the father. ‘‘ That 
oak’s bark 


Must have been tough, with little sap 
between ; 

It ought to run; but it and I are old.” 

Rhaicos, although each morsel of the 
bread 

Increased by chewing, and the meat grew 
cold 

And tasteless to his palate, took a draught 

Of gold-bright wine, which, thirsty as he 
was, 

He thought not of until his father fill’d 

The cup, averring water was amiss, 

But wine had been at all times pour’d on 
kid, 

It was religion. 

He thus fortified 

Said, not quite boldly, and not quite 
abashed, 

‘‘ Father, that oak is Zeus’s own; that 
oak 


29 


449 


Year after year will bring thee wealth 
from wax 
And honey. There isone who fears the 
gods 
And the gods love—that one ” 
(He blush’d, nor said 
What one) 

‘* Has promised this, and may do more. 
Thou hast not many moons to wait until 
The bees have done their best; if then 

there come 
Nor wax nor honey, let the tree be 
hewn.” 

“Zeus hath bestow’d on thee a 

prudent mind,” 

Said the glad sire: ‘* but look thou often 
there, 

And gather all the honey thou canst find 

In every crevice, over and above 

What has been promised ; would they 
reckon that?” 

Rhaicos went daily ; but the nymph as 

oft, 

Invisible. To play at love, she knew, 

Stopping its breathings when it breathes 
most soft, 

Is sweeter than to play on any pipe. 

She play’d on his: she fed upon hissighs ; 

They pleased her when they gently 
waved her hair, 

Cooling the pulses of her purple veins, 

And when her absence brought them 
out, they pleased. 

Even among the fondest of them all, 

What mortal or immortal maid is more 

Content with giving happiness than 
pain ? 

One day he was returning from the wood 

Despondently. She pitied him, and said 

‘Come back !” and twined her fingers in 
the hem 

Above his shoulder, 
steps 

To a cool rill that ran o’er level sand 

Through lentisk and through oleander, 
there 

Bathed she his feet, lifting them on her 


Then she led his 


lap 
When bathed, and drying them in both 


her hands. 

He dared complain ; for those who most 
are loved 

Most dare it; but not harsh was. his 
complaint. 

‘¢O thou inconstant !” said he, ‘‘ if stern 
law 

Bind thee, or will, stronger than sternest 
law [hope 


O, let me know henceforward when to 


450 

The fruit of love that grows for me but 
here.” 

He spake : and pluck’d it from its pliant 
stem. 

‘‘Tmpatient Rhaicos! Why thus inter- 
cept 


The answer I would give? There is a bee 

Whom I have fed, a bee who knows my 
thoughts 

And executes my wishes: I will send 

That messenger. If ever thou art false, 

Drawn by another, own it not, but drive 

My bee away ; thenshall I know my fate, 

And—for thou must be wretched—weep 
at thine. 

But often as my heart persuades to lay 

Its cares on thine and throb itself to rest, 

Expect her with thee, whether it be 
morn. 

Or eve, at any time when woods are 
safe.” 

Day after day the Hours beheld them 

blessed, 

And season after season: years had past, 

Blessed were they still. He who asserts 
that Love 

Ever is sated of sweet things, the same 

Sweet things he fretted for in earlier 
days, 

Never, by Zeus! loved he a Hamadryad. 

The nights had now grown longer, 

and perhaps 

The Hamadryads find them lone and 
dull 

Among their woods ; one did, alas! She 
called 

Her faithful bee: ’t was when all bees 
should sleep, 

And all did sleep but hers. 
sent forth 

To bring that light which never wintry 
blast 

Blows out, nor rain nor snow extin- 
guishes, 

The light that shines from loving eyes 
upon 

Kyes that love back, till they can see no 
more. 


She was 


Rhaicos was sitting at his father’s 

hearth : 

Between them stood the table, not o’er- 
spread 

With fruits which autumn 
fusely bore, 

Nor, anise cakes, nor odorous wine; but 
there 

The draft-board 

which game 


now pro- 


was expanded; at 


BRITISH, POETS 


Triumphant sat old Thallinos ; the son 
Was puzzled, vexed, discomfited, dis- 


traught. 

A buzz was at his ear: up went his 
hand, 

And it was heard no longer. The poor 
bee 

Return’d, (but not until the morn shone 
bright) 

And found the Hamadryad with her 

head 


Upon her aching wrist, and showed one 


wing 

Half-broken off, the other’s meshes 
marr’d, 

And there were bruises which no eye 
could see 

Saving a Hamadryad’s. 

At this sight 

Down fell the languid brow, both hands 
fell down, 

A shriek was carried to the ancient hall 

Of Thallinos: he heard it not: his son 

Heard it, and ran forthwith into the 
wood, 

No bark was on the tree, no leaf was 
green, 

The trunk was riven through. From 
that day forth 

Nor word nor whisper sooth’d his ear, 
nor sound 

Even of insect wing; but loud laments 

The woodmen and the shepherds one 
long year 

Heard day and night ; for Rhaicos would 
not quit 

The solitary place, but moan’d and died. 


Hence milk and honey wonder not, O 
guest, 
To find set duly on the hollow stone. 
1846. 


ACON AND RHODOPE; OR, INCON- 
STANCY 


(A Sequel) 


THE Year’s twelve daughters had in 
turn gone by, 

Of measured pace though varying mien 
all twelve, 

Some froward, 
adorn’d 

For festival, some reckless of attire. 

The snow had left the mountain-top ; 
fresh flowers 

Had withered in the meadow ; fig and 
prune 


some sedater, some 


LANDOR 


451 





Hung wrinkling ; the last apple glow’d 


amid 

Its freckled leaves; and weary oxen 
blink’d 

Between the trodden corn and twisted 
vine, 

Under whose bunches stood the empty 
crate, 

To creak ere long beneath them carried 
home. 

This was the season when twelve months 
before, 


O gentle Hamadryad, true to love ! 

Thy mansion, thy dim mansion in the 
wood 

Was blasted and laid desolate ; but none 

Dared violate its precincts, none dared 
pluck 

The moss beneath it, which alone re- 
main’d 

Of what was thine. 

Old Thallinos sat mute 

In solitary sadness. The strange tale 

(Not until Rhaicos died, but then the 
whole) 

Echeion had related, whom no force 

Could ever make look back upon the 
oaks. 

The father said, ‘‘ Echeion! thou must 
weigh, 

Carefully, and with steady hand, enough 

(Although no longer comes the store as 
once !) 

Of wax to burn all dayand night upon 

That hollow stone where milk and honey 
lie : 

So may the gods, so may the dead, be 
pleas’d!” 

Thallinos bore it thither in the morn, 

And lighted it and left it. 

First of those 

Who visited upon this solemn day 

The Hamadryad’s oak, were Rhodopé 

And Acon ; of one age, one hope, one 
trust. 

Graceful was she as was the nymph 
whose fate 

She sorrowed for: he slender, pale, and 


first 
Lapp’d by the flame of love: his father’s 
lands [afar. 


Were fertile, herds lowed over them 
Now stood the two aside the hollow stone 
And look’d with steadfast eyes toward 
the oak 
Shivered and black and bare. 
‘‘ May never we 
Love as they loved!” said Acon. 
at this 


She 


Smiled, for hesaid not what he meant to 


say, 

And Bought not of its bliss, but of its 
end. 

He caught the flying smile, and blush’d, 
and vow’'d 

Nor time nor other power, whereto the 
might 

Of love hath yielded and may yield 
again, 

Should alter his. 

The father of the youth 

Wanted not beauty for him, wanted not 

Song, that could lift earth’s weight 
from off his heart, 

Discretion, that could guide him thro’ 
the world, 

Innocence, that could clear his way to 


heaven ; 

Silver and gold and land, not green be- 
fore 

The ancestral gate, but purple under 
skies 


Bending far off, he wanted for his heir. 
Fathers have given life, but virgin 


heart 

They never gave; and dare they then 
control 

Or check it harshly? dare they break a 
bond 

Girt round it bythe holiest Power on 
high ? ; 

Acon was grieved, he said, grieved 

bitterly, 

But Acon had complhed . . *twas duti- 
ful : 


Crush thy own heart, Man! Man! but 
fear to wound 

Tne gentler, that relies on thee alone, 

By thee created, weak or strong by thee; 

Touch it not but for worship ; watch be- 
fore 

Its sanctuary ; nor leave it till are closed 

The temple-doors and the last lamp is 
spent. 

Rhodopé, in her soul’s waste solitude, 

Sate mournful by the dull-resounding 
sea, 

Often not hearing it, and many tears 

Had the cold breezes hardened on her 
cheek. : 

Meanwhile he sauntered in the wood of 
oaks, 

Nor shun’d to look upon the hollow 
stone 

That held the milk and honey, nor to 


lay 
His plighted hand where recently *twas 
laid 


452 


Opposite hers, when finger playfully 

Advanced and pushed back finger, on 
each side. 

He did not think of this, as she would 
do 

If she were there alone. 

The day was hot; 

The moss invited him; it cool’d his 
cheek, 

It cool’d his hands; he thrust them into 


it 

And sank to slumber. Never was there 
dream 

Divine as his. He saw the Hamadryad. 

She took him by thearm and led him on 

Along a valley, where profusely grew 

The smaller lilies with their pendent 
bells, 

And, hiding under mint, chill drosera, 

The violet shy of butting cyclamen, 

The feathery fern, and, browser of moist 
banks, 

Her offspring round her, the soft straw- 
berry ; 

The quivering spray of ruddy tamarisk, 

The oleander’s lght-haired progeny 

Breathing bright freshness in each 
other’s face, 

And graceful rose, bending her brow, 
with cup 

Of fragrance and of beauty, boon for 
Gods. 

The fragrance fill’d his breast with such 
delight 

His senses were bewildered, and he 
thought 

He saw again the face he most had 
loved. 

He stopped: the Hamadryad at his side 

Now stood between: then drew him far- 
ther off : 

He went, compliant as before : but soon 

Verdure had ceased: altho’ the ground 
was smooth, 


Nothing was there delightful. At this 
change 

He would have spoken, but his guide 
repressed 


All questioning, and said, 
‘Weak youth! what brought 
Thy footstep to this wood, my native 
haunt, 
My life-long residence? 
where first 
I sate with him . 
know, 
Too late!) the faithful Rhaicos. Haste 
thee home : {more 
Be happy, if thou canst; but come no 


this bank, 


. . the faithful (now I 


BRITESHePOETS 


Where those whom death alone could 

sever, died.” 
He started up: the moss whereon he 

slept 

Was dried and withered: deadlier pale- 
ness spread 

Over his cheek; he sickened: and the 
sire 

Had land enough; it held his only son, 

1847. 


MENELAUS AND HELEN AT TROY 


After the fall of Troy, Helen is pursued 
by Menelaus up the steps of the pal- 
ace; an old attendant deprecates 
and intercepts his vengeance. 

Menelaus. Out of my way! Off! or 
my sword may smite thee 

Heedless of venerable age. And thou 

Fugitive! stop. Stand, traitress, on that 


stair— 

Thou mountest not another, by the 
gods! 

Now take the death thou meritest, the 
death 


Zeus who presides o’er hospitality, 

And every other god whom thou has 
left, 

And every other who abandons thee 

In this accursed city, sends at last. 

Turn, vilest of vile slaves! turn, para- 
mour 

Of what all other women hate, of cow- 
ards, ; 

Turn, lest this hand wrench back thy 
head, and toss 

It and its odors to the dust and flames. 

Helen. Welcome, the death thou 

promisest! Not fear 

But shame, obedience, duty, make me 


turn: 
Menelaus. Duty! false harlot! 
Helen. Name too true! severe 


Precursor to the blow that is to fall. 
It should alone suffice for killing me. 
Menelaus. Ay, weep: be not the only 
one in Troy 
Who wails not on this day—its last— 


the day 
Thou and thy crimes darken with dead 
on dead. 
Helen. Spare! spare! O let the last 


that falls be me, 
There are but young and old. 
Menelaus. There are but guilty 
Where thou art, and the sword strikes 
none amiss. 


LANDOR 


453 








Hearest thou not the creeping blood 
buzz near 
Like flies? or wouldst thou rather hear 
it hiss 
Louder, against the flaming roofs thrown 
down 
Wherewith the streets are pathless? Ay. 
but vengeance 
Springs over all; and Nemesis and Até 
Drove back the flying ashes with both 
hands. 
I never saw thee weep till now: and 
now 
There is no pity in thy tears. The tiger 
Leaves not her young athirst for the 
first milk, 
As thou didst. Thine could scarce have 
clasped thy knee 
If she had felt thee leave her. 
Helen. O my child! 
My only one! thou livest: ’tis enough ; 
Hate me, abhor me, curse me—these are 
duties— 
Call me but Mother in the shades of 
death ! 
She now is twelve years old, when the 
bud swells 
And the first colors of uncertain life 
Begin to tinge it. 
Menelaus (aside. ) 
of home? 
Hers once, mine yet, and sweet Her- 
mione’s ! 
Is there one spark that cheer’d my hearth, 
one left, 
For thee, my last of love! 
Scorn, righteous scorn 
Blows it from me—but thou mayst— 
never, never— 


Can she think 


Thou shalt not see her even there. The 
slave 

On earth shall scorn thee, and the damn’d 
below. 

Helen. Delay not either fate. If death 

is mercy, 

Send me among the captives ; so that 
Zeus 


May see his offspring led in chains away, 

And thy hard brother, pointing with his 

sword _ [shore, 

At the last wretch that crouches on the 

Cry, ‘‘ She alone shall never sail for 
Greece !” 

Menelaus. Hast thou more words? 

Her voice is musical 

As the young maids who sing to Artemis : 

How glossy is that yellow braid my grasp 

Seiz’d and let loose! Ah! can then years 
have past 


Since—but the children of the gods, like 
them, 
Suffer not age. 
Helen! speak honestly, 
And thus escape my vengeance—was it 


force 
That bore thee off ? 
Helen. It was some evil god. 
Menelaus. Helping that hated man? 
Helen. How justly hated ! 
Menelaus. By thee too? 
Helen. Hath he not made thee un- 
happy ? 
O do not strike. 
Menelaus. Wretch! 
Helen. Strike, but do not speak, 


Menelaus. Lest thou remember me 
against thy will. 
Helen. Lest I look up and see you 
wroth and sad, 
Against my will; O! how against my will 
They know above, they who perhaps 
can pity. 
Menelaus. They shall not save thee. 
Helen. Then indeed they pity. 
Menelaus. Prepare for death, 
Helen. Not from that hand: * twould 
pain you. 
Menelaus. Touch not my hand.—Easily 
dost thou drop it ! 
Helen. Easy are all things, do but thou 
command. 
Menelaus. Look up then. 
Helen. To the hardest proof of all 
Iam now bidden ; bid me not look up. 
Menelaus, She looks as when I led her 
on behind 
The torch and fife, and when the blush 
o’erspread 
Her girlish face at tripping in the myrtle 
On the first step before the wreathéd 


gate. 
Approach me. Fall not on thy knees. 
Helen. The hand 


That is to slay me, best may slay me thus. 
I dare no longer see the light of heaven, 
Not thine—alas! the light of heaven to 
me, 
Menelaus. Follow me. 
She holds out both arms—and now 
Drops them again.—She comes.—Why 
stoppest thou? 
Helen. O Menelaus! could thy heart 
know mine, 
As once it did—for then they did con- 


verse, 
Generous the one, the other not un- 
worthy— [than guilt. 


Thou wouldst find sorrow deeper even 


454 


Menelaus. And I must lead her by the 
hand again? 
Nought shall persuade me. Never. She 
draws back— 
The true alone and loving sob like her. 
Come Helen! [ He takes her hand. 


Helen. O let never Greek see this ! 
Hide me from Argos, from Amyclai 
hid me, 
Hide me from all. 
Menelaus. Thy anguish is too strong 
For me to strive with. 
Helen. Leave it all to me. 


Menelaus. Peace! Peace! The wind, I 
hope, is fair for Sparta. 1847. 


AASCHY LOS AND SOPHOCLES 


Sophocles. Thou goest then, and leay- 
est none behind 
Worthy to rival thee! 
Aischylos. Nay, say not so. 
Whose is the hand that now is pressing 
mine ? 
A hand I may not ever press again ! 
What glorious forms hath it brought 
boldly forth 
From Pluto’s realm! The blind old 
CEdipos 
Was led on one side by Antigone, 
Sophocles propped the other. 
Sophocles. Sophocles 
Sooth’d not Prometheus chain’d upon 
his rock, 
Keeping the vultures and. the Gods 
away ; 
Sophocles is not greater than the chief 
Who conquered Ilion, nor could he re- 
venge 
His murder, or stamp everlasting brand 
Upon the brow of that adulterous wife. 
Aischylos. Live, and do more. 
Thine is the Lemnian isle, 
And thou has placed the arrows in the 
hand 
Of Philoctetes, hast assuaged his wounds 
And given his aid without which Greece 
had fail’d. 
Sophocles. I did indeed drive off the 
pest of flies ; 
We also have our pest of them which 
buzz i 
About our honey, darken it, and sting ; 
We laugh at them, for under hands like 


ours, 

Without the wing that Philoctetes 
shook, 

One single feather crushes the whole 
swarm, 


BRITISH POETS 


I must be grave, 
Hath Sicily such charms 
Above our Athens? Many charms hath 


she, 

But she hath kings. Accursed be the 
race ! 

ischylos. But where kings honor 

better men than they 

Let kings be honored too. 

The laurel crown 

Surmounts the golden; wear it : and 

farewell. 1847. 


SHAKESPEARE AND MILTON 


THE tongue of England, that which 
myriads 
Have spoken and will speak, were para- 
lyzed 
Hereafter, but two mighty men stand 
forth 
Above the flight of ages, two alone ; 
One crying out, 
All nations spoke thro’ me. 
The other : 
True ; and thro’ this trumpet burst 
God’s word ; the fall of Angels, and the 
doom 
First of immortal, then of mortal, Man. 
Glory ! be glory! not to me, to God. 
1853. 


TO YOUTH 


WHERE art thou gone, 
Youth? 
With wing at either shoulder, 
And smile that never left thy mouth 
Until the Hours grew colder: 


light-ankled 


Then somewhat seem’d to whisper near 
That thou and I must part; 

I doubted it: I felt no fear, 
No weight upon the heart: 


If aught befell it, Love was by 
And roll’d it off again ; ~ 

So, if there ever was a sigh, 
’Twas not a sigh of pain. 


I may. not call thee back ; but thou 
Returnest when the hand 

Of gentle Sleep waves o'er my brow 
His poppy-crested wand ; 


Then smiling eyes bend over mine, 
Then lips once pressed invite ; 
But sleep hath given a silent sign, 
And both, alas! take flight. 
1853. 


LANDOR 


TO AGE 


WELCOME, old friend! 
years 
Have we lived door by door: 
The Fates have laid aside their shears 
Perhaps for some few more. 


These many 


I was indocile at an age 
When better boys were taught, 

But thou at length hast made me sage, 
If I am sage in aught. 


Little I know from other men, 
Too little they from me, 

But thou hast pointed well the pen 
That writes these lines to thee. 


Thanks for expelling Fear and Hope, 
One vile, the other vain ; 

One’s scourge, the other’s telescope, 
I shall not see again : 


Rather what lies before my feet 
My notice shall engage— 
He who hath braved Youth’s dizzy heat 
Dreads not the frost of Age. 
1853. 


THE CHRYSOLITES AND RUBIES 


BACCHUS BRINGS 
THE chrysolites and rubies Bacchus 
brings 
To crown the feast where swells the 
broad-vein’d brow, 
Where maidens blush at what the min- 
strel sings, 
They who have coveted may covet 
now. 


Bring me, in cool alcove, the grape un- 
crushed, 
The peach of pulpy cheek and down 
mature, 
Where every voice (but bird’s or child’s) 
is hushed, 
And every thought, like the brook 
nigh, runs pure. 1853. 


SO THEN, I FEEL NOT DEEPLY! 


So then, I feel not deeply ! if I did, 
I should have seized the pen and pierced 
therewith 
The passive world ! 
And thus thou reasonest ? 
Well hast thou known the lover’s, not so 
well 


450 


The poet’s heart: while that heart 
bleeds, the hand 

Presses it close. Grief must run on and 
pass 

Into near Memory’s more quiet shade 

Before it can compose itself in song. 

He who is agonized and turns to show 

His agony to those who sit around, 

Seizes the pen in vain: thought, fancy, 
power, 

Rush back into his bosom; all the 
strength 

Of genius can not draw them into, light 


From under mastering Grief; but 
Memory, 

The Muse’s mother, nurses, rears them 
up, 

Informs, and keeps them with her all her 
days. 1853. 


YEARS, MANY PARTI-COLORED 
YEARS 


YEARS, many parti-colored years, 
Some have crept on, and some have 
flown 
Since first before me fell those tears 
I never could see fall alone. 
Years, not so many, are to come, 
Years not so varied, when from you 
One more will fall: when, carried home, 
I see it not, nor hear adieu. 1853. 


I WONDER NOT THAT YOUTH 
REMAINS 


I wonder not that Youth remains 
With you, wherever else she flies : 
Where could she find such fair domains, 
Where bask beneath such sunny eyes ? 
1853. 


ON MUSIC 


MAny love music but for music’s sake, 

Many because her touches can awake 

Thoughts that repose within the breast 
half-dead, 

And rise to follow where she loves to 
lead. 

What various feelings come from days 
gone by! 

What tears from far-off sources dim the 
eye! 

Few, when light fingers with sweet 
voices play 

And melodies swell, pause, and melt 
away, 


456 


BRITISH POETS 





Mind how at every touch, at every tone, 
A spark of life hath glisten’d and hath 
gone. 1853. 


ROSE AYLMER’S HAIR, GIVEN BY 
HER SISTER 


BEAUTIFUL spoils! borne off from van- 
quished death ! 
Upon my heart’s high altar shall ye 
lie 


Moved ec by only one adorer’s breath, 
Retaining youth, rewarding constancy. 
1853. 


DEATH STANDS ABOVE ME 


DEATH stands above me, whispering low 
I know not what into my ear: 

Of his strange language all I know 
Is, there is not a word of fear. 1853. 


ON HIS SEVENTY-FIFTH BIRTH- 
DAY 


I STROVE with none; fornone was worth 
my strife, 
Nature I loved, and next to Nature, 


Art ; 
I warmed both hands before the fire of 
life, 
It sinks, and I am ready to depart. 


1853. 
ON THE DEATH OF SOUTHEY 


It was a dream (ah! what is not a 


dream ?) 

In which I wander’d thro’ a boundless 
space 

People: by those that peopled earth ere- 
while. 

But who conducted me? That gentle 
Power, 

Gentle as Death, Death’s brother. On 
his brow 

Some have seen poppies; and perhaps 
among 


The many flowers about his wavy curls 

Poppies there might be ; roses I am sure 

I saw, and dimmer amaranths between. 

Lightly I thought I leaped across a 
grave 

Smelling of cool fresh turf, and sweet it 
smelt. 

IT would, but must not linger ; I must on, 

To tell my dream before forgetfulness 

Sweeps it away, or breaks or changes it. 


Iwas among the shades (if shades they 


' were) 
And look’d around me for some friendly 
hand 
To guide me on my way, and tell me all 
That en me around. I wish’d to 
nd 
One no less firm or ready than the guide 
Of Alighieri, trustier far than he, 
Higher in intellect, more conversant 
With earth and heaven and whatso lies 
between. 
He stood before me—Southey. 
‘*'Thou art he,” 
Said I, ‘‘ whom I was wishing.” 
“That I know,” 
Replied the genial voice and radiant eye. 
‘* We may be question’d, question we 


may not ; 

For that might cause to bubble forth 
again 

Some bitter spring which crossed the 
pleasantest 


And shadiest of our paths.” 
‘*T do not ask,” 
Said I, ‘‘ about your happiness ; I see 
The same serenity as when we walked 
Along the downs of Clifton. Fifty years 
Have roll’d behind us since that summer- 
tide, 
Nor thirty fewer since along the lake 
Of Lario, to Bellaggio villa-crown’d, 
Thro’ the crisp waves I urged my side- 
ling bark, 
Amid sweet salutations off the shore 
From lordly Milan’s proudly courteous 
dames.” 
‘¢Tandor! I well remember it,” said he, 
‘*T had just lost my first-born only boy, 
And then the heart is tender; lightest 
things 
Sink into it, and dwell there evermore.” 
The words were not yet spoken when 
the air 
Blew balmier ; 
neck 
An Angel threw his arms: 
son. 
‘* Father! I felt you wished me, 
the boy, 
‘‘ Behold me here ! ” 
Gentle the sire’s embrace, 
Gentle histone. ‘* See here your father’s 


and around the parent’s 
it was that 


” 


said 


friend !” 
He gazed into my face, then meekly 
said {ward 


‘* He whom my father loves hath his re- 
On earth; a richer one awaits him 
here,” 1858, 


LANDOR 


ON SOUTHEY’S DEATH 


FRIENDS! hear the words my wander- 
ing thoughts would say, 

And peat them into shape some other 
ay. 

Southey, my friend of forty years, is 


gone, 
And, shattered by the fall, Istand alone. 
1858. 


HEART’S-EASE 


THERE is a flower I wish to wear, 
But not until first worn by you. . 
Heart’s-ease .. of all earth’s flowers 
most rare ; 
Bring it; and bring enough for two. 
1858. 


THE THREE ROSES! 


WHEN the buds began to burst, 

Long ago, with Rose the First, 

I was walking ; joyous then 

Far above all other men, 

Till before us up there stood 

Britonferry’s oaken wood, 

Whispering, ‘‘ Happy as thou art, 

Happiness and thou must part.” 

Many summers have gone by 

Since a Second Rose and I 

(Rose from that same stem) have told 

This and other tales of old. 

She upon her wedding-day 

Carried home my tenderest lay : 

From her lap I now have heard 

Gleeful, chirping, Rose the Third, 

Not for her this hand of mine 

Rhyme with nuptial wreath shall twine ; 

Cold and torpid it must lie, 

Mute the tongue and closed the eye. 
1858. 


LATELY OUR SONGSTERS LOI- 
TERED IN GREEN LANES 


LATELY our songsters loiter’d in green 


“lanes, 

Content to catch the ballads of the 
plains ; 

I fancied I had strength enough to 
climb 


_ A loftier station at no distant time, 

And might securely from intrusion doze 

Upon the flowers thro’ which TIlissus 
flows. 


1 See pages 428 and 441. ‘‘ Rose the Third”? was 
the daughter of ‘‘ the Second Rose,” and thus the 
grand-niece of Rose Aylmer, 


In those pale olive grounds all voices 


cease, 

And from afar dust fills the paths of 
Greece. 

My slumber broken and my doublet 
torn, 

I find the laurel also bears a thorn. 


1865. 


THESEUS AND HIPPOLYTA 1! 


Hippolyta. Eternal hatred I have 
sworn against 
The persecutor of my sisterhood ; 
In vain, proud son of AXgeus, hast. thou 
snapped 
Their arrows and derided them; in vain 
Leadest thou me a captive; I can die, 
And die I will. 
Theseus. Nay; many are the years 
Of youth and beauty for Hippolyta. 
Hippolyta. Iscorn my youth, I hate 
my beauty. Go! 
Monster! of all the monsters in these 
wilds 
Most frightful and most odious to my 
sight. 
Theseus. I boast not that I saved thee 
from the bow 
Of Scythian. 


Hippolyta. And for what? To die 
disgraced. 
Strong as thou art, yet thou art not so 
strong 
As Death is, when we call him for sup- 
port. 
Theseus. Him too will I ward off; he 


strikes me first, 
Hippolyta, long after, when these eyes 
Are closed, and when the knee that 
supplicates 
Can bend no more. 
Hippolyta. Is the man mad? 
Theseus. He is. 
Hippolyta. So, thou canst tell one 
truth, however false 
In other things. 


Theseus. What other? Thou dost 

pause, 

And thine eyes wander over the smooth 
turf 

As if some gem (but gem thou wearest 
not 

Had fallen from the remnant of thy 
hair. 


1Written by Landor immediately before its 
publication, at the age of eighty-eight. Perhaps 
the only other example in literature of such 
vigor and creative power, at such an age, is that 
of Sophocles, 


458 


Hippolyta! speak plainly, answer me, 
What have I done to raise thy fear or 
hate ? 
Mippolyta. 
abhor. 
Unworthy man! did Heracles delude 
The maids who trusted him ? 


Fear I despise, perfidy I 


Theseus. . Did ever I? 
Whether he did or not, they never told 
me: 
I would have chided him. 
Hippolyta. Thou chide him! thou! 
The Spartan mothers well remember 
thee. 
Theseus. Scorn adds no beauty to the 
beautiful. 


Heracles was beloved by Omphale, 

He never parted from her, but obey’d 

Her slightest wish, as Theseus will Hip- 
polyta’s. 

Hippolyta. Then leave me, leave me 

instantly ; I know 
The way to my own country. 

Theseus. This command, 
And only this, my heart must disobey. 
My country shall be thine, and there 

thy state 
Regal. 
Hippolyta. 
my own, 
And keep for weaker heads thy dia- 
dems. 
Thermodon I shall never see again, 
Brightest of rivers, into whose clear 
depth 
mother plunged 
warmer breast, 
And taught me early to divide the waves 
With arms each day more strong, and 
soon to chase 
And overtake the father swan, nor heed 
His hoarser voice or his uplifted wing. 
Where are my sisters? are there any left ? 


Amla child? Give me 


My me from her 


Theseus. I hope it. 
Hippolyta. And I fear it: theirs may 
be 
A fate like mine; which, O ye Gods, for- 
bid! 
Theseus. I pity thee, and would as- 


suage thy grief. 
Hippolyta. Pity me not: thy anger I 
could bear. 
Theseus. There is no place for anger 
where thou art. 
Commiseration even men may feel 
For those who want it: even the fiercer 
beasts . 
Lick the sore-wounded of a kindred 
race, 


BRITISH POETS 


Hearing their cry, albeit they may not 
help. 
Hippolyta. This is no falsehood : and 
can he be false 
Who speaks it ? 
ITremember not the time 
When I have wept, it was so long ago. 
Thou forcest tears from me, because . . 
because . . 
I cannot hate thee as I ought to do. 
1863. 


AN AGED MAN WHO LOVED TO 
DOZE AWAY 


AN aged man who loved to doze away 

An hour by daylight, for his eyes were 
dim, 

And he had seen too many suns go down 

And rise again, dreamed that he saw two 
forms — 

Of radiant beauty ; he would clasp them 
both, 

But both flew stealthily away. He cried 

In his wild dream, 

‘“*T never thought, O youth, 

That thou, altho’ so cherished, would’st 
return 

But I did think that he who came with 

thee, 

who could swear more sweetly 
than birds sing, 
Would never leave me comfortless and 


Love, 


lone.” 
A sigh broke through his slumber, not 
the last. 1863. 


WELL I REMEMBER HOW YOU 
SMILED 


WELL I remember how you smiled 

To see me write your name upon 
The soft sea-sand. ‘‘O! what achild! 

You think yowre writing upon stone !” 
I have since written what no tide 

Shall ever wash away, what men 
Unborn shall read o’er ocean wide 

And find Ianthe’s name again. 

1863. 


TO MY NINTH DECADE 


To my ninth decade I have totter’d on, 
And no soft arm bends now my steps 
Lo steady ; 
She, who once led me where she would, 


is gone, 
So when he calls me, Death shall find 
me ready. 1863. 


TENNYSON 
LIST OF REFERENCES 


EDITIONS 


Complete Works, with Life, 10 volumes, The Macmillan Co. Poetical 
Works, Riverside Edition, 6 volumes, Houghton & Mifflin. Complete 
Works, 6 volumes, The Macmillan Co. (in preparation). Complete Works, 
Globe Edition, 1 volume. * Complete Works, Cambridge Edition, 1 vol- 
ume, edited by W. J. Rolfe. Lyrical Poems, Selected by F. T. Palgrave, 
(Golden Treasury Series). Poems; Chosen and edited by Henry Van 
Dyke; Ginn & Co. 


BrloGRAPHY 


*TENNYSON (Hallam), Alfred, Lord Tennyson, A Memoir, 2 volumes. 
(The Standard Biography.) Brnson (A. C.), Tennyson (Little Biogra- 
phies). CHrsterton (G. K.), Tennyson (Bookman Series). Cary (E. L.), 
Tennyson. Horton (R. F.), Life of Tennyson, [Lane (A.), Alfred Ten- 
nyson (Modern English Writers). Lyati (A. C.), Tennyson (English 
Men of Letters Series). Waven (A.), Life of Tennyson. 


REMINISCENCES AND EARLY CRITICISM 


* Naprer, The Homes and Haunts of Tennyson. Fierps (A.), Authors 
and Friends. Fiexrps (J. T.), Yesterdays with Authors. * Rircnie 
(Anne Thackeray), Records of Tennyson, Ruskin, and the Brownings. 
Rawnstey (H. D.), Memories of the Tennysons. Nicotit (W. R.), Liter- 
ary Anecdotes. Wertp, Glimpses of Tennyson. * Hatuiam (A. H), Lit- 
erary Remains: On some of the Characteristics of Modern Poetry, and on 
the Lyrical Poems of Alfred Tennyson (originally published in the Eng- 
lish Magazine, Aug., 1831). Wurtson (John), Essays: Tennyson’s Poems, 
(1832). SrerirmcG (John), Essays and Tales: Tennyson’s Poems, (1842). 
SPEDDING (James), Reviews: Tennyson’s Poems, (1843). Horne (R. H.), 
A new Spirit of the Age, (1844). Lower. (J. R.), Conversations with the 
Poets: Keats and Tennyson, (1846). Krnesury (C.), Miscellanies, (1850). 
Brey (George), Tennyson’s Poems, in Cambridge Essays, (1855). Mas- 
sey (Gerald), Tennyson and his Poetry, (1855). * Roscor (W. C.), Poems 
and Essays, Vol. II, (1860). * Bacrnor (W.), Literary Studies, Vol. IT: 
Wordsworth, Tennyson and Browning, (1864). * Tainz, History of Eng- 
lish Literature, Vol. IV. Mitr (J. 8.), Early Essays. Taytor (Bayard), 
Critical Essays. Tuckerman (II. T.), Thoughts on the Poets. 


AS9 


460 TENNYSON 


LATER CRITICISM 


Apams (F.), Essays in Modernity. Brookes (S. A.), Tennyson, his Art 
and Relation to Modern Life. BraptEy, Commentary on In Memoriam. 
CHESTERTON (G. K.), Twelve Types. *Dowpxrn (Edward), Studies in 
Literature: Tennyson and Browning. Everrerr (C. C.), Essays: Tenny- 
son and Browning as Spiritual Forces. * Garxs (L. E.), Studies and Ap- 
preciations. GuiapsTone (W. E.), Gleanings of Past Years. Gossz (E.), 
Questions at Issue: Tennyson—and after. Harrison (Frederic), Tenny- 
son, Ruskin, Mill, and other literary Estimates. *Hurron (R. H.), Lit- 
erary Essays. Layarp (G.§.), Tennyson and his Pre-Raphaelite Illus- 
trators. Muirsanp (J.), Littérature anglaise. Macaiitum (M. W.), Tenny- 
son’s Idyls of the King, and the Arthurian Story from the Sixteenth 
Century. Myers (F. W. H.), Science and a Future Life: Tennyson as a 
Prophet. Nerncronr (E.), Letteratura inglese. Nor (R. B. W.), Essays 
‘on Poetry and Poets. OnipHantr (Margaret), Victorian Age of English 
Literature, Vol. I. Rearpern (T. H.), Petrarch and Other Essays. Ro- 
BERTSON (J. M.), Essays toward a Critical Method: The Art of Tennyson. 
* Royce (J.), Studies of Good and Evil: Tennyson and Pessimism. 
SarntsBpuryY (George), Corrected Impressions. ScHERER (E.), Etudes de 
Littérature contemporaine, Vol. X. Suarrp (J. C.), Aspects of Poetry. 
SneatH, The Mind of Tennyson. *Srrpman (E. C.), Victorian Poets. 
STEPHEN (Leslie), Studies of a Biographer, Vol. I]. * Swinspurne, Mis- 
cellanies: Tennyson and Musset. * Van Dyke (Henry), Poetry of Ten- 
nyson. Wurman (Walt), Democratic Vistas. 

Bayne (P.), Lessons from my Masters. Bucnanan (R.), Master Spirits. 
Cooke (G. W.), Poets and Problems. Dixon (W.M.), A Tennyson 
Primer. Farrar (Ff. W.), Men I have Known. Forman (H. B.), Our 
Living Poets. Hrywoop (J. C.), How they Strike Me, these Authors: 
An over-rated Poet. Howrrtis (W. D.), My literary Passions. Pau 
(IT. W.), Men and Letters: Classical Poems of Tennyson. RawnsLEy 
(II. D.), Memories of the Tennysons. Sranuey (H. M.), Essays on Liter- 
ary Art. Watker (I1.), The Greater Victorian Poets. 


TRIBUTES IN VERSE 


* Watson (W.), * Lacryme Musarum; To Lord Tennyson; The For- 
esters. * Huxuiey (T. H.), in Stedman’s Victorian Anthology. GiLpER 
(R. W.), Five Books of Verse. Bourpition (F. W.), Sursum Corda. Ete. 


BIBLioGRAPHY, ETC. 


SHEPHERD (R. H.), Bibliography of Tennyson. Groimr Crus, Chrono- 
logical List of Tennyson’s Works, etc. Cortins, The Early Poems of 
Tennyson, with Bibliography and Various Readings. Dixon (W. M.), A 
Primer of Tennyson, with Bibliography, pp. 145-189. Lucr (Morton), 
Handbook tothe Works of Tennyson. Provipencr Public Library, Ten- 
nyson Reference List (Monthly Bulletin, Oct., 1897). Livineston (L.8.), 
Bibliography of the First Editions, 


TENNYSON 


CLARIBEL 
A MELODY 


WHERE Claribel low-lieth 
The breezes pause and die, 
Letting the rose-leaves fall ; 
But the solemn oak-tree sigheth, 
Thick-leaved, ambrosial, 
With an ancient melody 
Of an inward agony, 
Where Claribel low-lieth. 


At eve the beetle boometh 
Athwart the thicket lone ; 

At noon the wild bee hummeth 
About the moss’d headstone : 

At midnight the moon cometh, 
And looketh down alone. 

Her song the lintwhite swelleth, 

The clear-voiced mavis dwelleth, 
The callow throstle lispeth, 

The slumbrous wave outwelleth, 
The babbling runnel crispeth, 

The hollow grot replieth 
Where Claribel low-lieth. 1830. 


THE POET 


THE poet in a golden clime was born, 
With golden stars above ; 
Dower’d with the hate of hate, the scorn 
of scorn, 
The love of love. 


He saw thro’ life and death, thro’ good 
and ill, 
He saw thro’ his own soul, 
The marvel of the everlasting will, 
An open scroll, 


Before him lay; with echoing feet he 
threaded 
The secretest walks of fame : 
The viewless arrows of his thoughts 
were headed 
And wing’d with flame, 


461 


Like Indian reeds blown from his silver 
tongue, 
And of so fierce a flight, 
From Calpe unto Caucasus they sung, 
Filling with light 


And vagrant melodies the winds which 
bore 
Them earthward till they lit ; 
Then, like the arrow-seeds of the field 
flower, 
The fruitful wit 


Cleaving took root, and springing forth 
anew 
Where’er they fell, behold, 
Like to the mother plant in semblance, 
grew 
A flower all gold, 


And bravely furnish’d all abroad to fling 
The winged shafts of truth, 
To throng with stately blooms the 
breathing spring 
Of Hope and Youth. 


So many minds did gird their orbs with 
beams, 
Tho’ one did fling the fire ; 
Heaven flow’d upon the soul in many 
dreams 
Of high desire. 


Thus truth was multiplied on truth, the 
world 
Like one great garden show’d, 
And thro’ the wreaths of floating dark 
upeurl’d, 
‘Rare sunrise flow’d. 


And Freedom rear’d in that august sun- 
rise 
Her beautiful bold brow, 
When rites and forms before his burn- 
ing eyes 
Melted like snow. 


462 BRITISH POETS 


There was no blood upon her maiden 
robes 
Sunn’d by those orient skies ; 
But round about the circles of the globes 
Of her keen eyes 


And in her raiment’s hem was traced in 
flame 
WISDOM, a name to shake 
All evil dreams of power—a_ sacred 
name. 
And when she spake, 


Her words did gather thunder as they 
ran, 
And as the lightning to the thunder 
Which follows it, riving the spirit of 
man, 
Making earth wonder, 


So was their meaning to her words. No 
sword 
Of wrath her right arm whirl’d, 
But one poor poet’s scroll, and with his 
word 


She shook the world. 1830. 
THE LADY OF SHALOTE! 


PART I 


ON either side the river lie 
Long fields of barley and of rye, 
That clothe the wold and meet the sky ; 
And thro’ the field the road runs by 
To many-tower’d Camelot ; 
And up and down the people go, 
Gazing where the lilies blow 
Round an island there below, 
The island of Shalott. 


Willows whiten, aspens quiver, 
Little breezes dusk and shiver 
Thro’ the wave that runs for ever 
By the island in the river 
Flowing down to Camelot. 
Four gray walls, and four gray towers, 
Overlook a space of flowers. 
And the silent isle imbowers 
The Lady of Shalott. 


By the margin, willow-veil’d, 

Slide the heavy barges trail’d 

By slow horses ; and unhail’d 

The shallop flitteth silken-sail’d 
Skimming down to Camelot ; 

But who hath seen her wave her hand ? 


1 See the Life of Tennyson, by his Son, I, 116- 
We. 





Or at the casement seen her stand ? 
Or is she known in all the land, 
The Lady of Shalott ? 


Only reapers, reaping early 

In among the bearded barley, 

Hear a song that echoes cheerly 

From the river winding clearly, 
Down to tower’d Camelot ; 

And by the moon the reaper weary, 

Piling sheaves in uplands airy, 

Listening, whispers ‘‘’T is the fairy 
Lady of Shalott.” 


PART II 


There she weaves by night and day 
A magic web with colors gay. 
She has heard a whisper say, 
A curse is on her if she stay 
To look down to Camelot. 
She knows not what the curse may be, 
And so she weaveth steadily, 
And little other care hath she, 
The Lady of Shalott. 


And moving thro’ a mirror clear 
That hangs before her all the year, 
Shadows of the world appear. 
There she sees the highway near 
Winding down to Camelot ; 
There the river eddy whirls, | 
And there the surly village-churls, 
And the red cloaks of market girls, 
Pass onward from Shalott. 


Sometimes a troop of damsels glad, 
An abbot on an ambling pad, 
Sometimes a curly shepherd-lad, 
Or long-hair’d page in crimson clad, 
Goes by to tower’d Camelot ; 
And sometimes thro’ the mirror blue 
The knights come riding two and two: 
She hath no loyal knight and true, 
The Lady of Shalott. 


But in her web she still delights 

To weave the mirror’s magic sights, 

For often thro’ the silent nights 

A funeral, with plumes and lights 
And music, went to Camelot ; 

Or when the moon was overhead, 

Came two young lovers lately wed : 

‘*T am half sick of shadows,” said 
The Lady of Shalott. 


PART III 


A bow-shot from her bower-eaves, 
He rode between the barley-sheaves, 


TENNYSON 





The sun came dazzling thro’ the leaves, 
And flamed upon the brazen greaves 
Of bold Sir Lancelot. 
A red-cross knight for ever kneel’d 
To a lady in his shield, 
That sparkled on the yellow field, 
Beside remote Shalott. 


The gemmy bridle glitter’d free, 
Like to some branch of stars we see 
Hung in the golden Galaxy. 
The bridle bells rang merrily: 
As he rode down to Camelot ; 
And from his blazon’d baldric slung 
A mighty silver bugle hung, 
And as he rode his armor rung, 
Beside remote Shalott. 


All in the blue unclouded weather 

Thick-jewell’d shone the saddle-leather, 

The helmet and the helmet-feather 

Burn’d like one burning flame together, 
As he rode down to Camelot; ' 

As often thro’ the purple night, 

Below the starry clusters bright, 

Some bearded meteor, trailing light, 
Moves over still Shalott. 


His broad clear brow in sunlight glow’d; 
On burnish’d hooves his war-horse trode; 
From underneath his helmet flow’d 
His coal-black curls as on he rode, 

As he rode down to Camelot. 
From the bank and from the river 
He flash’d into the crystal mirror, 
*¢ Tirra lirra,” by the river 

Sang Sir Lancelot. 


She left the web, she left the loom, 
She made three paces thro’ the room, 
She saw the water-lily bloom, 
She saw the helmet and the plume, 
She look’d down to Camelot. 
Out flew the web and floated wide ; 
The mirror crack’d from side to side ; 
‘*The curse is come upon me,” cried 
The Lady of Shalott. 


PART IV 


In the stormy east-wind straining, 
The pale yellow woods were waning, 
The broad stream in his banks complain- 
ing, 
Heavily the low sky raining 
Over tower’d Camelot ; 
Down she came and found a boat 
Beneath a willow left afloat, 
And round about the prow she wrote 
The Lady of Shalott. 


463 


And down the river’s dim expanse 

Like some bold seér in a trance, 

Seeing all his own mischance— 

With a glassy countenance 
Did she look to Camelot. 

And at the closing of the day 

She loosed the chain, and down she lay; 

The broad stream bore her far away, 
The Lady of Shalott. 


Lying, robed in snowy white 
That loosely flew to Jeft and right— 
The leaves upon her falling light— 
Thro’ the noises of the night 
She floated down to Camelot ; 
And as the boat-head wound along 
The willowy hills and fields among, 
They heard her singing her last song, 
The Lady of Shalott. 


Heard a carol, mournful, holy, 
Chanted loudly, chanted lowly, 
Till her blood was frozen slowly 
And her eyes were darken’d wholly 

Turn’d to tower’d Camelot. 
For ere she reach’d upon the tide 
The first house by the water-side, 
Singing in her song she died, 

The Lady of Shalott. 


Under tower and balcony, 

By garden-wall and gallery, 

A gleaming shape she floated by, 

Dead-pale between the houses high, 
Silent into Camelot. 

Out upon the wharfs they came, 

Knight and burgher, lord and dame, 

And round the prow they read her name, 
The Lady of Shalott. 


Who is this ? and what is here? 

And in the lighted palace near 

Died the sound of royal cheer, 

And they cross’d themselves for fear, 
All the knights at Camelot : 

But Lancelot mused a little space ; 

He said, ‘‘ She has a lovely face ; 

God in his mercy lend her grace, 


The Lady of Shalott.” 1833. 


SONG: THE MILLER’S DAUGHTER 


IT is the miller’s daughter, 
And she is grown so dear, so dear, 
That I would be the jewel 
That trembles in her ear ; 
For hid in ringlets day and night, 
I’d touch her neck so warm and white. 


404 


And I would be the girdle 
About her dainty dainty waist, 
And her heart would beat against me, 
In sorrow and in rest ; 
And I should know if it beat right, 
1 *d clasp it round so close and tight. 


And I would be the necklace, 
And all day long to fall and rise 
Upon her balmy bosom, 
With her laughter or her sighs ; 
And I would lie so light, so light, 
I scarce should be unclasp’d at night. 
18 


GQENONE 


THERE lies a vale in Ida, lovelier 

Than all the valleys of Ionian hills. 

The swimming vapor slopes athwart the 
glen, 

Puts forth an arm, and creeps from pine 
to pine, 

And loiters, slowly drawn. 
hand 

The lawns and meadow-ledges midway 
down 

Hang rich in flowers, and far below 
them roars 

The long brook falling thro’ the cloven 
ravine 

In cataract after cataract to the sea. 

Behind the valley topmost Gargarus 

Stands up and takes the morning; 
in front 

The gorges, opening wide apart, reveal 

Troas and Ilion’s column’d citadel, 

The crown of Troas. 

Hither came at noon 

Mournful Ginone, wandering forlorn 

Of Paris, once her playmate on the hills. 

Her cheek had lost the rose, and round 
her neck 

Floated her hair or seem’d to float in 
rest. 

She, leaning on a fragment twined with 
vine, 

Sang to the stillness till the mountain- 
shade 

Sloped downward to her seat from the 
upper cliff. 


On either 


but 


‘*O mother Ida, many fountain’d Ida, 

Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 

For now the noonday quiet holds the 
HilS 

The grasshopper is silent in the grass ; 

The lizard, with his shadow .on the 
stone, [dead. 

Rests like a shadow, and the winds are 


BRITISH POETS 


The purple flower droops, the golden 
bee 

Is lily-cradled: I alone awake. 

My eyes are full of tears, my heart of 
love, 

My heart is breaking and my eyes are 
dim, 

And Iam all aweary of my life. 


‘‘O mother Ida, many-fountain’d Ida, 
Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
Hear me, O earth, hear me, O hills, O 
caves 

That house the cold-crown’d snake! O 
mountain brooks, 

Iam the daughter of a River God, 

Hear me, for I will speak, and build up 
all 

My sorrow with my song, as yonder 
walls 

Rose slowly toa music slowly breathed, 

A cloud that gather’d shape; for it 
may be 

That, while I speak of it, a little while 

My heart may wander from its deeper 
woe. 


‘‘O mother Ida, many-fountain’d Ida, 

Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 

I waited underneath the dawning hills ; 

Aloft the mountain-lawn was dewy- 
dark, 

And dewy-dark aloft the mountain-pine. 

Beautiful Paris, evil-hearted Paris, 

Leading a jet-black goat white-horn’d, 
white-hooved, 

Came up from reedy Simois all alone. 


‘¢O mother Ida, harken ere I die. 

Far off the torrent call’d me from the 
cleft ; 

Far up the solitary morning smote 

The streaks of virgin snow. With down- 
dropt eyes 

T sat alone; white-breasted like a star 

Fronting the dawn he moved ; a leopard 
skin 

Dropp’d from his shoulder, but his sunny 
hair 

Cluster’d about his temples like a God’s; 

And his cheek brighten’d as the foam- 
bow brightens 

When the wind blows the foam, and all 
my heart . 

Went forth to embrace him coming ere 
he came. 


‘¢ Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
He smiled, and opening out his milk- 
white palm 


TENNYSON 


Disclosed a fruit of pure Hesperian gold, 
That smelt ambrosially, and while I 
look’d 
And listen’d, the full-flowing river of 
speech 
Came down upon my heart : 
‘My own Céinone, 
Beautiful-brow’d CGinone, my own soul, 
Behold this fruit, whose gleaming rind 
ingraven 
‘*For the most fair,” would seem to 
award it thine, 
As lovelier than whatever Oread haunt 
The knolls of Ida, loveliest in all grace, 
Of movement, and the charm of married 
brows.’ 


‘Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 

He pressed the blossom of his lips to 
mine, 

And added, ‘This was cast upon the 
board, 

When all the full-faced presence of the 
Gods 

Ranged in the halls of Peleus; where- 
upon 

Rose feud, with question unto whom 
*twere due; 

But light-foot Iris brought it yester-eve, 

Delivering, that to me, by common 
voice 

Elected umpire, Heré comes to-day, 

Pallas and Aphrodite, claiming each 

This meed of fairest. Thou, within the 
cave 

Behind yon whispering tuft of oldest 
pine, 

Mayst well behold them unbeheld, un- 
heard 

Hear all, and see thy Paris, judge of 
Gods.” 


** Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 

It was the deep midnoon; one silvery 
cloud 

Had lost his way between the piny sides. 

Of this long glen. Then to the bower 
they came, 

Naked they came tothat smooth- 
swarded bower, [fire, 

And at their feet the crocus brake like 

Violet, amaracus, and asphodel, 

Lotos and lilies; and a wind arose, 

And overhead the wandering ivy and 
vine, [toon 

This way and that, in many a wild fes- 

Ran riot, garlanding the gnarled boughs 

With bunch and berry and flower thro’ 
and thro’, 


30 


465 


‘¢OQ mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
On the tree-tops a crested peacock lit, 
And o’er him flow’d a golden cloud, and 


lean’d 

Upon him, slowly dropping fragrant 
dew. 

Then first I heard the voice of her to 
whom 

Coming thro’ heaven, like a light that 
grows 

Larger and clearer, with one mind the 
Gods 

Rise up for reverence. She to Paris 
made 


Proffer of royal power, ample rule 

Unquestion’d, overflowing revenue 

Wherewith to embellish state, ‘from 
many a vale 

And river-sunder’d champaign clothed 
with corn, 

Or labor’d mine undrainable of ore. 

Honor,’ she said, ‘and homage, tax and 
toll, 

From many an inland town and haven 
large, 

Mast-throng’d beneath her shadowing 
citadel 

In glassy bays among her tallest towers.’ 


** OQ mother Ida, harken ere I die. 

Still she spake on and still she spake of 
power, 

‘Which in all action is the end of all; 

Power fitted to the season ; wisdom-bred 

And throned of wisdom—from all neigh- 
bor crowns 

Alliance and allegiance, till thy hand 

Fail from the sceptre-staff. Such boon 
from me, 

From me, heaven’s queen, Paris, to thee 
king-born, 

A shepherd all thy life but yet king- 
born, 

Should come most welcome, seeing men, 
in power 

Only, are likest Gods, who have attain’d 

Rest in a happy place and quiet seats 

Above the thunder, with undying bliss 

In knowledge of their own supremacy.’ 


‘Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 

She ceased, and Paris held the costly 
fruit 

Out at arm’s-length, so much the thought 
of power 

Flatter’d -his spirit; but Pallas where 
she stood 

Somewhat apart, her clear and bared 
limbs 


466 


O’erthwarted with the brazen-headed 
spear 

Upon her pearly shoulder leaning cold, 

The while, above, her full and earnest 


eye 

Over her snow-cold breast and angry 
cheek 

Kept watch, waiting decision, made re- 
ply : 

‘Self-reverence, self-knowledge, _ self- 
control, 

These three alone lead life to sovereign 


power. 
Yet not for power (power of herself 
Would eis uncall’d for) but to live by 
aw, 
Acting the law we live by without fear ; 
And, because right is right, to follow 
right 
Were wisdom in the scorn of conse- 
quence.’ 


‘* Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
Again she said: ‘I woo thee not with 
gifts. 
Sequel of guerdon could not alter me 
To fairer. Judge thou me by what lam, 
So shalt thou find me fairest. 
Yet, indeed, 
If gazing on divinity disrobed 
Thy mortal eyes are frail to judge of 
fair, 
Unbias’d by self-profit, O, rest thee sure 
That I shall love thee well and cleave to 
thee, 
So that my vigor, wedded to thy blood, 
Shall strike within thy pulses, like a 
God’s, 
To push thee forward thro’ a life of 
shocks, 
Dangers, and deeds, until endurance 
grow 
Sinew’d with action, and the full-grown 
will, 
Circled thro’ all experiences, pure law, 
Commeasure perfect freedom.’ 
‘* Here she ceas’d, 
And Paris ponder’d, and I cried, ‘O 
Paris, 
Give it to Pallas!’ but he heard me not, 
Or hearing would not hear me, woe is 
me! 


‘‘O mother Ida, many-fountain’d Ida, 
Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
Idalian Aphrodite beautiful, 

Fresh as the foam, new-bathed in 
Paphian wells, 
With rosy slender fingers backward drew 


BRITISH POETS 





From her warm brows and bosom her 
deep hair 

Ambrosial, golden round her lucid throat 

And shoulder ; from the violets her light 
foot 

Shone rosy-white, and o’er her rounded 
form 

Between the shadows of the vine-bunches 

Floated the glowing sunlights, as she 
moved. 


‘¢ Dear mother Ida, harken ere I die. 
She with a subtle smile in her mild eyes, 
The herald of her triumph, drawing nigh 
Half-whisper’d in his ear, ‘1 promise 

thee 
The fairest and most loving wife in 
Greece.’ 
She spoke and laugh’d; I shut my sight 
for fear ; 
But when I look’d, Paris had raised his 
arm, 
And I beheld great Heré’s angry eyes, 
As she withdrew into the golden cloud, 
And I was left alone within the bower ; 
And from that time to this I am alone, 
And I shall be alone until I die. 


‘* Yet, mother Ida, harken ere I die. 

Fairest—why fairest wife? am I not 
fair? 

My love hath tcld me so a thousand 
times. 

Methinks I must be fair, for yesterday, 

When I past by, a wildand wanton pard, 

Kyed like the evening star, with playful 
tail 

Crouch’d fawning in the weed. Most 
loving is she? 

Ah me, my mountain shepherd, that my 
arms 

Were wound about thee, and my hot lips 
pressed 

Close, close to thine in that quick-falling 
dew 

Of fruitful kisses, thick as autumn rains 

Flash in the pools of whirling Simois ! 


‘¢Q mother. hear me yet before I die. 

They came, they cut away my tallest 
pines, 

My tall dark pines, that plumed the 
craggy ledge 

High over the blue gorge, and all be- 
tween 

The snowy peak and snow-white cataract 

Foster’d the callow eaglet—from beneath 

Whose thick mysterious boughs in the 
dark morn 


TENNYSON 


The panther’s roar came muffled, while 
I sat 

Low in the valley. Never, never more 

Shall lone Ginone see the morning mist 

Sweep thro’ them ; never see them over- 
laid 

With narrow moonlit slips of silver 
cloud, 

Between the loud stream and the trem- 
bling stars. 


‘“*Q mother, hear me yet before I die. 

I wish that somewhere in the ruin’d 
folds, 

Among the fragments tumbled from the 
glens, 

Or the dry thickets, I could meet with 
her 

The Abominable, that uninvited came 

Into the fair Peleian banquet-hall, 

And cast the golden fruit upon the board, 

And bred this change; that I might 
speak my mind, 

And tell her to her fage how much I 
hate 

Her presence, hated both of Gods and 
men, 


‘*O mother, hear me yet before I die. 
Hath he not sworn his love a thousand 
times, 
In this green valley, under this green 
hill, 
Even on this hand, and sitting on this 
stone? 
Seal’d it with kisses? water’d it with 
tears ? 
O happy tears, and how unlike to these ! 
O happy heaven, how canst thou see my 


face? 
O happy earth, how canst thou bear my 
weight ? [cloud, 


O death, death, death, thou ever-floating 
There are enough unhappy on this earth, 
Pass by the happy souls, that love to 
live ; 
I pray thee, pass before my light of life, 
And shadow all my soul, that 1 may die. 
Thou weighest heavy on the heart with- 
in, 
Weigh heavy on my eyelids; let me die. 


‘*O mother, hear me yet before I die. 
I will not die alone, for fiery thoughts 
Do shape themselves within me, more 
. and more, 
Whereof I catch the issue, as I hear 
Dead sounds at night come from the 
inmost hills, 


467 


Like footsteps upon wool. I dimly see 

My far-off doubtful purpose, as a mother 

Conjectures of the features of her child 

Ere it is born. Her child !—a shudder 
comes 

Across me: never child be born of me, 

Unblest, to vex me with his father’s eyes ! 


‘*O, mother, hear me yet before I die. 
Hear me, O earth. I will not die alone, 
Lest their shrill happy laughter come to 

me 
Walking the cold and starless road of 
death 
Uncomforted, leaving my ancient love 
With the Greek woman. I will rise and 


go 
Down into Troy, and ere the stars come 
forth 
Talk with the wild Cassandra, for she 
says 


' A fire dances before her, and a sound 


Rings ever in her ears of armed men. 
What this may belI know not, but I 
know 
That wheresoe’er Tam by night and day, 
Allearth and air seem only burning fire.” 
1833. 


THE SISTERS 


WE were two daughters of one race ; 
She was the fairest in the face. 
The wind is blowing in turret and 
tree. 
They were together, and she fell ; 
Therefore revenge became me well. 
O, the earl was fair to see! 


She died ; she went to burning flame ; 
She mix’d her ancient blood with shame. 
The wind is howling in turret and tree. 
Whole weeks and months, and early and 
late, 
To win his love I lay in wait ! 
O, the earl was fair to see! 


I made a feast ; I bade him come ; 
I won his love, I brought him home. 
The wind is roaring in turret and tree. 
And after supper, on a bed, 
Upon my lap he laid his head. 
O, the earl was fair to see! 


I kiss’d his eyelids into rest. 
His ruddy cheek upon my breast. 
The wind is raging in turret and tree. 
I hated him with the hate of hell, 
But I loved his beauty passing well. 
O, the earl was fair to see ! 


468 


I rose up in the silent night ; 

I made my dagger sharp and bright. 
The wind is raving in turret and tree. 

As half-asleep his breath he drew, 

Three times I stabb’d him thro’ and thro’. 
O, the earl was fair to see! 


I curl’d and comb’d his comely head, 
He look’d so grand when he was dead. 
The wind is blowing in turret and tree. 
I wrapped his body in the sheet. 
And laid him at his mother’s feet. 
O, the earl was fair to see! 1833. 


THE PALACE OF ART 1 


I BUILT my soul a lordly pleasure-house, 
Wherein at ease for aye to dwell. 
I said, ‘‘O Soul, make merry and ca- 
rouse, 
Dear soul, for all is well. ” 


A huge crag-platform, smooth as burn- 
ish’d brass, 
I chose. The ranged ramparts bright 
From level meadow-bases of deep grass 
Suddenly scaled the light. 


Thereon I built it firm. Of ledge or shelf 
The rock rose clear, or winding stair. 
My soul would live alone unto herself 
In her high palace there. 


And ‘‘ while the world runs round and 
round,” I said, 
‘*Reign thou apart, a quiet king, 
Still as, while Saturn whirls, his stead- 
fast shade 
Sleeps on his luminous ring.” 


To which my soul made answer readily: 
** Trust me, in bliss I shall abide 
In this great mansion, that is built for 
me. 
So royal-rich and wide.” 


Four courts Imade, East, West and South 
and North, 
In each a squared lawn, wherefrom 
The golden gorge of dragons spouted 
forth 
A flood of fountain-foam. 


And round the cool green courts there 
ran a row 
Of cloisters, branch’d like mighty 
woods, 


1 See the Life of Tennyson, I, 118-121. 


BRITISH POETS 


Echoing all night to that sonorous flow 
Of spouted fountain-floods ; 


And round the roofs a gilded gallery 
That lent broad verge to distant lands. 
Far as the wild swan wings, to where 
the sky 
Dipped down to sea and sands. 


From those four jets four currents in one 
swell 
Across the mountain stream’d below 
In misty folds, that floating as they fell 
Lit up a torrent-bow. 


And high on every peak a statue seem’d 
To hang on tiptoe, tossing up 
A cloud of incense of all odor steam’d 
From out a golden cup. 


So that she thought, ‘‘ And who shall gaze 
upon 
My palace with unblinded eyes, 
While this great. bow will waver in the 
sun, 
And that sweet incense rise ?” 


For that sweet incense rose and never 
fail’d, 
And, while day sank or mounted 
higher, 
The light aerial gallery, golden-rail’d, 
Burnt like a fringe of fire. 


Likewise the deep-set windows, stain’d 
and traced, 
Would seem slow-flaming crimson fires 
From shadow’d grots of arches inter- 
laced, 
And tipped with frost-like spires. 


Full of long-sounding corridors it was, 
That over-vaulted grateful gloom, 
Thro’ which the livelong day my souldid . 


pass, 
Well-pleased, from room to room. 


Full of great rooms and small the palace 
stood, 
All various, each a perfect whole 
From living Nature, fit for every mood 
And change of my still soul. 


For some were hung with arras green 
and blue, 
Showing a gaudy summer-morn, 
Where with puff’d cheek the belted 
hunter blew 
His wreathed bugle-horn. 


TENNYSON 


One seem’d all dark and red—a tract of 
sand, 
And some one pacing there alone, 
Who paced for ever in a glimmering 
land, 
Lit with a low large moon. 


One show’d an iron coast and angry 
waves, 
You seem’d to hear them climb and 
fall 
And roar rock-thwarted under bellowing 
caves, 
Beneath the windy wall. 


And one, a full-fed river winding slow 
By herds upon an endless plain, 
The ragged rims of thunder brooding 
low, 
_ With shadow-streaks of rain. 


And one, the reapers at their sultry toil. 
In front they bound the sheaves. Be- 
hind 
Were realms of upland, prodigal in oil, 
And hoary to the wind. 


And one a foreground black with stones 
and slags ; 
Beyond, a line of heights ; and higher 
All barr’d with long white cloud the 
scornful crags ; 
And highest, snow and fire. 


And one, an English home—gray twi- 
light pour’d 
On dewy pastures, dewy trees, 
Softer than sleep—all things in order 
stored, 
A haunt of ancient Peace. 


Nor these alone, but every landscape 
fair, 
As fit for every mood of mind, 
Or gay, or grave, or sweet, or stern, was 
there, 
Notless than truth design’d. 


Or the maid-mother by a crucifix, 
In tracts of pasture sunny-warm, 
Beneath branch-work of costly sardonyx 
Sat smiling, babe in arm. 


Or in a clear-wall’d city on the sea, 
Near gilded organ-pipes, her hair 
Wound with white roses, slept Saint 
Cecily ; 
An angel look’d at her, 


469 


Or thronging all one porch of Paradise 
A group of Houris bow’d to see 
The dying Islamite, with hands and 
eyes 
That said, We wait for thee. 


Or mythic Uther’s deeply-wounded son 
In some fair space of sloping greens 
Lay, dozing in the vale of Avalon, / 
And watch’d by weeping queens. 


Or hollowing one hand against his ear, 
To list a foot-fall, ere he saw 
The wood-nymph, stay’d the Ausonian 
king to hear 
Of wisdom and of law. 


Or over hills with peaky tops engrail’d, 
And many a tract of palm and rice, 
The throne of Indian Cama slowly sail’d 

A summer fann’d with spice. 


Or sweet Europa’s mantle blew un- 
clasp’d, 
From off her shoulder backward borne; 
From one hand droop’d a crocus ; one 
hand grasp’d 
The mild bull’s golden horn. 


Or else flush’d Ganymede, his rosy thigh 
Half-buried in the eagle’s down, 
Sole as a flying star shot thro’ the sky 
Above the pillar’d town. 


Nor these alone: but every legend fair 
Which the supreme Caucasian mind 
Carved out of Nature for itself was there, 

Not less than life design’d. 


Then in the towers I placed great bells 
that swung, 
Moved of themselves, 
sounds ; 
And with choice paintings of wise men 
I hung 
The royal dais round. 


with silver 


For there was Milton like a seraph 


strong, 
Beside him Shakespeare bland and 
mild ; 
And there the world-worn Dante grasp’d 
his song, 


And somewhat grimly smiled. 


And there the Ionian father of the rest ; 
A million wrinkles carved his skin ; 
A hundred winters snow’d upon his 

breast, 
From cheek and throat and chin, 


470 


BRITISH POETS 





Above, the fair hall-ceiling stately-set 
Many an arch high up did lift, 
And angels rising and descending met 
With interchange of gift. 


Below was all mosaic choicely plann’d 
With cycles of the human tale 
Of this wide world, the times of every 
land 
So wrought they will not fail. 


The people here, a beast of burden slow, 
Toil’d onward, prick’d with goads and 
stings ; 
Here play’d, a tiger, rolling to and fro 
The heads and crowns of kings ; 


Here rose, an athlete, strong to break or 
bind 
All force in bonds that might endure, 
And here once more like some sick man 
declined, 
And trusted any cure. 


But over these she trod ; and those great 
bells 
Began tochime. She took her throne ; 
She sat betwixt the shining oriels, 
To sing her songs alone. 


And thro’ the topmost oriels’ colored 
flame 
Two godlike faces gazed below ; 
Plato the wise, and large-brow’d Ver- 
ulam, 
The first of those who know. 


And all those names that in their motion 
were 
Full-welling fountain-heads of change, 
Betwixt the slender shafts were blazon’d 
fair 
In diverse raiment strange ; 


Thro’ which the lights, rose, amber, em- 
erald, blue, 
Flush’d in her temples and her eyes, 
And from her lips, as morn from Mem- 
non, drew 
Rivers of melodies. 


No nightingale delighteth to prolong 
Her low preamble all alone, 
More than my soul to hear her echo’d 
song 
Throb thro’ the ribbed stone ; 


Singing and murmuring in her fe astful 
mirth, 
Joying to feel herself alive, 


Lord over Nature, lord of the visible 
earth, 
Lord of the senses five ; 


Communing with horse ‘** All these are 
mine, 
And let the world hae peace or wars, 
*"Tis one to me.” She—when young 
night divine 
Crown’d dying day with stars, 


Making sweet close of his delicious toils— 
Lit light in wreaths and anadems, 
And pure quintessences of precious oils 
In hollow’d moons of gems, 


To mimic heaven ; and clapped her hands 
and cried, 
‘‘T marvel if my still delight 
In this great house so royal-rich and wide 
Be flatter’d to the height. 


‘OQ all things fair to sate my various 
eyes ! 
O shapes and hues that please me well! 
O silent faces of the Great and Wise, 
My Gods, with whom I dwell! 


‘OQ Godlike isolation which art mine, 
I can but count thee perfect gain, 
What time I watch the darkening droves 
of swine 
That range on yonder plain. 


‘‘In filthy sloughs they roll a prurient 
skin, 
They graze and wallow, breed and 
sleep ; ¢ 
And oft some brainless devil enters in, 
And drives them to the deep.” 


Then of the moral instinct would she 
prate 
And of the rising from the dead, 
As hers by right of full-accomplish’d 
Fate ; 
And at the last she said : 


‘‘T take possession of man’s mind and 
deed. 
I care not what the sects may brawl. 
I sit as God holding no form of creed, 
But (pale all.” 


Full oft the riddle of the ae earth 
Flash’d thro’ her as she sat alone, 
Yet not the less held she her solemn 
mirth, 
And intellectual throne, 


TENNYSON 





And soshe throve and prosper’d ; so three 
years 
She prosper’d ; on the fourth she fell, 
Like Herod, when the shout was in his 
ears, 
Struck thro’ with pangs of hell. 


Lest she should fail and perish utterly, 
God, before whom ever lie bare 
The abysmal deeps of personality, 
Plagued her with sore despair. 


When she would think, where’ er she 
turn’d her sight 
Theairy hand confusion wrought, 
Wrote, ‘‘ Mene, mene,” and divided quite 
The kingdom of her thought. 


Deep dread and loathing of her solitude 
Fell on her, from which mood was 


born 
Scorn of herself; again, from out that 
mood 
Laughter at her self-scorn. 
“What! is not this my place of 


strength,” she said, 
‘* My spacious mansion built forme, 
Whereof the strong foundation-stones 
were laid: 
Since my first memory ?” 


But in dark corners of her palace stood 
Uncertain shapes ; and unawares 
On white-eyed phantasms weeping tears 
of blood, 
And horrible nightmares, 


And hollow shades enclosing hearts of 
flame, 
And, with dim fretted foreheads all, 
On corpses three-months-old at noon she 
came, 
That stood against the wall. 


A spot of dull stagnation, without light 
Or power of movement, seem’d my 
soul, 
Mid onward-sloping motions infinite 
Making for one sure goal ; 


A still salt pool, lock’d in with bars of 
sand, 
Left on the shore, that hears all night 
The plungirg seas draw backward from 
the land 
Their moon led waters white ; 


A star that with the choral starry dance 
Join’d not, but stood, and standing 
saw 


471 


The hollow orb of moving Circumstance 
Roll’d round by one fix’d law. 


Back on herself her serpent pride had 
curl’d. 
‘* No voice,” she shriek’d in that lone 
hall, 
‘*No voice breaks thro’ the stillness of 
this world ; 
One deep, deep silence all!” 


She, mouldering with the dull earth’s 
mouldering sod, 
Inwrapt tenfold in slothful shame, 
Lay there exiled from eternal God, 
Lost to her place and name ; 


And death and life she hated equally, 
And nothing saw, for her despair, 
But dreadful time, dreadful eternity, 

No comfort any where ; 


Remaining utterly confused with fears, 
And ever worse with growing time, 
And ever unrelieved by dismal tears, 
And all alone in crime. 


Shut up as ina crumbling tomb, girt 
round 
With blackness as a solid wall, > 
Far off she seem’d to hear the dully 
sound 
Of human footsteps fall ; 


As in strange lands a traveller walking 
slow, 
In doubt and great perplexity, 
A little before moonrise hears the low 
Moan of an unknown sea ; 


And knows not if it be thunder,ora 
sound 
Of rocks thrown down, or one deep 


cry 
Of great wild beasts ; then thinketh, ‘* I 
have found 
A new land, but I die.” 


She howl’d aloud, ‘* Iam on fire within. 
There comes no murmur of reply. 
What isit that will take away my sin, 
And save me lest I die?” 
So when four where wholly 
finished, 
She threw her royal robes away. 
‘¢Make me a cottage in the vale,” she 
said, 
‘Where I may mourn and pray, 


years 


472 


‘* Yet pull not down my palace towers, 
that are 
So lightly, beautifully built ; 
Perchance I may return with others 
there 
When I have purged my guilt.” 
1 


THE LOTOS-EATERS 


‘COURAGE !” he said, and pointed to- 
ward the land, 

‘This mounting wave will roll us shore- 
ward soon.” 

In the afternoon they came unto a land 

In which it seemed always afternoon. 

All round the coast the languid air did 
swoon, 

Breathing like one that hath a weary 
dream. 

Full-faced above the valley stood the 
moon ; 

And, like adownward smoke, the slender 
stream 

Along the cliff to fall and pause and fall 
did seem. 


A land of streams! some, like a down- 
ward smoke, 

Slow-dropping veils of thinnest lawn, 
did go; 

And some thro’ wavering lights and 
shadows broke, 

Rolling a slumbrous sheet of foam below. 

They saw the gleaming river seaward 
flow 

From the inner land; 
mountain-tops, 

Three silent pinnacles of aged snow, 

Stood sunset-flush’d ; and, dew’d with 
showery drops, 

Up-clomb the shadowy pine above the 
woven copse. 


far off, three 


The charmed sunset linger’d low adown 

In the red West ; thro’ mountain clefts 
the dale 

Was seen far inland, and the yellow down 

Border’d with palm, and many a winding 
vale 

And ‘meadow, set with slender galin- 
gale ; 

A land where all things always seem’d 
the same ! 

And round about the keel with faces 
pale, 

Dark faces pale against that rosy flame, 

The mild-eyed melancholy Lotos-eaters 
came, 


BRITISH POETS 


Branches they bore of that enchanted 
stem, 

Laden with flower and fruit, whereof 
they gave 

To each, but whoso did receive of them 

And taste, to him the gushing of the 
wave 

Far far away did seem to mourn and 
rave 

On alien shores ; and if his fellow spake, 

His voice was thin, as voices from the 
grave ; 

And deep-asleep he seem’d, yet allawake, 

And music in his ears his beating heart 
did make. 


They sat them down upon the yellow 


sand, 

Between the sun and moon upon the 
shore ; 

And sweet it was to dream of Father- 
land, 

Of child, and wife and slave; but ever- 
more 

Most weary seem’d the sea, weary the 
oar, 

Weary the wandering fields of barren 
foam. 

Then some one said, ‘* We will return no 
more ;” . 

And all at once they sang, ‘‘ Our island 
home 

Is far beyond the wave; we will no longer 
roam.” 


CHORIC SONG 


I 
THERE is sweet music here that softer 
falls 
Than petals from blown roses on the 
grass, 
Or night-dews on still waters between 
walls 


Of shadowy granite, ina gleaming pass ; 

Music that gentlier on the spirit lies, 

Than tired eyelids upon tired eyes ; 

Music that brings sweet sleep down from 
the blissful skies. 

Here are cool mosses deep, 

And thro’ the moss the ivies creep, 

Andin the stream the _ long-leaved 
flowers weep, 

And from the craggy ledge the poppy 
hangs in sleep. 


II 


Why are we weigh’d upon with heavi- 
ness, 


TENNYSON 


And utterly consumed with sharp dis- 
tress, 

While all things else have rest from 
weariness ? 

All things have rest: why should we 
toil alone, 

We only toil, who are the first of things, 

And make perpetual moan, 

Still from one sorrow to another thrown; 

Nor ever fold our wings, 

And cease from wanderings, 

Nor steep our brows in slumber’s holy 
balm ; 

Nor harken what the inner spirit sings, 

‘** There is no joy but calm! ”’— 

Why should we only toil, the roof and 
crown of things? 


iil 


Lo! in the middle of the wood, 
The eet leaf is woo’d from out the 
u 

With winds upon the branch, and there 

Grows green and broad, and takes no 
care, 

Sun-steep’d at noon, and in the moon 

Nightly dew-fed ; and turning yellow 

Falls, and floats adown the air. 

Lo! sweeten’d with the summer light, 

The full-juiced apple, waxing over- 
mellow, 

Drops in a silent autumn night. 

All its allotted length of days 

The flower ripens in its place, 

Ripens aa fades, and falls, and hath no 
toil, 

Fast-rooted in the fruitful soil. 


IV 


Hateful is the dark-blue sky, 

Vaulted o’er the dark-blue sea. 

Death is the end of life; ah, why 

Should life all labor be? 

Let us alone. Time driveth onward 
fast, 

And in a little while our lips are dumb. 

Let us alone. What is it that will 


last ? 
All things are taken from us, and be- 


come 

Portions and parcels of the dreadful 
past. 

Let us alone. What pleasure can we 
have 


To war with evil? Is there any peace 

In ever climbing up the climbing wave? 

All things have rest, and ripen toward 
the grave 


473 


In silence—ripen, fall, and cease : 
Give us long rest or death, dark death, 
or dreamful ease. 


Vv 


How sweet it were, hearing the down- 
ward stream, 

With half-shut eyes ever to seem 

Falling asleep in a half-dream ! 

To pram and dream, like yonder amber 
ight, 

Which will not leave. the myrrh-bush on 
the height ; 

To hear each other’s whisper’d speech ; 

Kating the Lotos day by day, 

To watch the crisping ripples on the 
beach, 

And tender curving lines of creamy 
spray ; 

To lend our hearts and spirits wholly 

To the influence of mild-minded melan- 
choly ; 

To muse and brood and live again in 
memory, 

With those old faces of our infancy 

Heap’d over with a mound of grass, 

Two handfuls of white dust, shut in an 
urn of brass! 


Vil 


Dear is the memory of our wedded lives, 

And dear the last embraces of our wives 

And their warm tears; but all hath 
suffer’d change ; 

For surely now our household hearths 


are cold, 

Our sons inherit us, our looks are 
strange, 

And we should come like ghosts to 


trouble joy. 
Or else the island princes over-bold 
Have eat our substance, and the minstrel 
sings 


Before them of the ten years’ war in 
Troy, 

And our great deeds, as half-forgotten 
things. 


Is there confusion in the little isle ? 

Let what is broken so remain, 

The Gods are hard to reconcile ; 

’'T is hard to settle order once again. 

There 7s confusion worse than death, 

Trouble on trouble, pain on pain, 

Long labor unto aged breath, 

Sore task to hearts worn out by many 
wars 

And eyes grown dim with gazing on the 
pilot-stars. 


474 


BRITISH POETS 








VILE 


But, propped on beds of amaranth and 
moly, 

How sweet—while warm airs lull us, 
blowing lowly— 

With half-dropped eyelid still, 

Beneath a heaven dark and holy. 

To watch the long bright river drawing 
slowly 

His waters from the purple hill— 

To hear the dewy echoes calling 

From cave to cave thro’ the thick-twined 
vine— 

To watch the emerald-color’d water fall- 
ing ; 

Thro’ many a woven acanthus-wreath 
divine ! 

Only to hear and see the far-off sparkling 
brine, 

Only to hear were sweet, stretch’d out 
beneath the pine. 


VIII 


The Lotos blooms below the barren peak, 

The Lotos blows by every winding 
creek ; 

All day the wind breathes low with mel- 
lower tone ; 

Thro’ every hollow cave and alley lone 
Round and round the spicy downs the 
yellow Lotos-dust is blown. 

We have had enough of action, and of 
motion we, 

Roll’d to starboard, roll’d to larboard, 
when the surge was seething free, 

Where the wallowing monster spouted 
his foam-fountains in the sea. 

Let us swear an oath, and keep it with 
an equal mind, 

In the hollow Lotos-land to live and lie 
reclined ; 

On the hills like Gods together, careless 
of mankind. 

For they he beside their nectar, and the 
bolts are hurl’d 

Far below them in the valleys, and the 
clouds are lightly curl’d 

Round their golden houses, girdled with 
the gleaming world ; 

Where they smile in secret, looking over 
wasted lands, 

Blight and famine, plague and earth- 
quake, roaring deeps and fiery 
sands, 

Clanging fights, and flaming towns, and 
sinking ships, and praying hands. 

But they smile, they find a music cen- 
tred in a doleful song 


Steaming up, a lamentation and an an- 
cient tale of wrong, 

Like a tale of little meaning tho’ the 
words are strong ; 

Chanted from an ill-used race of men 
that cleave the soil, 

Sow the seed, and reap the harvest with 
enduring toil, 

Storing yearly little dues of wheat, and 
wine and oil; 

Till they perish and they suffer—some, 
*'t is whisper’?d—down in hell 
Suffer endless anguish, others in Elysian 

valleys dwell, 

Resting weary limbs at last on beds of 
asphodel. 

Surely, surely, slumber is more sweet 
than toil, the shore 

Than labor in the deep mid-ocean, wind 
and wave and oar ; 

O, rest ye, brother mariners, we will not 
wander more. 1Ssosra 


A DREAM OF FAIR WOMEN 


I READ, before my eyelids dropped their 
shade, 
‘* The Legend of Good Women,” long 
ago 
Sung by the morning star of song, who 
made 
’ His music heard below ; 


Dan Chaucer, the first warbler, whose 
sweet breath 
Preluded those melodious bursts that 
fill 
The spacious times of great Elizabeth 
With sounds that echo still. 


And, for a while, the knowledge of his 


art 
Held me above the subject, as strong 
gales 


Hold swollen clouds from raining, tho’ 
my heart, 
Brimful of those wild tales, 


Charged both mine eyes with tears. In 
every land 
I saw, wherever light illumineth, 
Beauty and anguish walking hand in 
hand 
The downward slope to death. 


Those far-renowned brides of ancient 


song 
Peopled the hollow dark, like burning 
stars, 


TENNYSON 


And I heard sounds of insult, shame, 
and wrong, 
And trumpets blown for wars ; 


And clattering flints batter’d with clang- 
ing hoots ; 
And I saw crowds in column‘d sanctu- 
aries, 
And forms that pass’d at windows and 
on roofs 
. Of marble palaces ; 


Corpses across the threshold, heroes tall 
Dislodging pinnacle and parapet 
Upon the tortoise creeping to the wall, 
Lances in ambush set ; 


And high shrine-doors burst thro’ with 
heated blasts 
That run before the fluttering tongues 
of fire ; 
White surf wind-scatter’d over sails and 
masts, 
And ever climbing higher ; 


Squadrons and squares of men in brazen 
plates, 
Scaffolds, still sheets of water, divers 
woes, 
Ranges of glimmering vaults with iron 
grates, 
And hush’d seraglios. 


So shape chased shape as swift as, when 
to land 
Bluster the winds and tides the self- 
same way, 
Crisp foam-flakes scud along the level 
sand, 
Torn from the fringe of spray. 


I started once, or seem’d to start in pain, 
Resolved on noble things, and strove 
to speak, 
As when a great thought strikes along 
the brain 
And flushes all the cheek. 


Andonce my arm was lifted to hew down 
A cavalier from off his saddle-bow, 
That bore a lady from aleaguer’d town ; 

And then, I know not how, 


All those sharp fancies, by down-lapsing 
thought 
Stream’d onward, lost their edges, and 
did creep 
Roll’d on each other, rounded, smooth’d, 
and brought 
Into the gulfs of sleep. 


ATS 


At ay methought that I had wander’d 
ar 
In an old wood ; fresh-wash’d in coolest 
dew 
The maiden splendors of the morning 
star 
Shook in the steadfast blue. 


Enormous elm-tree boles did stoop and 
lean 
Upon the dusky brushwood under- 
neath 
Their broad curved branches, fledged 
with clearest green, 
New from its silken sheath. 


The dim red Morn had died, her journey 
done, 
And with dead lips smiled at the 
twilight plain, 
Half-fallen across the threshold of the 
sun, 
Never to rise again. 


There was no motion in the dumb dead 
air, 
Not any song of bird or sound of rill ; 
Gross darkness of the inner sepulchre 
Is not so deadly still 


As that wide forest. 
mine turn’d 
Their humid arms festooning tree to 
tree, 
And at the root thro’ lush green grasses 
burn’d 
The red anemone. 


Growths of jas- 


I knew the flowers, I knew the leaves, I 


knew 
The tearful glimmer of the languid 
dawn 


On those long, rank, dark wood-walks 
drench’d in dew, 
Leading from lawn to lawn. 


The smell of violets, hidden in the green, 
Pour’d back into my empty soul and 
frame 
The times when I remember to have been 
Joyful and free from blame. 


And from within me a clear undertone 
Thrill’d thro’ mine ears in that unbliss- 
ful clime, [own 
‘Pass freely thro’ ; the wood is all thine 
Until the end of time.” 


At length I saw a lady within call, 
Stiller than chisell’d marble, standing 
there ; 


476 


A daughter of the gods, divinely tall, 
And most divinely fair. 


Her loveliness with shame and with 
surprise 
Froze my swift speech; she turning 
on my face . 
The star-like sorrows of immortal eyes, 
Spoke slowly in her place : 


‘*T had great beauty ; ask thou not my 
name : [tiny. 
No one can be more wise than des- 
Many drew swords and died. Where’er 
I came 
I brought calamity.” 


‘‘No marvel, sovereign lady: in fair 
field 
Myself for such a face had boldly 
died,” 
I answer’d free; and turning I appeal’d 
To one that stood beside. 


But she, with sick and scornful looks 
averse, 
To her full height her stately stature 
draws: 
‘*My youth,” she said, ‘‘ was blasted 
with a curse: 
This woman was the cause. 


‘IT was cut off from hope in that sad 
place 
Which men call’d Aulis in those iron 
years : 
My father held his hand upon his face ; 
I, blinded with my tears, 


““Still strove to speak: my voice was 
thick with sighs 
Asina dream. Dimly I could descry 
The stern black-bearded kings with 
wolfish eyes, 
Waiting to see me die. 


‘The high masts flicker’d as they lay 
afloat ; 
The crowds, the temples, waver’d, and 
the shore ; 
The bright death quiver’d at the victim’s 
throat— 
Touch’d—and I knew no more.” 


Whereto the other with a downward 
brow : 
‘““T would the white cold 
plunging foam, 
Whirled by the wind, had roll’d me 
deep below, 
Then when I left my home.” 


heavy- 


BRITISH POETS 


Her slow full words sank thro’ the si- 
lence drear. 
As thunder-drops fall on a sleeping 
sea : 
Sudden I heard a voice that cried 
‘* Come here, 
That I may look on thee.” 


I turning saw, throned on a flowery rise, 
One sitting on a crimson scarf un- 
roll’d ; 
A queen, with swarthy cheeks and bold 
black eyes, 
Brow-bound with burning gold. 


She, flashing forth a haughty smile, be- 
gan: 
‘*T govern’d men by change, and so I 
sway’d 
All moods. 
aman. 
Once, like the moon, I made’ 


Tis long since I have seen 


‘* The ever-shifting currents of the blood 
According to my humor ebb and flow. 
I have no men to govern in this wood: 
That makes my only woe. 


‘¢Nay—yet it chafes me that I could 


not bend 
One will; nor tame and tutor with 
mine eye 
That dull cold-blooded Ceesar. Prythee, 
friend, 


Where is Mark Antony? 


‘‘The man, my lover, with whom I rode 
sublime 
On Fortune’s neck; we sat as God by 
God: 
The Nilus would have risen before his 
time 
And flooded at our nod. 


‘*We drank the Libyan Sun to sleep, and 
lit 
Lamps which out-burn’d Canopus. O, 
my life 
In Egypt! O, the dalliance and the wit, 
The flattery and the strife, 


‘“* And the wild kiss, when fresh from 
war’s alarms, 
My Hercules, my Roman Antony, 
My mailed Bacchus leaped into my arms, 
Contented there to die! 


‘* And there he died: and when I heard 
my name 
Sigh’d forth with life, I would not 
brook my fear 


TENNYSON 


477 





Of the other; with a worm I balk’d his 
fame. 
What else was left? look here ! ”— 


With that she tore her robe apart, and 


half 
The polish’d argent of her breast to 
sight 
Laid bare. Thereto she pointed with a 
laugh, 


Showing the aspic’s bite.— 


**T died a Queen. The Roman soldier 


found 
Me lying dead, my crown about my 
brows, 
A name for ever !—lying robed and 
crown’d 


Worthy a Roman spouse.” 


Her warbling voice, a lyre of widest 
range 
Struck by all passion, did fall down 
and glance 
From tone to tone, and glided thro’ all 
change 
Of liveliest utterance. 


When she made pause I knew not for 
delight ; 
Because with sudden motion from the 
ground 
She raised her piercing orbs, and fill’d 
with light 
The interval of sound. 


Still with their fires Love tipt his keenest 


darts ; 

As once they drew into two burning 
rings 

All beams of Love, melting the mighty 
hearts 


Of captains and of kings. 


Slowly my sense undazzled. ThenI heard 
A noise of some one coming thro’ the 
lawn, 
And singing clearer than the crested bird 
That claps his wings at dawn: 


‘¢ The torrent brooks of hallow’d Israel 
From craggy hollows pouring, late and 
soon, 
Sound all night long, in falling thro’ the 
dell, 
Far-heard beneath the moon. 


‘“*The balmy moon of blessed Israel 
Floods all the deep-blue gloom with 
beams divine ; 


All night the splinter’d crags that wall 
the dell 
With spires of silver shine.” 


As one that museth where broad sun- 
shine laves 
The lawn by some cathedral, thro’ the 
door 
Hearing the holy organ rolling waves 
Of sound on roof and floor 


Within, and anthem sung, is charm’d 
and tied 
To where he stands,—so stood I, when 
that flow 
Of music left the lips of her that died 
To save her father’s vow ; 


The daughter of the warrior Gileadite, 
A maiden pure ; as when she went along 
From Mizpah’s tower’d gate with wel- 
come light. 
With timbrel and with song. 


My words leaped forth: ‘‘ Heaven heads 
the count of crimes 
With that wild oath.” 
answer high: 
‘*Not so, nor once alone; a thousand 
times 
I would be born and die. 


She render’d 


‘*Single I grew, like some green plant, 

whose root 
Creeps to the garden water-pipes be- 

neath, 

Feeding the flower ; but ere my flower to 
fruit 

Changed, I was ripe for death. 
‘““My God, my land, my father—these 


did move 
Me from my bliss of life that Nature 


gave, 
Lower’d softly with a threefold cord of 
love 
Down to a silent grave. 
“And I went mourning, ‘No fair 


Hebrew boy 
Shall smile away my maiden blame 
among 
The Hebrew mothers’—emptied of all 


JOY, 
Leaving the dance and song, 


‘‘ Leaving the olive-gardens far below, 
Leaving the promise of my _ bridal 
bower, [glow 
The valleys of grape-loaded vines that 
Beneath the battled tower, 


478 
‘The hight white cloud swam over us. 
Anon 
We heard the lion roaring from his 
den ; 
We saw the large white stars rise one 
by one, 


Or, from the darken’d glen, 


‘*Saw God divide the night with flying 
flame, 
And thunder on the everlasting hills. 
I heard Him, for He spake, and grief be- 
came 
A solemn scorn of ills. 


‘“When the next moon was roll’d into 
the sky, 
Strength came to me that equall’d my 
desire. 
How beautiful a thing it was to die 
For God and for my sire ! 


‘‘It comforts me in this one thought to 
dwell, 
That I subdued me to my father’s will ; 
Because the kiss he gave me, ere I fell, 
Sweetens the spirit still. 


‘* Moreover it is written that my race 
Hew’d Ammon, hip and thigh, from 
Aroer 
On Arnon unto Minneth.” Here her face 
Glow’d, as I look’d at her. 


99 


She lock’d her lips; she left me where 


I stood : 
‘Glory to God,” she sang, and past 
afar, 
Thridding the sombre boskage of the 
wood, 


Toward the morning-star. 


Losing her carol I stood pensively, 
As one that from a casement leans his 
head, 
When midnight bells cease ringing sud- 
denly, 
And the old year is dead. 


** Alas! alas!” a low voice, full of care, 
Murmur’d beside me: ‘* Turn and look 
on me; 
IT am that Rosamond, whom men call 
fair, 
If what I was I be. 


‘* Would I had been some maiden coarse 
and poor! 
O me, that I should ever see the light ! 
Those dragon eyes of anger’d Eleanor 
Do hunt me, day and night.” 


BRITISH POETS 


She ceased in tears, fallen from hope and 
trust : 
To whom the Egyptian: ‘‘O, you 
tamely died ! 
You should have clung to Fulvia’s waist, 
and thrust 
The dagger thro’ her side.” 


With that sharp sound the white dawn’s 
creeping beams, 
Stolen to my brain, dissolved the mys- 
tery 
Of folded sleep. 
dreams 
Ruled in the eastern sky. 


The captain of my 


Morn broaden’d on the borders of the 
dark 
Ere I saw her who clasp’d in her last 
trance 
Her murder’d father’s head, or Joan of 
Arc, 
A light of ancient France ; 


Or her who knew that Love can vanquish 
Death, 
Who kneeling, with one arm about her 
king, 
Drew forth the poison with her balmy 
breath, 
Sweet as new buds in spring. 


No memory labors longer from the deep 
Gold-mines of thought to lift the 
hidden ore 
That glimpses, moving up, than I from 
sleep 
To gather and tell o’er 


Each little sound and sight. With what 
dull pain 
Compass’d, how eagerly I sought to 
strike 
Into that wondrous track of dreams 
again ! 


But no two dreams are like. 


As when a soul laments, which hath 
been blest. 
Desiring what is mingled with past 
years, 
In yearnings that can never be expressed 
By signs or groans or tears ; 
Because all words, tho’ cull’d with 
choicest art, 
Failing to give the bitter of the sweet, 
Wither beneath the palate, and the heart 
Faints, faded by its heat. 1883. 


TENNYSON 





SAINT AGNES’ EVE 


DEEP on the convent-roof the snows 
Are sparkling to the moon ; 

My breath to heaven like vapor goes ; 
May my soul follow soon ! 

The shadows of the convent-towers 
Slant down the snowy sward, 

Still creeping with the creeping hours 
That lead me to my Lord. 

Make Thou my spirit pure and clear 
As are the frosty skies, 

Or this first snowdrop of the year 
That in my bosom lies, 


As these white robes are soil’d and dark, 
To yonder shining ground ; 

As this pale taper’s earthly spark, 
To yonder argent round; 

So shows my soul before the Lamb, 
My spirit before Thee ; 

So in mine earthly house I am, 
To that I hope to be. 

Break up the heavens, O Lord! and far, 
Thro’ all yon starlight keen, 

Draw me, thy bride, a glittering star, 
In raiment white and clean. 


He lifts me to the golden doors ; 
The flashes come and go; 
All heaven bursts her starry floors, 
And strows her lights below, 
And deepens on and up! the gates 
Roll back, and far within 
For me the Heavenly Bridegroom waits, 
To make me pure of sin. 
The Sabbaths of Eternity, 
One Sabbath deep and wide— 
A light upon the shining sea— 
The Bridegroom with his bride ! 
1837. 


YOU ASK ME, WHY, THO’ ILL AT 
EASE 


You ask me, why, tho’ ill at ease, 
Within this region I subsist, 
Whose spirits falter in the mist, 

And languish for the purple seas. 


It is the land that freemen till, 
That sober-suited Freedom chose, 
The land, where girt with friends or 
foes 
A man may speak the thing he will; 


A land of settled government, 
A land of just and old renown, 
Where Freedom slowly broadens down 
From precedent to precedent ; 





479 





Where faction seldom gathers head, 
But, by degrees to fullness wrought, 
The strength of some diffusive thought 

Hath time and space to work and spread, 


Should banded unions persecute 
Opinions, and induce a time 
When single thought is civil crime, 
And individual freedom niute, 


Tho’ power should make from land to 
land 
The name of Britain trebly great— 
Tho’ every channel of the State 
Should filland choke with golden sand— 


Yet waft me from the harbor-mouth, 
Wild wind! I seek a warmer sky, 
And I will see before I die 

The palms and temples of the South. 

18338, 1842. 


OF OLD SAT FREEDOM ON THE 
HEIGHTS 


OF old sat Freedom on the heights, 
The thunders breaking at her feet ; 

Above her shook the starry lights ; 
She heard the torrents meet. 


There in her place she did rejoice, 
Self-gather’d in her prophet-mind, 

But fragments of her mighty voice 
Came rolling on the wind. 


Then stepped she down thro’ town and 
field 
To mingle with the human race, 
And part by part to men reveal’d 
The fulness of her face— 


Grave mother of majestic works, 
From her isle-altar gazing down, 

Who, Godlike, grasps the triple forks, 
And, king-like, wears the crown. 


Her open eyes desire the truth. 
The wisdom of a thousand years 

Isin them. May perpetual youth 
Keep dry their ight from tears ; 


That her fair form may stand and 
shine, 
Make bright our days and light our 
dreams, 
Turning to scorn with lips divine 
The falsehood of extremes ! 


1838, 1842. 


450 


BREPISH POTS 





LOVE THOU THY LAND 


Love thou thy land, 
brought 
From out the storied past, and used 
Within the present, but transfused 
Thro’ future time by power of thought ; 


with love far- 


True love turn’d round on fixed poles, 
Love, that endures not sordid ends, 
For English natures, freemen, friends, 

Thy brothers, and immortal souls. 


But pamper not a hasty time, 
Nor feed with crude imaginings 
The herd, wild hearts and feeble 
wings 
That every sophister can lime. 


Deliver not the tasks of might 
To weakness, neither hide the ray 
From those, not blind, who wait for 
day, 
Tho’ sitting girt with doubtful light. 


Make knowledge circle with the winds ; 
But let her herald, Reverence, fly 
Before her to whatever sky 

Bear seed of men and growth of minds. 


Watch what main-currents draw the 
years : 
Cut Prejudice against the grain. 
But gentle words are always gain ; 
Regard the weakness of thy peers. 


Nor toil for title, place, or touch 
Of pension, neither count on praise— 
It grows to guerdon after-days. 

Nor deal in watch-words overmuch ; 


Not clinging to some ancient saw, 
Not master’d by some modern term, 
Not swift nor slow to change, but 
firm ; 
And in its season bring the law, 


That from Discussion’s lip may fall 
With Life that, working strongly, 
binds— 
Set in all ights by many minds, 
To close the interests of all. 


For Nature also, cold and warm, 
And moist and dry, devising long, 
Thro’ many agents making strong, 

Matures the individual form. 


Meet is it changes should control 
Our being, lest we rust in ease. 


We all are changed by still degrees, 
All but the basis of the soul. 


So let the change which comes be free 
To ingroove itself with that which 
flies, 
And work, a joint of state, that plies 
Its office, moved with sympathy. 


A saying hard to shape in act ; 

For all the past of Time reveals 

A bridal dawn of thunder-peals, 
Wherever Thought hath wedded Fact. 


Even now we hear with inward strife 
A motion toiling in the gloom— 
The Spirit of the years to come 

Yearning to mix himself with Life. 


A slow-develop’d strength awaits 
Completion in a painful school ; 
Phantoms of other forms of rule, 

New Majesties of mighty States— 


The warders of the growing hour, 
But vague in vapor, hard to mark ; 
And round them sea and air are dark 
With great contrivances of Power. 
e 


Of many changes, aptly join’d, 
Is bodied forth the second whole. 
Regard gradation, lest the soul 
Of Discord race the rising wind ; 


A wind to puff your idol-fires, 
And heap their ashes on the head ; 
To shame the boast so often made, 
That we are wiser than our sires. 


O, yet, if Nature’s evil star 
Drive men in manhood, asin youth, 
To follow flying steps of Truth 
Across the brazen bridge of war— 


If New and Old, disastrous feud, 
Must ever shock, like armed foes, 
And this be true, till Time shall close, 
That Principles are rain’d in blood ; 


Not yet the wise of heart would cease 
To hold his hope thro’ shame and guilt, 
But with bis hand against the hilt, 


Would pace the troubled land, like 
Peace ; 
Not less, tho’ dogs of Faction bay, 
Would serve his kind in deed and 


word, 
Certain, if knowledge bring the sword, 
That knowledge takes the sword away— 


TENNYSON 





Would love the. gleams of good that 
broke 
From either side, nor veil his eyes ; 
And if some dreadful need should rise 
Would strike, and firmly, and one stroke. 


To-morrow yet would reap to-day, 
’ As we bear blossom of the dead ; 
Earn well the thrifty months, nor wed 
Raw Haste, half-sister to Delay. 
1833. 1842. 
MORTE D’ARTHUR 


So all day long the noise of battle roll’d 

Among the mountains by the winter sea, 

Until King Arthur's table, man by man, 

Had fallen in Lyonnesse about their lord, 

King Arthur; then, because his wound 
was deep, 

The bold Sir Bedivere uplifted him, 

Sir Bedivere, the last of all his knights, 

And bore him to a chapel nigh the field, 

A broken chancel with a broken cross, 

That stood ona dark strait of barren land. 

On one side lay the ocean, and on one 

Lay eee water, and the moon was 
ull. 

Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedi- 

vere: 

‘** The sequel of to-day unsolders all 

The goodliest fellowship of famous 


knights 

Whereof this world holds record. Such 
a sleep 

They sleep—the men I loved. I think 
that we 


Shall never more, at any future time, 

Delight our souls with talk of knightly 
deeds, 

Walking about the gardensand the halls 

Of Camelot, as in the days that were. 
I perish by this people which I made,— 
Tho’ Merlin sware that I should come 
again 
To rule once more—but let what will be 
be, 

I am so deeply smitten thro’ the helm 

That without help I cannot last till 
morn. 

Thou therefore take my-brand Excali- 
bur, 

Which was my pride ; for thou remem- 
berest how 

In those old days, one summer noon, an 
arm 

Rose up from out the bosom of the lake, 

Clothed in white samite, mystic, won- 
derful, 


31 


481 

Holding the sword — and how I row’d 
across 

And took it, and have worn it, like a 
king ; 


And, wheresoever I am sung or told 
In aftertime, this also shall be known. 
But now delay not ; take Excalibur, 
And fling him far into the middle mere; 
Watch what thou seest, and lightly 
bring me word.” 

To him replied the bold Sir Bedivere: 

‘* It is not meet, Sir King, to leave thee 


thus, 

Aidless, alone, and smitten thro’ the 
helm. 

A little thing may harm a wounded 
man. 


Yet I thy hest will all perform at full, 
Watch what I see, and lightly bring thee 
word.” 
So saying, from the ruin’d shrine he 
stept 
And in the moon athwart the place of 
tombs, 
Where lay the mighty bones of ancient 
men, 
Old knights, and over them the sea-wind 
sang 
Shrill, chill, with flakes of foam. He, 
stepping down 
By zigzag paths and juts of pointed rock, 
Came on the shining levels of the lake. 
There drew he forth the brand Exca- 
libur, 
And o’er him, drawing it, the winter 
moon, 
Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, 
ran forth 
And sparkled keen with frost against 
the hilt ; 
For all the haft twinkled with diamond 
sparks, 
Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth 
work 
Of subtlest jewellery. He gazed so long 
That both his eyes were dazzled, as he 
stood, 
This way and that dividing the swift 
mind, 
In act to throw ; but at the last it seem’d 
Better to leave Excalibur conceal’d 
There in the many-knotted water-flags, 
That whistled stiff and dry about the 
marge. 
So strode he back slow to the wounded 
king. 
Then spake King Arthur to Sir Bedi- 
vere : [I gave? 
‘* Hast thou perform’d my mission which 


482 
What is it thou hast seen, or what hast 
heard ?” 
And answer made the bold Sir Bedi- 
vere: 


‘*T heard the ripple washing in the reeds, 
And the wild water lapping on the 
crag.” 
To whom replied King Arthur, faint 
and pale: 
‘“Thou hast betray’d thy nature and thy 
name, 
Not rendering true answer, as beseem’d 
Thy fealty, nor like a noble knight ; 
For surer sign had follow'd, either hand, 
Or voice, or else a motion of the mere. 
This is a Shameful thing for men to Le. 
Yet now, I charge thee, quickly go 
again 
As thou art lief and dear, and do the 
thing 
I bade thee, watch, and lightly bring 
me word.” 
Then went Sir Bedivere the second 
time 
Across the ridge, and paced beside the 
mere, 
Counting the dewy pebbles, fix’d in 
thought : 
But when he saw the wonder of the hilt, 
How curiously and strangely chased, he 
smote 
His palms together, and he cried aloud : 
‘* And if indeed I cast the brand away. 
Surely a precious thing, one worthy note, 
Should thus be lost forever from the 
earth, 
Which might have pleased the eyes of 
many men. 
What good should follow this, if this 
were done? 
What harm, undone? deep harm to dis- 
obey, 
Seeing obedience is the bond of rule. 
Were it well to obey then, if a king de- 
mand 
An act unprofitable, against himself ? 
The king is sick, and knows not what he 
does. 
What record, or what relic of my lord 
Should be to aftertime, but empty breath 
And rumors of a doubt? but were this 


kept, 

Stored in some treasure-house of mighty 
kings, 

Some one might show it at a joust of 
arms, 

Saying, ‘King Arthur’s sword, Excali- 
bur, [lake ; 


Wrought by the lonely maiden of the 


BRITISH POETS 


Nine years she wrought it, sitting in the 


deeps 
Upon the hidden bases of the hills.’ 
So might some old man speak in the 
aftertime 
To all the people, winning reverence ; 
But now much honor and much fame 
were lost.” 
So spake he, clouded with his own con- 
ceit, 
And hid Excalibur the second time, 
And so strode back slow to the wounded 
king. 
Then spoke King Arthur, breathing 
heavily : 
‘¢ What is it thou hast seen, or what hast 
heard ?” 
And answer made the bold Sir Bedi- 
vere: 
‘‘T heard the water lapping on the crag, 
And the long ripple washing in the 
reeds.” 
To whom replied King Arthur, much 
in wrath : 
‘** Ah, miserable and unkind, untrue, 
Unknightly, traitor-hearted ! Woe is me! 
Authority forgets a dying king, 
Laid widow’d of the power in his eye 
That bow’d the will. I see thee what 
thou art, 
For thou, the latest-left of all my 
knights, 
In whom should meet the offices of all, 
Thou wouldst betray me for the precious 
hilt ; 
Kither from lust of gold, or like a girl 
Valuing the giddy pleasure of the eyes. 
Yet, fora man may failin duty twice, 
And the third time may prosper, get 
thee hence ; 
But, if thou spare to fling Excalibur, 
I will arise and slay thee with my hands.” 
Then quickly rose Sir Bedivere, and 
ran, 
And, leaping down the ridges lghtly, 
plunged 
Among the bulrush-beds, and clutch’d 
the sword, 
And strongly wheel’d and threw it. 
great brand 
Made lightnings in the splendor of the 
moon, 
And flashing round and round, and 
whirl’d in an arch, 
Shot like a streamer of the northern 
morn, 
Seen where the moving isles of winte 
shock ; 
By night, with noises of the northern sea. 


The 


TENNYSON 


— 
So flash’d and fell the brand Excalibur ; 


But ere he dipped the surface, rose an arm 
ts i white samite, mystic, wonder- 
ul, 

And caught him by the hilt, and brand- 
ish’d him . 

Three times, and drew him under ‘in the 
mere. 

And lightly went the other to the king. 

Then spoke King Arthur, drawing 

thicker breath : 

‘““Now seel by thine eyes that this is 


done. 

Speak out ; what is it thou hast heard, 
or seen?” 

And answer made the bold Sir Bedi- 

vere: 

‘Sir King, I closed mine eyelids, lest 
the gems 

Should blind my purpose, for I never 
saw, 

Nor shall see, here or elsewhere, till I 
die, 


Not tho’ I live three lives of mortal men, 

So great a miracle as yonder hilt. 

Then with both hands I flung him, 
wheeling him ; 

But when I look’d again, behold an arm, 

Clothed in white samite, mystic, won- 
derful, 

That caught him by the hilt, and bran- 
dish’d him 

Three times, and drew him under in 
the mere.” 

And answer made 

breathing hard : 

“My end draws nigh; ’t is time that I 
were gone. 

Make broad thy shoulders to receive my 
weight, 

And bear me to the margin ; yet I fear 

My wound hath taken cold, and I shall 
die.”” 

So saying, from the pavement he half 
rose, 
Slowly, with pain, reclining on his arm, 
And looking wistfully with wide blue 

eyes 
As ina picture. Him Sir Bedivere 
Remorsefully regarded thro’ his tears, 
And would have spoken, but he found 
not words, 
Then took with care, and kneeling on 
one knee, 
O’er both his shoulders drew the languid 


King Arthur, 


hands, 
And rising bore him thro’ the place of 
tombs. {hard, 


But, as he walk’d, King Arthur panted 





483 
Like one that feels a nightmare on his 
bed 
When all the house is mute. So sigh’d 
the king, 


Muttering and murmuring at his ear, 
‘* Quick, quick ! 

1 fear it is too late, and I shall die.” 

But the other swiftly strode from ridge 
to ridge, 

Clothed with his breath, and looking, as 
he walk’d, 

Larger than human on the frozen hills. 

He heard the deep behind him, and a 
cry 

Before. His own thought drove him 
like a goad. 

Dry clash’d his harness in the icy caves 

And barren chasms, and all to left and 
right 

The bare black cliff clang’d round him, 
as he based 

His feet on juts of slippery crag that 
rang 

Sharp-smitten with the dint of armed 
heels— 

And on a sudden, lo! the level lake, 

And the long glories of the winter moon. 

Then saw they how there hovea dusky 

barge, 

Dark as a funeral scarf from stem to 
stern, 

Beneath them; and descending they 
were ware 

That all the decks were dense with stately 
forms 

Black-stoled, black-hooded, like a dream 
—by these 

Three queens with crowns of gold—and 
from them rose 

A cry that shiver’d to the tingling stars, 

And, as it were one voice, an agony 

Of lamentation, like a wind that shrills 

All night in a waste land, where no one 
comes, 

Or hath come, since the making of the 
world. 

Then murmur’d Arthur, ‘‘ Place me 

in the barge,” 

And to the barge they came. 
those three queens 

Put forth their hands, and took the king, 
and wept. 

But she that rose the tallest of them 
all 

And fairest, laid his head upon her lap, 

And loosed the shatter’d casque, and 
chafed his hands, 

And call’d him by his name, complaining 
loud, 


There 


484 


And dropping bitter tears against his 
brow 

Striped with dark blood ; for all his face 
was white 

And colorless, and like the wither’d moon 

Smote by the fresh beam of the springing 
east ; 

And all his greaves and cuisses dash’d 
with drops 

Of onset; and the light and lustrous 
curls— 

That made his forehead like a rising sun 

High from the dais-throne—were parch’d 
with dust ; 

Or, clotted into points and hanging loose, 

Mix’d with the knightly growth that 
fringed his lips. 

So like a shatter’d column lay the king ; 

Not like that Arthur who, with lance in 
rest, 

From spur to plume astar of tournament, 

Shot thro’ the lists at Camelot, and 
charged 

Before the eyes of ladies and of kings. 

Then loudly cried the bold Sir Bedivere: 
** Ah! my Lord Arthur, whither shall I 


o? 

Where shall I hide my forehead and my 
eyes? 

For now I see the true old times are 
dead. 

When every morning brought a noble 
chance, 

And every chance brought out a noble 
knight. 

Such times have been not since the hight 
that led 


» The holy Elders with the gift of myrrh. 

But now the whole ROUND TABLE is dis- 
solved 

Which was an image of the mighty 
world ; 

And I, the last, go forth companionless, 

And the days darken round me, and the 
years, 

Among new men, strange faces, other 
minds.” 

And slowly answer’d Arthur from the 

barge : 

‘‘ The old order changeth, yielding place 
to new, 

And God fulfils himself in many ways, 

Lest one good custom should corrupt the 
world. 

Comfort thyself: what comfort is in 
me? 

I have lived my life, and that which I 
have done [thot, 

- May He within himself make pure! but 


BRITISH POETS 


If thoushouldst never see my face again, 

Pray for my soul. More things are 
wrought by prayer 

Than this world dreams of. 
let thy voice 

Rise like a fountain for me night and 
day. 

For what are men better than sheep or 
goats 

That nourish a blind life within the 
brain, 

If, knowing God, they lift not hands of 
prayer 

Both for themselves and those who call 
them friend ? 

For so the whole round earth is every 
way 

Bound by gold chains about the feet of 
God. 

But now farewell. Lam going along way 

With these thou seest—if indeed I go— 

For all my mind is clouded with a 
doubt—- 

To the island-valley of Avilion ; 

Where falls not hail, or rain, orany snow, 

Nor ever wind blows loudly, but it lies 

Deep-meadow’d, happy, fair with 
orchard lawns 

And bowery hollows 
summer sea, 

Where I will heal me of my grievous 
wound.” 

So said he, and the barge with oar and 

sail 

Moved from the brink, like some full- 
breasted swan 

That, fluting a wild carol ere her death, 

Ruffles her pure cold plume, and takes 
the flood 

With swarthy webs. 
Bedivere 

Revolving many memories, till the hull 

Look’d one black dot against the verge — 
of dawn, 

And on the mere the wailing died away. 

1835, 1842. 1869.1 


Wherefore, 


crown’d with 


Long stood Sir 


DORA 2 


WITH farmer Allan at the farm abode 


William and Dora. William was hisson, 
And she his niece. He often look’d at 
them 


And often thought, ‘‘Tll make them 
man and wife.” 


1TIn 1869 the Morte d@’ Arthur was incorporated 
in the Passing of Arthur, the last of the Idylls of 
the King. 

2See the Life of Tennyson, I, 195-6, and 265, 


TENNYSON 


_— 





Now Dora felt her uncle’s will in all, 
And yearn’d toward William; but the 
youth, because 
He had always been with her in the 
house, 
Thought not of Dora. 
Then there came.a day 
When Allan ecall’d his son, and said: 
‘* My son, 
I married late, but I would wish to see 
My grandchild on my knees before I die ; 
And I have set my heart upon a match. 
Now therefore look to Dora; she is well 
To look to ; thrifty too beyond her age. 
She is my brother’s daughter ; he and I 
Had once hard words, and parted, and 
he died 
_ In foreign lands ; but for his sake I bred 
His daughter Dora. Take her for your 
wife ; 
For I have wish’d this marriage night 
and day, 
For many years.” 
swered short : 
**T cannot marry Dora; by my life, 
I will not marry Dora!” Then the old 
man 
Was wroth, and doubled up his hands, 
and said : 
** You will not, boy ! you dare to answer 
thus ! 
But in my time a father’s word was law, 
And so it shall be now for me. Look to 


But William an- 


it ; 

Consider, William, take a month to 
think, 

And let me have an answer to my wish, 

Or, by the Lord that made me, you shall 
pack, 

And never more darken my doors again.” 

But William answer’d madly, bit his lips, 

And broke away. The more he look’d at 
her 

The less he liked her; and his ways 
were harsh ; 


But Dora bore them meekly. Then be- 

fore 

The month was out he left his father’s 
house, 

And hired himself to work within the 
fields ; 

And half in love, half spite, he woo’d 
and wed 


A laborer’s daughter, Mary Morrison. 
Then, when the bells were ringing, 
Allan call’d 
His niece and said: ‘‘ My girl, [love you 
well ; [son, 
But if you speak with him that was my 


485 


Or change a word with her he calls his 


wife, 

My AGS is none of yours. My will is 
ey ee 

And Dora promised, being meek. She 
thought, 

“Tt cannot be; my uncle’s mind will 
change!” 

And dave went on, and there was born 

a bo 

To William; then distresses came on 
him, 

And day by day he passed his father’s 
gate, 

Heart-broken, and his father helped 
him not. 

But Dora stored what little she could 
save, 


And sent it them by stealth, nor did 
they know 
Who sent it; till at last a fever seized 
On William, and in harvest time he 
died. 
Then Dora went to Mary. Mary sat 
And look’d with tears upon her boy, and 
thought 
Hard things of Dora. 
said : 
*““T have obey'd my uncle until now, 
And I have sinn’d, for it was all thro’ 
me 
This evil came on William at the first. 
But, Mary, for the sake of him that’s 
gone, 
And for your sake, the woman that he 
chose, 
And for this orphan, Iam come to you. 
You know there has not been for these 
five years 
So full a harvest. Let me take the boy, 
And I will set him in my uncle’s eye 
Among the wheat; that when his heart 
is glad 
Of the full harvest, he may see the boy, 
And bless him for the sake of him 
that’s gone.” 
And Dora took the child, and went 
her way 
Across the wheat, and sat upon a mound 
That was unsown, where many poppies 
grew. 
Far off the farmer came into the field 
And spied her not, for none of all his 
men 


Dora came and 


Dare tell him Dora waited with the 
child ; 

And Dora would have risen and gone to 
him, [reap’d, 


But her heart fail’d her ; and the reapers 


486 


BRUM Storrs 





And the sun fell, and all the land was 

dark. 
But when the morrow came, she rose 

and took 

The child once more, and sat upon the 
mound ; 

And made a little wreath of all the 
flowers 

That grew about, and tied it round his 
hat 

To make him pleasing in her uncle’s eye. 

Then when the farmer pass’d into the 


field 

He spied her, and he left his men at 
work, 

And came and said: ‘‘ Where were you 
yesterday ? 


Whose child is that ? 
doing here? ” 

So Dora cast her eyes upon the ground, 

And answer’d softly, ‘‘ This is William’s 
child?” 

‘- And did I not,” said Allan, ‘‘ did I not 

Forbid you, Dora?” Dora said again : 

‘* Do with me as you will, but take the 
child, 

And bless him for the sake of him 
that ’s gone !” 

And Allan said: ‘‘I see it isa trick 

Got up betwixt you and the woman 
there. 

I must be taught my duty, and by you! 

You knew my word was law, and yet 


What are you 


you dared 
To slight it. Well—for I will take the 
boy ; 
But go you hence, and never see me 
more.” 
So saying, he took the boy that cried 
aloud 


And struggled hard. The wreath of 
flowers fell 

At Dora’s feet. 
hands, 

And the boy’s cry came to her from the 
field 

Moreand more distant. 
her head, 

Remembering the day when first she 
came, 

And all the things that had been. 
bow’d down 

And wept in secret; and the reapers 


She bow’d upon her 


She bow’d down 


She 


reap’d, 
And the sun fell, and all the land was 
dark. 
Then Dora went to Mary’s house, and 
stood 


Upon the threshold. Mary saw the boy 





Was not with Dora. She broke out in 
praise 

To God, that help’d her in her widow- 
hood. 

And Dora said: ‘‘My uncle took the 
boy ; 

But, Mary, let me live and work with 
you: 

He says that he will never see me more.” 

Then answer’d Mary : ‘* This shall never 
be, 

That thou shouldst take my trouble on 
thyself ; 

And, now I think, he shall not have the 
boy, 

For he will teach him hardness, and to 
slight 

His mother. Therefore thou and I will 
89, 

And I will have my boy, and bring him 
home ; 

And I will beg of him to take thee back. 

But if he will not take thee back again, 

Then thou and I will live within one 
house, 

And work for William’s child, until he 
grows 

Of age to help us.” 

So the women kiss’d 

Each other, and set out, and reach’d the 
farm. 

The door was off the latch; they peep’d, 
and saw 

The boy set up betwixt his grandsire’s 
knees, 

Who thrust him in the hollows of his 
arm, 

And clapped him on the hands and on the 
cheeks, 

Like one that loved him; and the lad 
stretch’d out 

And babbled for the golden seal, that 


hung 

From Allan’s watch and sparkled by the 
fire. 

Then they came in; but when the boy 
beheld 


His mother, he cried out to come to her ; 

And Allan set him down, and Mary 
said : 

“QO father !—if you let me call you 

so— 

I never came a-begging for myself, 

Or William, or this child; but now I 
come 

For Dora; take her back, she loves you 
well. 

O Sir, when William died, he died at 
peace 


TENNYSON 


487 





With all men; for I ask’d him, and he 
said, 

He could not ever rue his marrying me— 

I had been a patient wife; but, Sir, he 
said 

That he was wrong to cross his father 
thus. 

‘God bless him!’ he said, ‘and may he 
never know 

The troubles I have gone thro’!’ 
he turn’d 

His face and pass’d—unhappy that I 
am! 

But now, Sir, let me have my boy, for 


Then 


you 

Will make him hard, and he will learn 
to slight 

His father’s memory; and take Dora 


ack, 
And let all this be as it was before.” 
So Mary said, and Dora hid her face 


By Mary. There was silence in the 
room ; 

And all at once the old man burst in 
sobs : 


**Thave been to blame—to blame. I 
have kill’d my son. 
T have kill’d him—but I loved him—my 
dear son. 
May God forgive me!—I have been to 
blame. 
Kiss me, my children.” 
Then they clung about 
The old man’s neck, and kiss’d him many 


times. 

And all the man was broken with re- 
morse ; 

And all his love came back a hundred- 
fold ; 


And for three hours he sobb’d o’er 
William’s child 
Thinking of William. 

So those four abode 

Within one house together, and as years 

Went forward Mary took another mate ; 

But Dora lived unmarried till her death. 

1842. 


ULYSSES! 


Ir little profits that an idle king, 

By this still hearth, among these barren 
crags, 

Match’d with an aged wife, I mete and 
dole 

Unequal laws unto a savage race, 

That hoard, and sleep, and feed, and 
know not me. 


1 See the Life of Tennyson, I, 196. 


I cannot rest from travel ; I will drink 

Life to the lees. All times I have en- 
joy’d 

Greatly, have suffer’d greatly, both with 
those 

That loved me, and alone ; onshore, and 
when 

Thro’ scudding drifts the rainy Hyades 

Vextthe dim sea. Iam becomea name; 

For always roaming with a hungry heart 

Much have I seen and known,—cities of 

men 

manners, climates, 
governments, 
Myself not least, but honor’d of them 


And councils, 


all,— 

And drunk delight of battle with my 
peers, 

Far on the ringing plains of windy Troy. 

I am a part of all that I have met ; 

Yet all experience isan arch wherethro’ 

Gleams that untravell’d world whose 
margin fades 

For ever and for ever when I move. 

How dull it is to pause, to make an end, 

To rust unburnish’d, not to shine in use ! 

As tho’ to breathe were life! Life piled 
on life 

Were all too little, and of one to me 

Little remains ; but every hour is saved 

From that eternal silence, something 
more, 

A bringer of new things: and vile it were 

For some three suns to store and hoard 
myself, 

And this gray spirit yearning in desire 

To follow knowledge like a sinking star, 

Beyond the utmost bound of human 
thought. 

This is my son, mine own Telemachus, 

To whom I leave the sceptre and the 
isle,— 

Well-loved of me, discerning to fulfil 

This labor, by slow prudence to make 
mild 

A rugged people, and thro’ soft degrees 

Subdue them to the useful and the good. 

Most blameless is he, centred in the 
sphere 

Of common duties decent, not to fail 

In offices of tenderness, and pay 

Meet adoration to my household gods, 

When Iamgone. He works his work, I 
mine. 


There lies the port ; the vessel puffs her 
sail ; 
There gloom the dark, broad seas. My 
mariners, 


488 


Souls that have toil’d and wrought, and 
thought with me,— 

That ever with a frolic welcome took 

The thunder and the sunshine, and op- 
posed 

Free hearts, free foreheads,—you and I 
are old; 

Old age hath yet his honor and his toil. 

Death closes all ; but something ere the 
end, 

Some work of noble note, may yet be 
done, 

Not unbecoming men that strove with 
Gods. 

The lights begin to twinkle from the 
rocks ; 

The long day wanes; the slow moon 
climbs ; the deep 

Moans round with many voices. 
my friends 

’T is not too late to seek a newer world. 

Push off, and sitting well in order smite 

The sounding furrows; for my purpose 
holds 

To sail beyond the sunset, and the baths 

Of all the western stars, until I die. 

It may be that the gulfs will wash us 


Come, 


down ; 
It may be we shall touch the Happy 
Isles, [knew. 


And see the great Achilles whom we 

Tho’ much is taken, much abides; and 
tho’ [old days 

We are not now that strength which in 

Moved earth and heaven, that which we 
are, we are,— 

One equal temper of heroic hearts, 

Made weak by time and fate, but strong 


in will 
To strive, to seek, to find, and not to 
yield. 1842. 


LOCKSLEY HALL! 


COMRADES, leave me herea little, while 
as yet ’t is early morn: 

Leave me here, and when you want me, 
sound upon the bugle-horn. 


’T is the place, and all around it, as of 
old, the curlews call, 

Dreary gleams about the moorland fly- 
ing over Locksley Hall; 


Locksley Hall, that in the distance 
overlooks the sandy tracts, 

And the hollow ocean-ridges roaring 
into cataracts. 


1 See the Life of Tennyson, I, 176 and 195. 


BRITISH POETS 


Many a night from yonder ivied case- 
ment, ere I went to rest, 

Did I look on great Orion sloping slowly 
to the west. 


Many anight I saw the Pleiads, rising 
thro’ the mellow shade, 

Glitter like a swarm of fireflies tangled 
in a silver braid. 


Here about the beach I wander’d, nour- 
ishing a youth sublime 

With the fairy tales of science, and the 
long result of. time ; 


When the centuries behind me like a 
fruitful land reposed ; 

When I clung to all the present for the 
promise that it closed ; 


When I dipped into the future far as hu- 
man eye could see, 

Saw the vision of the world and all the 
wonder that would be.— 


In the spring a fuller crimson comes 
upon the robin’s breast ; 

In the spring the wanton lapwing gets 
himself another crest ; 


In the spring a livelier iris changes on 
the burnish’d dove ; 

In the spring a young man’s fancy light- 
ly turns to thoughts of love. 


Then her cheek was pale and thinner 
than should be for one so young, 

And her eyes on all my motions with a 
mute observance hung. 


And I said, ‘‘ My cousin Amy, speak, 
and speak the truth to me, 

Trust me, cousin, all the current of my 
being sets to thee.” 


On her pallid cheek and forehead came a 
color and a light, 

As Thave seen the rosy red flushing in 
the. northern night. 


And she turn’d—her bosom shaken with 
a sudden storm of sighs— 

All the spirit deeply dawning in the 
dark of hazel eyes— 


Saying, ‘‘I have hid my feelings, fear- 
ing they should do me wrong ;” 

Saying, ‘‘ Dost thou love me, cousin ?” 
weeping, ‘‘I have loved thee 
long.” 


TENNYSON 


Love took up the glass of time, and 
turn’d it in his glowing hands ; 

Every moment, lightly shaken, ran itself 
in golden sands. 


Love took up the harp of Life, and smote 
on all the chords with might ; 

Smote the chord of Self, that, trembling, 
past in music out of sight. 


Many a morning on the moorland did we 
_hear the copses ring, 

And her whisper throng’d my pulses 
‘with the fulness of the spring. 


Many an evening by the waters did we 
watch the stately ships, 

And our spirits rush’d together at the 
touching of the lips. 


O my cousin, shallow-hearted! O my 
Amy, mine no more! 
O the dreary, dreary, moorland! O the 


barren, barren shore ! 


Falser than all fancy fathoms, falser 
than all songs have sung, 

Puppet to a father’s threat, and servile 
to a shrewish tongue ! 


Is it well to wish thee happy? having 
known me—to decline 
On a range of lower feelings and a nar- 
rower heart than mine ! 


Yet it shall be; thou shalt lower to his 
level day by day, 

What is fine within thee growing coarse 
to sympathize with clay. 

As the husband is, the wife is; thou art 
mated with a clown, 

And the grossness of his nature will 
have weight to drag thee down. 


He will hold thee, when his passion shall 
have spent its novel force, 

Something better than his dog, a little 
dearer than his horse. 


What is this? his eyes are heavy ; think 
not they are glazed with wine. 

Go to him, it is thy duty; kiss him, 
take his hand in thine. 


It may be my lord is weary,that his brain 
is overwrought ; 

Soothe him with thy finer fancies, touch 
him with thy lighter thought. 


489 


He will answer to the purpose, easy 
things to understand— 

Better thou wert dead before me, tho’ I 
slew thee with my hand! 


Better thou and I were lying, hidden 
from the heart’s disgrace, 

Roll’d in one another’s arms, and silent 
in a last embrace. 


Cursed be the social wants that sin 
against the strength of youth! 

Cursed be the social lies that warp us 
from the living truth ! 


Cursed be the sickly forms that err from 
honest Nature’s rule ! 

Cursed * be the gold that gilds the 
straiten’d forehead of the fool! 


Well—’t is well that I should bluster !— 
Hadst thou less unworthy proved— 

Would to God—for I had loved thee 
more than ever wife was loved. 


Am I mad, that I should cherish .that 
which bears but bitter fruit ? 

I will pluck it from my bosom, tho’ my 
heart be at the root. 


Never, tho’ my mortal summers to such 
length of years should come 

As the many-winter’d crow that leads 
the clanging rookery home. 


Where is comfort? in division of the 
records of the mind ? 

Can I part her from herself, and love her, 
as I knew her, kind ? 


Iremember one that perish’d ; sweetly 
did she speak and move ; 

Such a one dol remember, whom to look 
at was to love. 


Can I think of her as dead, and love her 
for the love she bore ? 

No—she never loved me truly; love is 
love for evermore. 


Comfort? comfort scorn’d of devils! this 
is truth the poet sings, 

That a sorrow’s crown of sorrow is re- 
membering happier things. 


Drug thy memories, lest thou learn it, 
lest thy heart be put to proof, 

In the dead unhappy night, and when 
the rain is on the roof, 


490 


Like a dog, he hunts in dreams, and 
thou art staring at the wall, 
Where the dying night-lamp flickers, 
and the shadows rise and fall. 


Then a hand shall pass before thee, 
pointing to his drunken sleep, 

To thy widow’d marriage-pillows, to the 
tears that thou wilt weep. 


Thou shalt hear the ‘‘ Never, never,” 
whisper’d by the phantom years, 

And a song from out the distance in the 
ringing of thine ears; 


And an eye shall vex thee, looking an- 
cient kindness on thy pain. 

Turn thee, turn thee on thy pillow ; get 
thee to thy rest again. 


Nay, but Nature brings thee solace ; for 
a tender voice will cry. 

°T is a purer life than thine, a lip to drain 
thy trouble dry. 

Baby lips willlaugh me down; my latest 
rival brings thee rest. 

Baby fingers, waxen touches, press me 
from the mother’s breast. 


O, the child too clothes the father with 
a dearness not his due. 

Half is thine and half is his; it will be 
worthy of the two. 


O, I see thee old and formal, fitted to thy 
petty part, 

With a little hoard of maxims preaching 
down a daughter’s heart. 


‘‘They were dangerous guides the feel- 
ings—she herself was not exempt— 

Truly, she herself had suffer’d ” i 
in thy self-contempt ! 





Overlive it—lower yet—be happy! where- 
fore should I care? 

I myself must mix with action, lest I 
wither by despair. 


What is that which I should turn to, 
lighting upon days like these ? 

Every door is barr’d with gold, and opens 
but to golden keys. 


Every gate is throng’d with. suitors, all 
the markets overflow. 

JT have but an angry fancy; whatis that 
which I should do? 


BRITISH POETS 


I had been content to perish, falling on 
the foeman’s ground, 

When the ranks are roll’d in vapor, and 
the winds are laid with sound. 


But the jingling of the guinea helps the 
hurt that Honor feels, 
And the nations do but murmur, snarl- 
ing at each other’s heels. 


Can I but relive in sadness? I will turn 
that earlier page. 

Hide me from my deep emotion, O thou 
wondrous Mother-Age! 


Make me feel the wild pulsation that I 
felt before the strife, 

When I heard my days before me, and 
the tumult of my life ; 


Yearning for the large excitement that 
the coming years would yield, 

Eager-hearted as a boy when first he 
leaves his father’s field, 


And at night along the dusky highway 
near and nearer drawn, 

Sees in heaven the light of London flaring 
like a dreary dawn ; 


And his spirit leaps within him to be 
gone before him then, 

Underneath the light he looks at, in 
among the throngs of men ; 


Men, my brothers, men the workers, ever 
reaping something new ; 

That which they have done but earnest 
of the things that they shall do. 


For I dipped into the future, far as human 
eye could see, 

Saw the Vision of the world, and all the 
wonder that would be ; 


Saw the heavens fill with commerce, ar- 
gosies of magic sails, 

Pilot of the purple twilight, dropping 
down with costly bales ; 


Heard the heavens fill with shouting, and 
there rain’d a ghastly dew 

From the nations’ airy navies grappling 
in the central blue ; 


Far along the world-wide whisper of the 
south-wind rushing warm, 

With the standards of the peoples plung- 
ing thro’ the thunder-storm ; 


TENNYSON 


Till the war-drum throbb’d no longer, 
and the battle-flags were furl’d 

In the Parliament of man, the Federa- 
tion of the world. 


There the common sense of most shall 
hold a fretful realm in awe, 

And the kindly earth shall slumber, 
lappedin universal law. 


So I triumph’d ere my passion sweeping 
thro’ me left me dry, 

Left me with the palsied heart, and left 
me with the jaundiced eye ; 

j 

Kye, to whichall order festers, all things 
here are out of joint. 

Science moves, but slowly, slowly, creep- 
ing on from point to point ; 


Slowly comes a hungry people, as alion, 
creeping nigher, 

Glares at one that nods and winks be- 
hind a slowly-dying fire. 


Yet I doubt not thro’ the ages one in- 
creasing purpose runs, 

And the thoughts of men are widen’d 
with the process of the suns. 


What is that to him that reaps not har- 
vest of his youthful joys, 

Tho’ the deep heart of existence beat for 
ever like a boy’s? 


Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers, 
and I linger on the shore, 

And the individual withers, and the 
world is more and more. 


Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers, 
and he bears a laden breast, 

Full of sad experience, moving toward 
the stillness of his rest. 


Hark, my merry comrades call me, 
sounding on the bugle-horn, 

They to whom my foolish passion were 
a target for their scorn. 


Shall it not be scorn to me to harp on 
such a moulder’d string ? 
I am shamed thro’ all my nature to have 
loved so slight a thing. 
4% 


Weakness to be wroth with weakness! 
woman’s pleasure, woman’s pain— 

Nature made them blinder motions 
bounded in a shallower brain. 


491 


Woman is the lesser man, and all thy 
passions, match’d with mine, 

Are as moonlight unto sunlight, and as 
water unto wine— 


Here at least, where nature sickens, 
nothing. Ah, for some retreat 

Deep in yonder shining Orient, where 
my life began to beat, 


Where in wild Mahratta-battle fell my 
father evil-starr’d ;— 

I was left a trampled orphan, and a 
selfish uncle’s ward. 


Or to burst all links of habit—there to 
wander far away, 

On from island unto island at the gate- 
ways of the day. 


Larger constellations burning, mellow 
moons and happy skies, 

Breadths of tropic shade and palms in 
cluster, knots of Paradise. 


Never comes the trader, never floats an 
European flag, 

Slides the bird o’er lustrous woodland, 
swings the trailer from the crag; 


Droops the heavy-blossom’d bower, 
hangs the heavy-fruited tree— 

Summer isles of Eden lying in dark- 
purple spheres of sea, 


There methinks would be enjoyment 
more than in this march of mind, 

In the steamship, in the railway, in the 
thoughts that shake mankind. 


There the passions cramp’d no longer 
shall have scope and breathing 
space ; 

I will take some savage woman, she 
shall rear my dusky race. 


Iron-jointed, supple-sinew’d, they shall 
dive, and they shall run, 

Catch the wild goat by the hair, and 
hurl their lances in the sun; 


Whistle back the parrot’s call, and leap 
the rainbows of the brooks, 

Not with blinded eyesight poring over 
miserable books— 


Fool, again the dream, the fancy! but I 
know my words are wild, 

But I count the gray barbarian lower 
than the Christian child. 


492 


I, to herd with narrow foreheads, vacant 
of our glorious gains, 

Like a beast with lower pleasures, like a 
beast with lower pains! 


Mated with a squalid savage—what to 
me were sun or clime! 

I the heir of all the ages, in the fore- 
most files of time— 


I that rather held it better men should 
perish one by one, 

Than that earth should stand at gaze like 
Joshua’s moon in Ajalon ! 

Not in vain the distance beacons. For- 
ward, forward let us range, 

Let the great world spin for ever down 
the ringing grooves of change. 


Thro’ the shadow of the globe we sweep 
into the younger day ; 

Better fifty years of Europe than a cycle 
of Cathay. 


Mother-Age,—for mine I knew not,—- 
help me as when life begun ; 

Rift the hills, and roll the waters, flash 
the lightnings, weigh the sun. 


O, I see the crescent promise of my spirit 
hath not set. 

Ancient founts of inspiration well thro’ 
all my fancy yet. 


Howsoever these things be, a long fare- 
well to Locksley Hall! 

Now for me the woods may wither, now 
for me the roof-tree fall. 


Comes a vapor from the margin, black- 
ening over heath and holt, 
Cramming all the blast before it, in its 

breast a thunderbolt. 


Let it fall on Locksley Hall, with rain or 
hail, or fire or snow ; 

For the mighty wind arises, roaring sea- 
ward, and I go. 1842. 


GODIVA 


I waited for the train at Coventry ; 

[hung with grooms and porters on the 
bridge, 

To watch the three tall spires ; and there 
[ shaped 

The city’s ancient legend into this. :— 

Not only we, the latest seed of Time, 
New men, that in the flying of a wheel 


BRITISH POETS 


Cry down the past, not only we, that 
prate 

Of rights and wrongs, have loved the 
people well, 

And loathed to see them overtax’d; but 
she 

Did more, and underwent, and over- 
came, 

The woman of a thousand summers back, 

Godiva, wife to that grim Earl, who 
ruled 

In Coventry ; for when he laid a tax 

Upon his town, and all the mothers, 
brought 

Their children, clamoring, ‘‘ If we pay, 
we starve!” 

She sought her lord, and found him, 
where he strode 

About the hall, among his dogs, alone, 

His beard a foot before him, and his hair 

A yard behind. She told him of their 
tears, 

And pray’d him, ‘‘If they pay this tax 
they starve.” 


Whereat he stared, replying, half- 
amazed, 

‘*You would not let your little finger 
ache 


For suchas these ?”—‘‘ But I would die,” 
said she, 

He laugh’d, and swore by Peter and by 
Paul, 

Then fillip’d at the diamond in her ear: 

‘*O, ay, ay, ay, you talk!”—‘‘ Alas!” 
she said, 

‘*But prove me what it is I would not 
do.” 

And from a heart as rough as Esau’s 
hand, 

He answer’d, ‘‘ Ride you naked thro’ the 

aneneOwWwn, 

And JT repeal it;” and nodding, as in 
scorn, 

He parted, with great strides among his 
dogs. 

So left alone, the passions of her mind, 

As winds from all the compass shift and 
blow, 

Made war upon each other for an hour, 

Till pity won. She sent a herald forth, 

And bade him cry, with sound of trum- 


pet, all 

The hard condition, but that she would 
loose 

The people; therefore, as they loved her 
well, 

From then till noon no foot should pace 
the street, all 


No eye look down, she passing, but that 


TENNYSON 


493 





Should keep within, door shut, and win- 

dow barr’d. 
Then fled she to her inmost bower, and 

there 

Unclasp’d the wedded eagles of her belt, 

The grim Earl’s gift; but ever at a 
breath 

She linger’d, looking like a summer 
moon . 

Half-dipped in éloud. Anon she shook 

her head, 

And shower’d the rippled ringlets to her 


knee ; 

Unclad herself in haste; adown the 
stair 

Stole oa j and like a creeping sunbeam 
sli 


From pillar unto pillar, until she reach’d 

The gateway ; there she found her pal- 
frey trapt 

In purple blazon’d with armorial gold. 

Then she rode forth, clothed on with 

chastity. 

The deep air listen’d round her as she 
rode, 

And all the low wind hardly breathed 
for fear. 

The little wide-mouth’d heads upon the 
spout 

Had cunning eyes to see; the barking 
cur 

Made her cheek flame; her palfrey’s 
footfall shot 

Light horrors thro’ her pulses ; the blind 


walls 

Were fullof chinks and holes ; and over- 
head 

Fantastic gables, crowding, stared ; 
but she 

Not less thro’ all bore up, till, last, she 
saw’ 

The white-flower’d elder-thicket from 
the field 

Gleam thro’ the Gothic archway in the 
wall. 

Then she rode back, clothed on with 

chastity. 

And one low churl, compact of thankless 
earth, 


The fatal byword of all years to come, 
Boring a little auger-hole in fear, 
Peep’d—but his eyes, before they had 
their will, 
Were shrivell’d into darkness in his 
head, [who wait 
And dropped before him. Sothe Powers, 
On noble deeds, cancell’d a sense mis- 
used ; [at once, 
And she, that knew not, pass’d; and all 


With twelve great shocks of sound, the 

shameless noon [dred towers, 

Was clash’d and hammer’d from a hun- 

ea after one; but even then she gain’d 

er bower, whence reissuing, robed and 

crown’d, 

To meet her lord, she took the tax away 
And built herself an everlasting name. 
1842. 


SIR GALAHAD 


My good blade carves the casques of men, 
My tough lance thrusteth sure, 

My strength is as the strength of ten, 
Because my heart is pure. 

The shattering trumpet shrilleth high, 
The hard brands shiver on the steel, 
The splinter’d spear-shafts crack and fly, 

The horse and rider reel ; 
They reel, they roll in clanging lists, 
And when the tide of combat stands, 
Perfume and flowers fall in showers, 
That lightly rain from ladies’ hands. 


How sweet are looks that ladies bend 
On whom their favors fall ! 
For them I battle till the end, 
To save from shame and thrall ; 
But all my heart is drawn above, 
My knees are bow’d in crypt and 
shrine; 
I never felt the kiss of love, 
Nor maiden’s hand in mine. 
More bounteous aspects on me beam, 
Me mightier transports move and 
thrill ; 
So keep I fair thro’ faith and prayer 
A virgin heart in work and will. 


When down the stormy crescent goes, 
A light before me swims, 

Between dark stems the forest glows, 
I hear a noise of hymns. 

Then by some secret shrine I ride ; 
I hear a voice, but none are there ; 

The stalls are void, the doors are wide, 
The tapers burning fair. 

Fair gleams the snowy altar-cloth, 
The silver vessels sparkle clean, 

The shrill bell rings, the censer swings, 
And solemn chants resound between. 


Sometimes on lonely mountain-meres 
I find a magic bark. 

I leap on board ; no helmsman steers ; 
I float till all is dark. 

A gentle sound, an awful light ! 
Three angels bear the Holy Grail ; 


494 





With folded feet, in stoles of white, 
On sleeping wings they sail. 

Ah, blessed vision! blood of God! 
My spirit beats her mortal bars, 

As down dark tides the glory slides, 
And starlike mingles with the stars. 


When on my goodly charger borne 
Thro’ dreaming towns I go, 

The cock crows ere the Christmas-morn, 
The streets are dumb with snow. 

The tempest crackles on the leads, 
And, ringing, springs from brand and 

mail ; 

But o’er the dark a glory spreads, 
And gilds the driving haul, 

I leave the plain, I climb the height ; 
No branchy thicket shelter yields ; 

But blessed forms in whistling storms 
Fly o’er waste fens and windy fields. 


A maiden knight—to me is given 
Such hope, I know not fear ; 

I yearn to breathe the airs of heaven 
That often meet me here. 

I muse on joy that will not cease, 
Pure spaces clothed in living beams, 

Pure lilies of eternal peace, 
Whose odors haunt my dreams ; 

And, stricken by an angel’s hand, 
This mortal armor that I wear, 

This weight and size, this heart and 

eyes, 

Are touch’d, are turn’d to finest air. 


The clouds are broken in the sky, 
And thro’ the mountain-walls 

A rolling organ-harmony 
Swells up and shakes and falls. 

Then move the trees, the copses nod, 
Wings flutter, voices hover clear: 

‘*O just and faithful knight of God! 
Ride on! the prize is near.” 

So pass I hostel, hall, and grange ; 
By bridge and ford. by park and pale, 

All-arm’d I ride, whate’er betide, 
Until I find the Holy Grail. 1842. 


A FAREWELL 


FLOW down, cold rivulet, to the sea, 
Thy tribute wave deliver ; 

No more by thee my steps shall be, 
For ever and for ever. 


Flow, softly flow, by lawn and lea, 
A rivulet, then a river; 

Nowhere by thee my steps shall be, 
For ever and for ever, 


BRITISH POETS 


But here will sigh thine alder-tree, 
And here thine aspen shiver ; 

And here by thee will hum the bee, 
For ever and for ever. 


A thousand suns will stream on thee, 
A thousand moons will quiver ; 

But not by thee my steps shall be, 
For ever and for ever. 1842. 


THE VISION OF SIN 


I 


I HAD a vision when the night was late ; 

A youth came riding toward a palace- 
gate. 

He rode a horse with wings, that would 
have flown, 

But that his heavy rider kept him down. 

And from the palace came achild of sin, 

And took him by the curls, and led him 
in, 

Where sat a company with heated eyes, 

Expecting when a fountain should arise. 

A sleepy light upon their brows and 
lips— 

As when the sun, a crescent of eclipse, 

Dreams over lake and lawn, and isles 
and capes— 

Suffused them, sitting, lying, languid 

shapes, 

By heaps of gourds, and skins of wine, 

and piles of grapes. 


II 


Then methought I heard a mellow 
sound, 

Gathering up from all the lower ground; 

Narrowing in to where they sat assem- 


bled, 

Low voluptuous music winding trem- 
bled, 

Woven in circles. They that heard it 
sigh’d, 


Panted hand-in-hand with faces pale, 
Swung themselves, and in low tones re- 
lied ; 

Till the fountain spouted, showering 
wide 

Sleet of diamond-drift and pearly hail. 

Then the music touch’d the gates and 
died, 

Rose again from where it seem’d to fail, 

Storm’d in orbs of song, a growing gale ; 

Till thronging in and in, to where they 
waited, 

As ’t were a hundred-throated nightin- 
gale, 


The strong tempestuous treble throbb’d 
and palpitated ; 

Ran into its giddiest whirl of sound, 

Caught the sparkles, and in circles, 

Purple gauzes, golden hazes, liquid 
mazes, 

Flung the torrent rainbow round. 

Then they started from their places, 

Moved with violence, changed in hue, 

Caught each other with wild grimaces, 

Half-invisible to the view, 

Wheeling with precipitate paces 

To the melody, till they flew, 

Hair and eyes and limbs and faces, 

Twisted hard in fierce embraces, 

Like to Furies, like to Graces, 

Dash’d together in blinding dew ; 

Till, kill’d with some luxurious agony, 

The nerve-dissolving melody 

Fluttered headlong from the sky. 


III 


And then I look’d up toward a mountain- 
tract, 

That girt the region with high cliff and 
lawn. 

I saw that every morning, far with- 
drawn 

Beyond the darkness and the cataract, 

God made Himself an awful rose of 
dawn, 

Unheeded ; and detaching, fold by fold, 

From those still heights, and, slowly 
drawing near, 

A vapor heavy, hueless, formless, cold, 

Came floating on for many a month and 


rear, 

reed ; and I thought I would have 
spoken, 

And warn’d that madman ere it grew 
too late, 

But, as in dreams, I could not. Mine 
was broken, 

When that cold vapor touch’d the palace- 
rate, 

And inka again. I saw within my 
head 

A gray and gap-tooth’d man as lean as 
death, 

Who slowly rode across a wither’d 
heath, 

And lighted at a ruin’d inn, and said : 


IV 


‘* Wrinkled ostler, grim and thin! 
Here is custom come your way ; 

Take my brute, and lead him in, 
Stuff his ribs with mouldy hay. 


TENNYSON 495 


‘* Bitter barmaid, waning fast! 
See that sheets are on my bed. 

What! the flower of life is past ; 
It is long before you wed. 


**Slip-shod waiter, lank and sour, 
At the Dragon on the heath! 
Let us have a quiet hour, 
Let us hob-and-nob with Death. 


‘*T am old, but let me drink ; 
Bring me spices, bring me wine; 
I remember, when I think, 
That my youth was half divine. 


‘* Wine is good for shrivell’d lips, 
When a blanket wraps the day. 
When the rotten woodland drips, 
And the leaf is stamp’d in clay. 


**Sit thee down, and have no shame, 
Cheek by jowl, and knee by knee ; 
What care I for any name? 
What for order or degree ? 


‘* Let me screw thee up a peg ; 

Let me loose thy tongue with wine ; 
Callest thou that thing a leg ? 

Which is thinnest ?. thine or mine? 


** Thou shalt not be saved by works, 
Thou hast been a sinner too; 

vuin’d trunks on wither’d forks, 
Empty scarecrows, I and you! 


‘* Fill the cup and fill the can, 
Have a rouse before the morn ; 

Every moment dies a man, 
Every moment one is born. 


‘We are men of ruin’d blood ; 
Therefore comes it we are wise. 

Fish are we that love the mud, 
Rising to no fancy-flies. 


‘* Name and fame! to fly sublime 
Thro’ the courts, the camps, the 
schools, 
Is to be the ball of Time, 
Bandied by the hands of fools. 


‘¢ Friendship !—to be two in one— 
Let the canting lar pack ! 

Well I know, when I am gone, 
How she mouths behind my back. 


‘¢ Virtue !—to be good and just— 
Every heart, when sifted well, 

Is a clot of warmer dust, 
Mix’d with cunning sparks of hell. 


496 BRITISH 


‘““O, we two as well can look 
Whited thought and cleanly life 

As the priest, above his book 
Leering at his neighbor’s wife. 


“Fill the cup and fill the can, 
Have a rouse before the morn : 

Every moment dies a man, 
Every moment one is born. 


‘* Drink, and let the parties rave ; 
They are fill’d with idle spleen, 
Rising, falling, like a wave, 
For they know not what they mean. 


‘* He that roars for liberty 
Faster binds a tyrant’s power, 

And the tyrant’s cruel glee 
Forces on the freer hour. 


‘* Will the can and fill the cup ; 
All the windy ways of men 

Are but dust that rises up, 
And is lightly laid again. 


‘‘ Greet her with applausive breath, 
Freedom, gaily doth she tread ; 

In her right a civic wreath, 
In her left a human head. 


‘“* No, I love not what is new: 
She is of an ancient house, 
And I think we know the hue 

Of that cap upon her brows. 


“ Let her go! her thirst she slakes 
Where the bloody conduit runs, 

Then her sweetest meal she makes 
On the first-born of her sons. 


‘* Drink to lofty hopes that cool.— 
Visions of a perfect State ; 

Drink we, last, the public fool, 
Frantic love and frantic hate. 


‘*Chant me now some wicked stave, 
Till thy drooping courage rise, 

And the glow-worm of the grave 
Glimmer in thy rheumy eyes. 


‘* Fear not thou to loose thy tongue, 
Set thy hoary fancies free ; 

What is loathsome to the young 
Savors wel] to thee and me. 


** Change, reverting to the years, 
When thy nerves could understand 
What there is in loving tears, 
And the warmth of hand in hand. 


POETS 


‘Tell me tales of thy first love— 
April hopes, the fools of chance-- 
Till the graves begin to move, 
And the dead begin to dance. 


‘« Will the can and fill the cup ; 
All the windy ways of men 

Are but dust that rises up. 
And is lightly laid again. 


‘Trooping from their mouldy dens 
The chap-fallen circle spreads— 
Welcome, fellow-citizens, 
Hollow hearts and empty heads ! 


‘** You are bones, and what of that? 
Every face, however full. 

Padded round with flesh and fat, 
Is but modell’d on a skull. 


‘* Death is king, and Vivat Rex! 
Tread a measure on the stones, 

Madam—if I know your sex 
From the fashion of your bones. 


‘* No, I cannot praise the fire 

In your eye—nor yet your lip; 
All the more do I admire 

Joints of cunning workmanship. 


“Loder Gods 
plan— 
Neither modell’d, glazed, norframed; 
Buss me, thou rough sketch of man, 
Far too naked to be shamed ! 


likeness—the ground- 


‘* Drink to Fortune, drink to Chance, 
While we keep a little breath! 

Drink to heavy Ignorance ! 
Hob-and-nob with brother Death ! 


‘* Thou art mazed, the night is long, 
And the longer night is near-- 
What! Iam not all as wrong 
As a bitter jest is dear. 


‘Youthful hopes, by scores, to al, 
When the locks are crisp and curl’d ; 

Unto me my maudlin gall . 
And my mockeries of the world. 


‘** Fill the cup and fill the can ; 
Mingle madness, mingle scorn ! 

Dregs of life, and lees of man; 
Yet we will not die forlorn.” 


V 


The voice grew faint; there came a 
further change ; 


TENNYSON 


Once more uprose the mystic moun- 
tain range. 
Below were men and horses pierced 
with worms, 
And slowly quickening into lower forms ; 
By shards and scurf of salt, and scum of 


dross, 

Old plash of rains, and refuse patch’d 
with moss. 

Then some one spake: ‘‘ Behold ! it was 
a crime 


Of sense avenged by sense that wore 
with time.” 

Another said: ‘‘ The crime of sense be- 
came 

The crime of malice, and is equal blame.” 

And one: ‘*‘ He had not wholly quench’d 
his power ; 

A little grain of conscience made him 
sour.” 

At last I heard a voice upon the slope 

Cry tothesummit, ‘‘ Is there any hope?” 

To which an answer peal’d from that 


high land, 

Butin a tongue no man could under- 
stand ; 

And on the glimmering limit far with- 
drawn 

God made Himself an awful rose of 
dawn. 1842. 


BREAK, BREAK, BREAK 


BREAK, break, break, 
On thy cold gray stones, O Sea ! 

And I would that my tongue could utter 
The thoughts that arise in me. 


O, well for the fisherman’s boy, 

That he shouts with his sister at play ! 
O, well for the sailor lad, 

That he sings in his boat on the bay ! 


And the stately ships go on 
To their haven under the hill; 

But O for the touch of a vanish’d hand, 
And the sound of a voice that is still ! 


Break, break, break, 
At the foot of thy crags, O Sea! 
But the tender grace ofa day that is 
dead 
Will never come back to me. 1842. 


THE POET’S SONG 


THE rain had fallen, the Poet arose, 
He pass’d by the town and out of the 
street ; 


32 


497 


A light wind blew from the gates of 
the sun, 
And waves of shadow went over the 
wheat ; 
And he sat him down in a lonely place, 
And chanted a melody loud and sweet, 
That made the wild-swan pause in her 
cloud, 
And the lark drop down at his feet. 


The swallow stopped as he hunted the fly, 
The snake slipped under a spray, 
The wild hawk stood with the down on 
his beak, 
And stared, with his: foot on the prey ; 
And the nightingale thought, ‘‘I have 
sung many songs, 
But never a one so gay, 
For he sings of what the world will be 
When the years have died away.” 1842. 


LYRICS FROM THE PRINCESS 


TEARS, idle tears, I know not what 
they mean, 
Tears from the depth of some divine de- 
spair 
Rise in the heart, and gather tothe eyes, 
In looking on the happy autumn-fields, 
And thinking of the days that are no 
more. 


Fresh as the first beam glittering on 
a sail, 
That brings our friends up from the 
underworld, 
Sad as the last which reddens over one 
That sinks with all we love below the 
verge ; 
So sad, so fresh, the days that are no 
more. 


Ah, sad and strange as in dark sum- 

mer dawns 

The earliest pipe of half-awaken’d birds 

To dying ears, when unto dying eyes 

The casement slowly grows a glimmer- 
ing square ; 

So sad, so strange, the days that are no 
more. 


Dear as remember’d kisses after death, 

And sweet as those by hopeless fancy 
feign’d 

On lips that are for others ; deep as love, 

Deep as first love, and wild with all re- 


gret ; 
O Death in Life, the days that are no 
more ! 


498 


O Swallow, Swallow, flying, flying 
south, 

Fly to her, and fall upon her gilded eaves, 

And tell her, tell her, what I tell to thee. 


O, tell her, Swallow, thou that know- 


est each, 

That bright and fierce and fickle is the 
South, 

And dark and true and tender is the 
North. 


O Swallow, Swallow, if I could fol- 
low, and light 
Upon her lattice, I would pipe and trill, 
And cheep and twitter twenty million 
loves. 


O, were I thou that she might take 
me in, 

And lay me on her bosom, and her heart 

Would rock the snowy cradle tillI died! 


Why lingereth she to clothe her heart 
with love, 
Delaying as the tender ash delays 
To clothe herself, when all the woods are 
green? 


O, tell her, Swallow, that thy brood 
is flown; 
Say to her, I do but wanton in the South, 
But in the North long since my nest is 
made. 


O, tell her, brief is life but love is long, 

And brief the sun of summer in the 
North, 

And brief the moon of beauty in the 
South. 


O Swallow, flying from the golden 
: woods, 
Fly to her, and pipe and woo her, and 
make her mine, 
And tell her, tell her, that I follow thee. 





As thro’ the land at eve we went, 
And pluck’d the ripen’d ears, 

We fell out, my wife and I, 

O, we fell out, I know not why, 
And kiss’d again with tears. 

And blessings on the falling out 
That all the more endears, 

When we fall out with those we love 
And kiss again with tears! 

For when we came where lies the child 
We lost in other years, 


BRITISH POETS 


There above the little grave, 
O, there above the little grave, 
We kiss’d again with tears. 


Sweet and low, sweet and low, 
Wind of the western sea, 

Low, low, breathe and blow, 
Wind of the western sea! 

Over the rolling waters go, 

Come from the dying moon, and blow, 
Blow him again to me: 

While my little one, while my pretty one, 

sleeps. 


Sleep and rest, sleep and rest, 

Father will come to thee soon ; 
Rest, rest, on mother’s breast, 

Father will come to thee soon ; 
Father will come to his babe in the nest, 
Silver sails all out of the west 

Under the silver moon ; 

Sleep, my little one, sleep, my pretty 
one, sleep. 





The splendor falls on castle walls 
And snowy summits old in story ; 
The long light shakes across the lakes, 
And the wild cataract leaps in glory. 
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes 
flying, 
Blow, bugle; answer, echoes, dying, 
dying, dying. 


O, hark, O, hear ! how thin and clear, 
And thinner, clearer, farther going! 
O, sweet and far from cliff and scar 
The horns of Elfland faintly blowing ! 
Blow, let us hear the purple glens reply- 
ing, 
Blow, bugle: answer, echoes, dying, 
dying, dying. 


O love, they die in yon rich sky, 

They faint on hill or field or river ; 
Our echoes roll from soul to soul, 

And grow for ever and for ever. 
Blow, bugle, blow, set the wild echoes 

flying, 
And answer, echoes, answer, dying, dy- 
ing, dying. 


Thy voice is heard thro’ rolling drums 
That beat to battle where he stands; 
Thy face across his fancy comes. 
And gives the battle to his hands. 


TENNYSON 


499 


a a a Se a rc a a aa a pee 


A moment, while the trumpets blow, 
He sees his brood about thy knee ; 
The next, like fire he meets the foe, 
And an him dead for thine and 
thee. 





Home they brought her warrior dead ; 
She nor swoon’d nor utter’d cry. 

All her maidens, watching, said, 
**She must weep or she will die.” 


Then they praised him, soft and low, 
Call’d him worthy to be loved, 
Truest friend and noblest foe; 
Yet she neither spoke nor moved. 


Stole a maiden from her place, 
Lightly to the warrior stepped, 
Took the face-cloth from the face; 

Yet she neither moved nor wept. 


Rose a nurse of ninety years, 
Set his child upon her knee— 

Like summer tempest came her tears— 
‘* Sweet my child, I live for thee.” 





Ask me no more: the moon may draw 
the sea ; 


IN MEMORIAM A. H. H. 


The cloud may stoop from heaven and 
take the shape, 
With fold to fold, of mountain or of 
cape ; 
But O too fond, when have I answer’d 
thee ? 
Ask me no more. 


Ask me no more: what answer should I 
ive? 

I love not hollow cheek or faded eye : 

Yet, O my friend, I will not have thee 

die! 

Ask me no more, lest I should bid thee 

live ; 
Ask me no more. 


Ask me no more: thy fate and mine are 
seal’d ; 
I strove against the stream and all in 
vain ; 
Let the great river take me to the 
main. 
No more, dear love, for ata touch I yield ; 
Ask me no more. 
1847-1850.} 


1 The first two of these lyrics, included in the 
body of the work, were published in the original 
edition, 1847; the others, inserted between the 
sections of the poem, were first given in the 
edition of 1850. 


OBIT MpDCcCCXxxt 


StronG Son of God, immortal Love, 
Whom we, that have not seen thy face, 
By faith, and faith alone, embrace, 

Believing where we cannot prove ; 


Thine are these orbs of light and shade ; 
Thou madest Life in man and brute; 
Thou madest Death ; and lo, thy foot 

Ts on the skull which thou hast made. 


Thou wilt not leave us in the dust: 
Thou madest man, he knows not why, 
He thinks he was not made to die; 

And thou hast made him: thou art just. 


Thou seemest human and divine, 
The highest, holiest manhood, thou. 
Our wills are ours, we know not how ; 
Our wills are ours, to make them thine. 


Our little systems have their day ; 
They have their day and cease to be ; 
They are but broken lights of thee. 

And thou, O Lord, art more than they. 


We have but faith: we cannot know, 
For knowledge is of things we see ; 
And yet we trust it comes from thee, 

A beam in darkness: let it grow. 


Let knowledge grow from more to more, 
But more of reverence in us dwell ; 
That mind and soul, according well, 

May make one music as before, 


But vaster. Weare fools and slight ; 
We mock thee when we do not fear: 
But help thy foolish ones to bear ; 

Help thy vain worlds to bear thy light. 


Forgive what seem’d my sin in me, 
What seem’d my worth since I began ; 
For merit lives from man to man, 

And not from man, O Lord, to thee. 


1 Arthur Henry Hallam, Tennyson’s closest 
friend, and betrothed to Tennyson’s sister Emily, 
died at Vienna, September 15, 1833. See the Life 
of Tennyson, I., 49-55, 75-83, 104-108; and 295-327. 


500 
Se ea a SR ee 


Forgive my grief for one removed, 
Thy creature, whom I found so fair. 
I trust he lives in thee, and there 

I find him worthier to be loved. 


Forgive these wild and wandering cries, 
Confusions of a wasted youth ; 
Forgive them where they fail in truth, 
And in thy wisdom make me wise. 
1849.1 
Ill 


O Sorrow, cruel fellowship, 
O Priestess in the vaults of Death, 
O sweet and bitter in a breath, 
What whispers from thy lying lip? 


‘¢ The stars,” she whispers, ‘‘ blindly run ; 
A web is woven across the sky ; 
From out waste places comes a cry, 
And murmurs from the dying sun ; 


‘* And all the phantom, Nature, stands— 
With all the music in her tone, 
A hollow echo of my own,— 

A hollow form with empty hands.” 


And shall I take a thing so blind, 
Embrace her as my natural good ; 
Or crush her, like a vice of blood, 

Upon the threshold of the mind? 


V 


I sometimes hold it half a sin 
To put in words the grief I feel ; 
For words, like Nature, half reveal 
And half conceal the Soul within. 


But, for the unquiet heart and brain, 
A use in measured language lies ; 
The sad mechanic exercise, 

Like dull narcotics, numbing pain. 


In words, like weeds, I 11 wrap me o’er 
Like coarsest clothes against the cold ; 
But that large grief which these en- 

fold 

Is given in outline and no more. 


1It must be particularly noticed that this in- 
troductory poem was among the last written of 
those which make up In Memoriam. The early 
parts begin with No. II. or No. III. 

On the development of thought and feeling in 
the poem as a whole, which is fully shown in the 
parts here given, see Thomas Davidson’s Prole- 
gomena to In Memoriam, Alfred Gatty’s Key to 
In Memoriam, and J.G Genung’sIn Memoriam : 
Its Purpose and its Structure. 


BRITISH POETS 





VI 


One writes, that ‘‘ other friends remain,” 
That ‘‘ loss is common to the race ”— 
And common is the commonplace, 

And vacant chaff well meant for grain. 


That loss is common would not make 
My own less bitter, rather more. 
Too common! Never morning wore 
To evening, but some heart did break. 


O father, wheresoe’er thou be, 

Who pledgest now thy gallant son, 

A shot, ere half thy draught be done, 
Hath still’d the life that beat from thee. 


O mother, praying God will save 
Thy sailor,—while thy head is bow’d, 
His heavy-shotted hammock-shroud 
Drops in his vast and wandering grave. 


Ye know no more than I who wrought 
At that last hour to please him well ; 
Who mused on all I had to tell, 

And something written, something 

thought ; 


Expecting still his advent home ; 

And ever met him on his way 

With wishes, thinking, ‘“‘ here to-day,” 
Or ‘‘ here to-morrow will he come.” 


O, somewhere, meek, unconscious dove, 
That sittest ranging golden hair ; 
And glad to find thyself so fair, 

Poor child, that waitest for thy love! 


For now her father’s chimney glows 
In expectation of a guest ; 
And thinking ‘this will please him 
best,” 
She takes a riband or a rose; 


For he will see them on to-night ; 
And with the thought her color burns 3 
And, having left the glass, she turns 
Once more to set a ringlet right ; 


And, even when she turn’d, the curse 
Had fallen, and her future lord 
Was drown’d in passing thro’ the ford, 
Or kill’d in falling from his horse. 


O, what to her shall be the end ? 
And what to me remains of good ? 
To her perpetual maidenhood, 

And unto me no second friend, 


TENNYSON 


Vil 


Dark house, by which once more I stand 
Here in the long unlovely street, 
Doors, where my heart was used to 

beat 

So quickly, waiting for a hand, 


A hand that can be clasp’d no more— 
Behold me, for I cannot sleep, 
And like a guilty thing I creep 

At earliest morning to the door. 


He is not here; but far away 

The noise of life begins again, 

And ghastly thro’ the drizzling rain 
On the bald street breaks the blank day. 


Ix 


Fair ship, that from the Italian shore 
Sailest the placid ocean-plains 
With my lost Arthur’s loved remains, 
Spread thy full wings, and waft him o’er. 


So draw him home to those that mourn 
In vain ; a favorable speed 
Ruffle thy mirror’d mast, and lead 
Thro’ prosperous floods his holy urn. 


All night no ruder air perplex 
Thy sliding keel, till Phosphor, bright 
As our pure love, thro’ early light 
Shall glimmer on the dewy decks. 


Sphere all your lights around, above ; 
Sleep, gentle heavens, before the 
prow ; 
Sleep, gentle winds, as he sleeps now, 
My friend, the brother of my love ; 


My Arthur, whom I shall not see 
Till all my widow’d race be run ; 
Dear as the mother to the son, 

More than my brothers are to me. 


x 


I hear the noise about thy keel; 
I hear the bell struck in the night ; 
I see the cabin-window bright ; 

I see the sailor at the wheel. 


Thou bring’st the sailor to his wife, 
And travell’d men from foreign lands ; 
And letters unto trembling hands ; 

And thy dark freight, a vanish’d life. 


So bring him ; we have idle dreams ; 
This look of quiet flatters thus | 
Our home-bred fancies. O, to us, 

The fools of habit, sweeter seems 


5or 





To rest beneath the clover sod, 
That takes the sunshine and the rains, 
Or where the kneeling hamlet drains 
The chalice of the grapes of God ; 


Than if with thee the roaring wells 
Should gulf him fathom-deep in brine, 
And hands so often clasp’d in mine, 

Should toss with tangle and with shells. 


XI 


Calm is the morn without a sound, 
Calm as to suit a calmer grief. 
And only thro’ the faded leaf 

The chestnut pattering to the ground; 


Calm and deep peace on this high wold, 
And on these dews that drench the 
furze, 
And all the silvery gossamers 
That twinkle into green and gold ; 


Calm and still light on yon great plain 
That sweeps with all its autumn 
bowers, 
And crowded farms and _ lessening 
towers, 
To mingle with the bounding main ; 


Calm and deep peace in this wide air, 
These leaves that redden to the fall, 
And in my heart, if calm at all, 

If any calm, acalm despair ; 


Calm on the seas, and silver sleep, 
And waves that sway themselves in 
rest, 
And dead calm in that noble breast 
Which heaves but with the heaving 
deep. 
XIII 


Tears of the widower, when he sees 
A late-lost form that sleep reveals, 
And moves his doubtful arms, and 
feels 
Her place is empty, fall like these ; 


Which weep a loss for ever new, 
A void where heart on heart reposed : 
And, where warm hands have _ prest 
and closed, 
Silence, till I be silent too ; 


Which weep the comrade of my choice, 
An awful thought, a life removed, 
The human-hearted man I loved, 

A Spirit, not a breathing voice. 


502 


BRITISH POETS 





Come, Time, and teach me, many years, 
T do not suffer in a dream ; 
For now so strange do these things 
seem, 
Mine eyes have leisure for their tears, 


My fancies time to rise on wing, 
And glance about the approaching 
sails, 
As tho’ they brought but merchants’ 
bales, 
And not the burthen that they bring. 


XIV 


If one should bring me this report, 
That thou hadst touch’d the land to- 
day, 
And I went down unto the quay, 
And found thee lying in the port ; 


And standing, muffled round with woe, 
Should see thy passengers in rank 
Come stepping lightly down the 

plank, 

And beckoning unto those they know ; 


And if along with these should come 
The man I held as half-divine, 
Should strike a sudden hand in mine, 

And ask a thousand things of home ; 


And I should tell him all my pain, 
And how my life had droop’d of late, 
And he should sorrow o’er my state 

And marvel what possess’d my brain ; 


And I perceived no touch of change, 
No hint of death in all his frame, 
But found him all in all the same, 

I should not feel it to be strange. 


XVIII 


'T is well; *t is something; we 
stand 
Where he in English earth is laid, 
And from his ashes may be made 
The violet of his native land. 


may 


°T is little ; but it looks in truth 
As if the quiet bones were blest 
Among familiar names to rest 

And in the places of his youth. 


Come then, pure hands, and bear the 
head 
That sleeps or wears the mask of sleep, 
And come, whatever loves to weep, 
And hear the ritual of the dead. 


Ah yet, even yet, if this might be, 
I, falling on his faithful heart, 
Would breathing thro’ his lips impart 
The life that almost dies in me; 


That dies not, but endures with pain, 
And slowly forms the firmer mind, 
Treasuring the look it cannot find, 

The words that are not heard again. 


XIX 


The Danube to the Severn gave 
The darken’d heart that beat no more ; 
They laid him by the pleasant shore, 
And in the hearing of the wave. 


There twice a day the Severn fills ; 
The salt sea-water passes by, 
And hushes half the babbling Wye, 
And makes a silence in the hills. 


The Wye is hush’d nor moved along, 
And hush’d my deepest grief of all, 
When fill’d with tears that cannot 

fall, 

I brim with sorrow drowning song. 


The tide flows down, the wave again 
Is vocal in its wooded walls ; 
My deeper anguish also falls, 

And Ican speak a little then. 


XXI 


I sing to him that rests below, 
And, since the grasses round me wave, 
I take the grasses of the grave, 

And make them pipes whereon to blow. 


The traveller hears me now and then, 
And sometimes harshly will he speak : 
“This fellow would make weakness 

weak, 

And melt the waxen hearts of men.” 


Another answers: ‘‘ Let him be, 
He loves to make parade of pain, 
That with his piping he may gain 
The praise that comes to constancy.” 


A third is wroth: ‘‘Is this an hour 
For private sorrow’s barren song, 
When more and more the people throng 
The chairs and thrones of civil power ? 


‘* A time to sicken and to swoon, 
When Science reaches forth her arms 
To feel from world to world, and 
charms 
Her secret from the latest moon ? ” 


TENNYSON 


Behold, ye speak an idle thing ; 
Ye never knew the sacred dust. 
I do but sing because I must, 

And pipe but as the linnets sing ; 


And one is glad; her note is gay, 

For now her little ones have ranged ; 
_.And one is sad ; her note is changed, 
Because her brood is stolen away. 


XXIII 


Now, sometimes in my sorrow shut, 
Or breaking into song by fits, 
Alone, alone, to where he sits, 

The Shadow cloak’d from head to foot, 


Who keeps the keys of all the creeds, 
I wander, often falling lame, 
And looking back to whence I came, 
Or on to where the pathway leads ; 


And crying, How changed from where 
it ran 
Thro’ lands where not a leaf was 
dumb, 
But all the lavish hills would hum 
The murmur of a happy Pan; 


When each by turns was guide to each, 
And Fancy light from Fancy caught, 
And Thought leaped out to wed with 

Thought 
Ere Thought could wed 
Speech ; 


itself with 


And all we met was fair and good, 
And all was good that Time could 
bring. 
And all the secret of the Spring 
Moved in the chambers of the blood ; 


And many an old philosophy 
On Argive heights divinely sang, 
And round us all the thicket rang 
To many a flute of Arcady. 


XX VII 


IT envy not in any moods 

The captive void of noble rage, 

The linnet born within the cage, 
That never knew the summer woods ; 


I envy not the beast that takes 
His license in the field of time, 
Unfetter’d by the sense of crime, 
To whom a conscience never wakes ; 


Nor, what may count itself as blest, 
The heart that never plighted troth 


35 


But stagnates in the weeds of sloth ; 
Nor any want-begotten rest. 


I hold it true, whate’er befall ; 

I feel it, when I sorrow most ; 

°T is better to have loved and lost 
Than never to have loved at all. 


XXVIII 


The time draws near the birth of Christ. 
The moon is hid, the night is still ; 
The Christmas bells from hill to hill 

Answer each other in the mist. 


Four voices of four hamlets round, 
From far and near, on mead and moor, 
Swell out and fail, as if a door 

Were shut between me and the sound; 


Each voice four changes on the wind, 
That now dilate, and now decrease, 
Peace and goodwill, goodwill and 

peace, 

Peace and goodwill, to all mankind. 


This year I slept, and woke with pain, 
I almost wish'd no more to wake, 
And that my hold on life would break 
Before I heard those bells again ; 


But they my troubled spirit rule, 
For they controll’d me when a boy ; 
They bring me sorrow touch’d with 


oy, 
The merry, merry bells of Yule. 
XXX 
With trembling fingers did we weave 
The holly round the Christmas hearth; 


A rainy cloud possess’d the earth, 
And sadly fell our Christmas-eve. 


At our old pastimes in the hall 
We gamboll’d, making vain pretence 
Of gladness, with an awful sense 

Of one mute Shadow watching all. 


We paused: the winds were in the 
beech ; 
We heard them sweep the winter 
land ; 
And in a circle hand-in-hand 
Sat silent, looking each at each. 


Then echo-like our voices rang ; 
We sung, tho’ every eye was dim, 
A merry song we sang with him 

Last year ; impetuously we sang. 


504 


We ceased ; a gentler feeling crept 
Upon us: surely rest is meet. 
‘‘They rest,” we said, ‘‘ their sleep is 
sweet,” 
And silence follow’d, and we wept. 


Our voices took a higher range ; 
Once more we sang: ‘‘ They do not die 
Nor lose their mortal sympathy, 

Nor change to us, although they change ; 


‘‘Rapt from the fickle and the frail 
With gather’d power, yet the same, 
Pierces the keen seraphic flame 

From orb to orb, from veil to veil.” 


Rise, happy morn, rise, holy morn, 
Draw forth the cheerful day from 
night : 
O Father, touch the east, and light 
The light that shone when Hope was 
born. 
XX XI 


When Lazarus left his charnel-cave, 
And home to Mary’s house return’d, 
Was this demanded—if he yearn’d 

To hear her weeping by his grave? 


‘* Where wert thou, brother, those four 
days?” 
There lives no record of reply, 
Which telling what it is to die 
Had surely added praise to praise. 


From every house the neighbors met, 
The streets were fill’d with joyful 
sound, 
A solemn gladness even crown’d 
The purple brows of Olivet. 


Behold a man raised up by Christ ! 
The rest remaineth unreveal’d ; 
He told it not, or something seal’d 

The lips of that Evangelist. 


XXXII 


Her eyes are homes of silent prayer, 
Nor other thought her mind admits 
But, he was dead, and there he sits, 

And he that brought him back is there. 


Then one deep love doth supersede 
All other, when her ardent gaze 
Roves from the living brother’s face, 
And rests upon the Life indeed. 


All subtle thought, all curious fears, 
Borne down by gladness so complete, 
She bows, she bathes the Saviour’s feet 

With costly spikenard and with tears. 


BRITISH POETS 


Thrice blest whose lives are faithful 
prayers, 
Whose loves in higher love endure ; 
What souls possess themselves so pure, 
Or is there blessedness like theirs ? 


XXXII 


O thou that after toil and storm 
Mayst seem to have reach’d a purer 


air, 
Whose faith has centre everywhere, 
Nor cares to fix itself to form, 


Leave thou thy sister, when she prays, 
Her early heaven, her happy views ; 
Nor thou with shadow’d hint confuse 

A life that leads melodious days. 


Her faith thro’ form is pure as thine, 
Her hands are quicker unto good. 
O, sacred be the flesh and blood 

To which shé links a truth divine! 


See thou, that countest reason ripe 
In holding by the law within, 
Thou fail not in a world of sin, 

And even for want of such a type. 


XL 


Could we forget the widow’d hour 
And look on Spirits breathed away, 
As on a maiden in the day 

When first she wears her orange-flower ! 


When crown’d with blessing she doth 
rise 
To take her latest leave of home, 
And hopes and light regrets that come 
Make April of her tender eyes ; 


And doubtful joys the father move, 
And tears are on the mother’s face, 
As parting with a long embrace 

She enters other realms of love: 


Her office there to rear, to teach, 
Becoming as is meet and fit 
A link among the days, to knit 
The generations each with each ; 


And, doubtless, unto thee is given 
A life that bears immortal fruit 
In those great offices that suit 

The full-grown energies of heaven. 


Ay me, the difference I discern ! 

How often shall her old fireside 

Be cheer’d with tidings of the bride, 
How often she herself return, 


TENNYSON 


And tell them all they would have told, 
And bring her babe, and make her 
boast, 
Till even those that miss’d her most 
Shall count new things as dear as old ; 


But thou and I have shaken hands, 
Till growing winters lay me low ; 
My paths are in the fields I know, 

And thine in undiscover’d lands. 


XLVIII 


If these brief lays, of Sorrow born, 
Were taken to be such as closed 
Grave doubts and answers here pro- 

posed, 

Then these were such as men might 

scorn. 


Her care is not to part and prove ; 
She takes, when harsher moods re- 
mit, 
What slender shade of doubt may flit, 
And makes it vassal unto love; 


And hence, indeed, she sports with words, 
But better serves a wholesome law, 
And holds it sin and shame to draw 

The deepest measure from the chords ; 


Nor dare she trust a larger lay, 

But rather loosens from the lip 

Short swallow-flights of song, that dip 
Their wings in tears, and skim away. 


LIV 


O, yet we trust that somehow good 
Will be the final goal of ill, 
To pangs of nature, sins of will, 
Defects of doubt, and taints of blood ; 


That nothing walks with aimless feet ; 
That not one life shall be destroy’d, 
Or cast as rubbish to the void, 

When God hath made the pile complete ; 


That not a worm is cloven in vain; 
That not a moth with vain desire 
Is shrivell’d in a fruitless fire, 

Or but subserves another’s gain. 


Behold, we know not anything ; 
I can but trust that good shall fall 
At last—far off—at last, to all, 
And every winter change to spring. 


So runs my dream; but what-am I? 
An infant crying in the night ; 
An infant crying for the light, 

And with no language but a cry. 


5°5 





LV 


The wish, that of the living whole 
No life may fail beyond the grave, 
Derives it not from what we have 

The likest God within the soul ? 


Are God and Nature then at strife, 
That Nature lends such evil dreams? 
So careful of the type she seems, 

So careless of the single life, 


That I, considering every where 
Her secret meaning in her deeds, 
And finding that of fifty seeds 

She often brings but one to bear, 


I falter where I firmly trod, 
And falling with my weight of cares 
Upon the great world’s altar-stairs 
That slope thro’ darkness up to God, 


I stretch lame hands of faith, and grope, 
And gather dust and chaff, and call 
To what I feel is Lord of all, 

And faintly trust the larger hope. 


LVI 


‘So careful of the type?” but no. 
From scarped cliff and quarried stone 
She cries, *‘ A thousand types are gone ; 

I care for nothing, all shall go. 


“Thou makest thine appeal to me : 

I bring to life, I bring to death ; 

The spirit does but mean the breath : 
I know no more.” And he, shall he, 


Man, her last work, who seem’d so fair, 
Such splendid purpose in his eyes, 
Who roll’d the psalm to wintry skies, 

Who built him fanes of fruitless prayer, 


Who trusted God was love indeed 

And love Creation’s final law— 
Tho’ Nature, red in tooth and claw 
With ravine, shriek’d against his creed— 


Who loved, who suffer’d countless ills, 
Who battled for the True, the Just, 
Be blown about the desert dust, 

Or seal’d within the iron hills ? 


No more? A monster then, a dream, 
A discord. Dragons of the prime, 
That tear each other in their slime, 

Were mellow music match’d with him. 


O life as futile, then, as frail ! 
O for thy voice to soothe and bless ! 
What hope of answer, or re‘lress ? 
Behind the veil, behind the veil. 


506 


BRITISH POETS 





LVII 


Peace ; come away : the song of woe 

Is after all an earthly song. 

Peace ; come away : we do him wrong 
To sing so wildly : let us go. 


Come; let us go: your cheeks are pale ; 
But half my life I leave behind. 
Methinks my friend is richly shrined ; 

But { shall pass, my work will fail. 


Yet in these ears, till hearing dies, 
One set slow bell will seem to toll 
The passing of the sweetest soul 

That ever look’d with human eyes. 


I hear it now, and o’er and o’er, 
Eternal greetings to the dead ; 
And ‘‘ Ave, Ave, Ave,” said, 

‘* Adieu, adieu,” for evermore. 


LVIII 


In those sad words I took farewell. 
Like echoes in sepulchral halls, 
As drop by drop the water falls 

In vaults and catacombs, they fell; 


And, falling, idly broke the peace 
Of hearts that beat from day to day, 
Half-conscious of their dying clay, 
And those cold crypts where they shall 
cease. 


The high Muse answer’d: ‘‘ Wherefore 
grieve 

Thy brethren with a fruitless tear ? 

Abide a little longer here, 


And thou shalt take a nobler leave.” 


LXIV 


Dost thou look back on what hath been, 
As some divinely gifted man, 
Whose life in low estate began 

And on a simple village green ; 


Who breaks his birth’s invidious bar, 
And grasps the skirts of happy chance 
And breasts the blows of cir cumstance, 

And grapples with his evil star ; 


Who makes by force his merit known 
And lives to clutch the golden keys, 
To mould a mighty state’s decrees, 

And shape the whisper of the throne ; 


And moving up from high to higher, 
Becomes on Fortune’s crowning slope 
The pillar of a people’s hope, 

The center of a world’s desire ; 


Yet feels, as ina pensive dream, 
When all his active powers are still, 
A distant dearness in the hill, 

A secret sweetness in the stream, 


The limit of his narrower fate, 
While yet beside its vocal springs 
He play’d at counsellors and kings 

With one that was his earliest mate ; 


Who ploughs with pain his native lea 
And reaps the labor of his hands, 
Or in the furrow musing stands: 

** Does my old friend remember me?” 


LXVII 


When on my bed the moonlight falls, 
I know that in thy place of rest 
By that broad water of the west 
There comes a glory on the walls: 


Thy marble bright in dark appears, 
As slowly steals a silver flame 
Along the letters of thy name, 

And o’er the number of thy years. 


The mystic glory swims away, 
From off my bed the moonlight dies ; 
And closing eaves of wearied eyes 

I sleep till dusk is dipt in gray ; 


And then I know the mist is drawn 
A lucid veil from coast to coast, 
And in the dark church like a ghost 
Thy tablet glimmers in the dawn. 


LXXIV 


As sometimes in a dead man’s face, 
To those that watch it more and more, 
A likeness, hardly seen before, 
Comes out—to some one of his race ; 


So, dearest, now thy brows are cold, 
IT see thee what thou art, and know 
Thy likeness to the wise below, 

Thy kindred with the great of old. 


But there is more than I can see, 

And what I see I leave unsaid, 

Nor speak it, knowing Death has made 
His darkness beautiful with thee. 


LXXVIII 


Again at Christmas did we weave 
The holly round the Christmas hearth; 
The silent snow possess’d the earth, 
And calmly fell our Christmas-eve. 


TENNYSON 


The yule-clog sparkled keen with frost, 
No wing of wind the region swept, 
But over all things brooding slept 

The quiet sense of something lost. 


As in the winters left behind, 
Again our ancient games had place, 
The mimic picture’s breathing grace, 
And dance and song and hoodman-blind. 


Who show’d a token of distress ? 
No single tear, no mark of pain— 
O sorrow, then can sorrow wane? 
O grief, can grief be changed to less? 


O last regret, regret can die! 
No—mixed with all this mystic frame, 
Her deep relations are the same, 

But with long use her tears are dry. 


LXX XIII 


Dip down upon the northern shore, 
O sweet new-year delaying long ; 
Thou doest expectant Nature wrong ; 
Delaying long, delay no more. 


What stays thee from the clouded noons, 
Thy sweetness from its proper place ; 
Can trouble live with April days, 

Or sadness in the summer moons ? 


Bring orchis, bring the foxglove spire, 
The little speedwell’s darling blue, 
Deep tulips dash’d with fiery dew, 

Laburnums, dropping-wells of fire. 


O thou, new-year, delaying long, 
Delayest the sorrow in my blood, 
That longs to burst a frozen bud 

And flood a fresher throat with song. 


LXXXV 


This truth came borne with bier and pall, 
I felt it, when I sorrow’d most, 
’T is better to have loved and lost, 
Than never to have loved at all— 


O true in word, and tried in deed, 
Demanding, so to bring relief 
To this which is our common grief, 
What kind of life is that I lead ; 


And whether trust in things above 
Be dimm/’d of sorrow, or sustain’d ; 
And whether love for him have drain’d 
My capabilities of love ; 


Your words have virtue such as draws 
A faithful answer from the breast, 


597 





Thro’ light reproaches, half expressed, 
And loyal unto kindly laws. 


My blood an even tenor kept, 
Till on mine ear this message falls, 
That in Vienna’s fatal walls 

God’s finger touch’d him, and he slept. 


The great Intelligences fair 

That range above our mortal state, 

In circle round the blessed gate, 
Received and gave him welcome there ; 


And led him thro’ the blissful climes, 
And show’d him in the fountain fresh 
All knowledge that the sons of flesh 

Shall gather in the cycled times. 


But I remain’d, whose hopes were dim, 
Whose life, whose thoughts were little 
worth, 
To wander on a darken’d earth. 
Where all things round me breathed of 
him. 


O friendship, equal-poised control, 
O heart, with kindlest motion warm, 
O sacred essence, other form, 

O solemn ghost, O crowned soul! 


Yet none could better know than I, 
How much of act at human hands 
The sense of human will demands 

By which we dare to live or die. 


Whatever way my days decline, 
I felt and feel, tho’ left alone, 
His being working in mine own, 
The footsteps of his life in mine ; 


A life that all the Muses deck’d 
With gifts of grace, that might express 
All-comprehensive tenderness, 
All-subtilizing intellect : 


And so my passion hath not swerved 
To works of weakness, but I find 
An image comforting the mind, 

And in my grief a strength reserved. 


Likewise the imaginative woe, 
That loved to handle spiritual strife, 
Diffused the shock thro’ all my life, 
But in the present broke the blow. 


My pulses therefore beat again 
For other friends that once I met; 
Nor can it suit me to forget 

The mighty hopes that make us men. 


508 


I woo your love: I count it crime 
To mourn for any overmuch ; 
I, the divided half of such 

A friendship as had master’d Time ; 


Which masters Time indeed, and is 
Eternal, separate from fears. 
The all-assuming months and years 
Can take no part away from this ; 


But Summer on the steaming floods, 
And Spring that swells the narrow 
brooks, 
And Autumn, with a noise of rooks, 
That gather in the waning woods, 


And every pulse of wind and wave 
Recalls, in change of light or gloom, 
My old affection of the tomb, 

And my prime passion in the grave. 


My old affection of the tomb, 
A part of stillness, yearns to speak : 
‘* Arise, and get thee forth and seek 
A friendship for the years to come. 


‘*T watch thee from the quiet shore ; 
Thy spirit up to mine can reach ; 
But in dear words of human speech 

We two communicate no more.” 


And I, ‘‘ Can clouds of nature stain 
The starry clearness of the free ? 
How is it? Canst thou feel for me 

Some painless sympathy with pain?” 


And lightly does the whisper fall: 
‘°T is hard for thee to fathom this ; 
I triumph in conclusive bliss, 

And that serene result of all.” 


So hold I commerce with the dead ; 
Or so methinks the dead would say ; 
Or so shall grief with symbols play 

And pining life be fancy-fed. 


Now looking to some settled end, 
That those things pass, andI shall prove 
A meeting somewhere, love with love, 
I crave your pardon, O my friend; 


If not so fresh, with love as true, 
I, clasping brother-hands, aver 
I could not, if I would, transfer 

The whole I felt for him to you. 


For which be they that hold apart 
The promise of the golden hours ? 
First love, first friendship, | equal 
powers, 
That marry with the virgin heart. 


BRITISH’ POETS 


Still mine, that cannot but deplore, 
That beats within a lonely place, 
That yet remembers his embrace, 

But at his footstep leaps no more. 


My heart, tho’ widow’d, may not rest 
Quiet in the love of what is gone, 
But seeks to beat in time with one 

That warms another living breast. 


Ah, take the imperfect gift I bring, 
Knowing the primrose yet is dear, 
The primrose of the later year, 

As not unlike to that of Spring. 


LXXXVI 


Sweet after showers, ambrosial air, 
That rollest from the gorgeous gloom 
Of evening over brake and bloom 


And meadow, slowly breathing bare 


The round of space, and rapt below 
Thro’ all the dewy tassell’d wood, 
And shadowing down the horned flood 

In ripples, fan my brows and blow 


The fever from my cheek, and sigh 
The full new life that feeds thy breath 
Throughout my frame, till Doubt and 
Death. 
Ill brethren, let the fancy fly. 


From belt to belt of crimson seas 
On leagues of odor streaming far, 
To where in yonder orient star 

A hundred spirits whisper ‘‘ Peace.” 


LXXXVII 


I past beside the reverend walls 
In which of old I wore the gown; 
I roved at random thro’ the town, 
And saw the tumult of the halls ; 


And heard once more in college fanes 
The storm their high-built organs 
make, 
And thunder-music, rolling, shake 
The prophet blazon’d on the panes ; 


And caught once more the distant shout, 
The measured pulse of racing oars 
Among the willows ; paced the shores 

And many a bridge, and all about. 


The same gray flats again, and felt 
The same, but not the same; and last 
Up that long walk of limes I past 

To see the rooms in which he dwelt. 


TENNYSON 


Another name was on the door. 
I linger’d ; all within was noise 
Of songs, and clapping hands, and 


boys 
That crash’d the glass and beat the floor ; 


Where once we held debate, a band 
Of youthful friends, on mind and art, 
And labor, and the changing mart, 
And all the framework of the land ; 


When one would aim an arrow fair, 
But send it slackly from the string ; 
And one would pierce an outer ring, 

And one an inner, here and there ; 


And last the master-bowman, he, 
Would cleave the mark. A_ willing 
ear 
We lent him. Who but hung to hear 
The rapt oration flowing free 


From point to point, with power and 
grace 
And music in the bounds of law, 
To those conclusions when we saw 
The God within him light his face, 


And seem to lift the form, and glow 
In azure orbits heavenly-wise ; 
And over those ethereal eyes 

The bar of Michael Angelo? 


LXXXVIIlI 


Wild bird, whose warble, liquid sweet, 
Rings Eden thro’ the budded quicks, 
O, tell me where the senses mix, 

O, tell me where the passions meet, 

Whence radiate: fierce extremes em- 

ploy 
Thy spirits in the darkening leaf, 
And in the midmost heart of grief 
Thy passion clasps a secret joy ; 


And I—my harp would prelude woe— 
[ cannot all command the strings ; 
The glory of the sum of things 

Will flash along the chords and go. 


XCVI 


You say, but with no touch of scorn, 
Sweet-hearted, you, whose light-blue 
eyes 
Are tender over drowning flies, 
You tell me, doubt is Devil-born, 


I know not: one indeed I knew 
In many a subtle question versed, 


509 
Who touch’d a jarring lyre at first, 
But ever strove to make it true; 


Perplexed in faith, but pure in deeds, 
At last he beat his music out. 
There lives more faith in honest doubt, 
Believe me, than in half the creeds. 


He fought his doubts and gather’d 
strength, 
He would not make his judgment 
blind, 
He faced the spectres of the mind 
And laid them; thus he came at length 


To find a stronger faith his own, 
And Power was with him in the night, 
Which makes the darkness and the 
light, 
And dwells not in the light alone, 


But in the darkness and the cloud, 

As over Sinai’s peaks of old, 

While Israel made their gods of gold, 
Altho’ the trumpet blew so loud. 


XCVII 
My love has talk’d with rocks and trees ; 
He finds on misty mountain-ground 
His own vast shadow glory-crown’d ; 
He sees himself in all he sees. 


Two partners of a married life— 
I look’d on these and thought of thee 
In vastness and in mystery, 

And of my spirit as of a wife. 


These two—they dwelt with eye on eye, 
Their hearts of old have beat in tune, 
. Their meetings made December June, 
Their every parting was to die. 


Their love has never past away ; 
The days she never can forget 
Are earnest that he loves her yet, 

Whate’er the faithless people say. 


Her life is lone, he sits apart ; 
He loves her yet, she will not weep, 
Tho’ rapt in matters dark and deep 
He seems to slight her simple heart. 


He thrids the labyrinth of the mind, 
He reads the secret of the star, 
He seems so near and yet so far, 

He looks so cold: she thinks him kind, 


She keeps the gift of years before, 

A wither’d violet is her bliss ; 

She knows not what his greatness is, 
For that, for all, she loves him more, 


510 


BRITISH POETS 





For him she plays, to him she sings 
Of early faith and plighted vows ; 
She knows but matters of the house, 
And he, he knows a thousand things, 


Her faith is fixed and cannot move, 
She darkly feels him great and wise. 
She dwells on him with faithful eyes, 

‘“*T cannot understand ; I love.” 


CII 


We leave the well-beloved place 
Where first we gazed upon the sky ; 
The roofs that heard our earliest cry 

Will shelter one of stranger race. 


We go, but ere we go from home, 
As down the garden-walks I move, 
Two spirits of a diverse love 

Contend for loving masterdom. 


One whispers, ‘‘ Here thy boyhood sung 
Long since its matin song, and heard 
The low love-language of the bird 

In native hazels tassel-hung.” 


The other answers, ‘‘ Yea, but here 
Thy feet have stray’d in after hours 
With thy lost friend among _ the 

bowers, 

And this hath made them trebly dear.” 


These two have striven half the day, 
And each prefers his separate claim, 
Poor rivals in a losing game, 

That will not yield each other way. 


I turn to go; my feet are set ; 
To leave the pleasant fields and 
farms ; 
They mix in one another’s arms 
To one pure image of regret. 


CIV 


The time draws near the birth of Christ ; 
The moon is hid, the night is still ; 
A single church below the hill 

Is pealing, folded in the mist. 


A single peal of bells below, 
That wakens at this hour of rest 
A single murmur in the breast, 
That these are not the bells I know. 


Like strangers’ voices here they sound, 
In lands where not a memory strays, 
Nor landmark breathes of other days, 

But allis new unhallow’d ground. 


CVI 


Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky, 
The flying cloud, the frosty light : 
The year is dying in the night ; 

Ring out, wild bells, and let him die. 


Ring out the old, ring in the new, 
Ring, happy bells, across the snow: 
The year is going, let him go; 

Ring out the false, ring in the true. 


Ring out the grief that saps the mind, 
For those that here we see no more; 
Ring out the feud of rich and poor ; 

Ring in redress to all mankind. 


Ring out a slowly dying cause, 
And ancient forms of party strife ; 
Ring in the nobler modes of life, 
With sweeter manners, purer laws. 


Ring out the want, the care, the sin, 
The faithless coldness of the times ; 
Ring out, ring out my mournful 

rhymes, 

But ring the fuller minstrel in. 


Ring out false pride in place and blood, 
The civic slander and the spite ; 
Ring in the love of truth and right, 
Ring in the common love of good. 


Ring out old shapes of foul disease ; 
Ring out the narrowing lust of gold; 
Ring out the thousand wars of old, 

Ring in the thousand years of peace. 


Ring in the valiant man and free, 
The larger heart, the kindlier hand; 
Ring out the darkness of the land, 

Ring in the Christ that is to be. 


CVIII 


I will not shut me from my kind, 
And, lest I stiffen into stone, 
I will not eat my heart alone, 
Nor feed with sighs a passing wind: 


What profit lies in barren faith, 
And vacant yearning, tho’ with might 
To scale the heaven’s highest height, 
Or dive below the wells of death ? 


What find I in the highest place, 


But mine own phantom chanting 
hymns? 

And on the depths of death there 
swims 


The reflex of a human face. 


TENNYSON 


Ill rather take what fruit may be 

Of sorrow under human skies: 

‘'T is held that sorrow makes us wise, 
Whatever wisdom sleep with thee. 


CxXI 


The churlin spirit, up or down 
Along the scale of ranks, thro’ all, 
To him who grasps a golden ball, 

By blood a king, at heart a clown,—- 


The churl in spirit, howe’er he veil 
His want in forms for fashion’s sake, 
Will let his coltish nature break 

At seasons thro’ the gilded pale ; 


For who can always act? but he, 
To whom a thousand memories call, 
Not being less but more than all 
The gentleness he seem’d to be, 


Best seem’d the thing he was, and join’d 
Each office of the social hour 
To noble manners, as the flower 

And native growth of noble mind ; 


Nor ever narrowness or spite, 

Or villain fancy fleeting by, 

Drew in the expression of an eye 
Where God and Nature met in light; 


And thus he bore without abuse 
The grand old name of gentleman, 
Defamed by every charlatan, 

And soil’d with all ignoble use. 


CXIII 


’Tis held that sorrow makes us wise ; 
Yet how much wisdom sleeps with 
thee 
Which not alone had guided me, 
But served the seasons that may rise ; 


For can I doubt, who knew thee keen 
In intellect, with force and skill 
To strive, to fashion, to fulfil— 
I doubt not what thou wouldst have 
been : 


A life in civic action warm, 
A soul on highest mission sent, 
A potent voice of Parliament, 
A pillar steadfast in the storm, 


Should licensed boldness gather force, 
Becoming, when the time has birth, 
A lever to uplift the earth 

And roll it in another course, 


511 





With thousand shocks that come and 
go, 
With agonies, with energies, 
With overthrowings, and with cries, 
And undulations to and fro. 
» 
CXIV 
Who loves not Knowledge ? 
rail 
Against her beauty? May she mix 
With men and prosper! Who shall 
fix 
Her pillars ? 


Who shall 


Let her work prevail. 


But on her forehead sits a fire ; 
She sets her forward countenance 
And leaps into the future chance, 
Submitting all things to desire. 


Half-grown as yet, a child, and vain— 
She cannot fight the fear of death. 
What is she, cut from love and faith, 

But some wild Pallas from the brain 


Of demons? fiery-hot to burst 

All barriers in her onward race 

For power. Let her know her place; 
She is the second, not the first. 


A higher hand must make her mild, 

If all be not in vain, and guide 

Her footsteps, moving side by side 
With Wisdom, like the younger child ; 


For she is earthly of the mind, 
But Wisdom heavenly of the soul. 
O friend, who camest to thy goal 
So early, leaving me behind, 


I would the great world grew like thee, 
Who grewest not alone in power 
And knowledge, but by year and hour 
In reverence and in charity. 


CX V 
Now fades the last long streak of snow, 
Now burgeons every maze of quick 
About the flowering squares, and 


thick 
By ashen roots the violets blow. 


Now rings the woodland loud and long, 
The distance takes a lovelier hue, 
And drown’d in yonder living blue | 

The lark becomes a sightless song. 


Now dance the lights on lawn and lea, 
The flocks are whiter down the vale, 
And milkier every milky sail 

On winding stream or distant sea. 


Si 


Where now the seamew pipes, or dives 
In yonder greening gleam, and fly 
The happy birds, that change their 

sky 

To build and brood, that live their lives 


From land to land ; and in my breast 
Spring wakens too, and my regret 
Becomes an April violet, 

And buds and blossoms like the rest. 


CXVIII 


Contemplate all this work of Time, 
The giant laboring in his youth ; 
Nor dream of human love and truth, 

As dying Nature’s earth and lime ; 


But trust that those we call the dead 
Are breathers of an ampler day 
For ever nobler ends. ‘They say, 

The solid earth whereon we tread 


In tracts of fluent heat began, 
And grew to seeming-random forms, 
The seeming prey of cyclic storms, 
Till at the last arose the man ; 


Who throve and branch’d from clime to 
clime, 
The herald of a higher race, 
And of himself in higher place, 
If so he type this work of time 


Within himself, from more to more; 
Or, crown’d with attributes of woe 
Like glories, move his course, and 

show 

That life is not as idle ore, 


But iron dug from central gloom, 
And heated hot with burning fears, 
And dipped in baths of hissing tears, 
And batter’d with the shocks of doom 


To shape and use. Arise and fly 
The reeling Faun, the sensual feast ; 
Move upward, working out the beast, 
And let the ape and tiger die. 


CXXITI 


There rolls the deep where grew the 
tree. 
O earth, what changes hast thou seen ! 
There where the long street roars hath 
been 
The stillness of the central sea. 


The hills are shadows, and they flow 
From form to form, and nothing 
stands ; 


BRITISH POETS 


They melt like mist, the solid lands, 
Like clouds they shape themselves and 


go. 


But in my spirit will I dwell, 
And dream my dream, and hold it true ; 
For tho’ my lips may breathe adieu, 

I cannot think the thing farewell. 


CXXIV 


That which we dare invoke to bless ; 
Our dearest faith; our ghastliest 
doubt ; 
He, They, One, All ; within, without ; 
The Power in darkness whom we guess,— 


I found Him not in world orsun, 

Or eagle’s wing, or insect’s eye, 

Nor thro’ the questions men may try, 
The petty cobwebs we have spun. 


If e’er when faith had fallen asleep, 
I heard a voice, ‘‘ believe no more,” 
And heard an ever-breaking shore 
That tumbled in the Godless deep, 


A warmth within the breast would melt 
The freezing reason’s colder part, 
And like a man in wrath the heart 

Stood up and answer’d, ‘‘I have felt.” 


No, like a child in doubt and fear: 
But that blind clamor made me wise ; 
Then wasI as a child that cries, 

But, crying, knows his father near ; 


And what I am beheld again 
What is, and no man understands ; 
And out of darkness came the hands 
That reach thro’ nature, moulding men, 


CXXV 


What ever I have said or sung, 
Some bitter notes my harp would give, 
Yea, tho’ there often seem’d to live 

A contradiction on the tongue, 


Yet hope had never lost her youth, 
She did but look through dimmer eyes ; 
Or Love but play’d with gracious lies, 
Because he felt so fix’d in truth ; 


And if the song were full of care, 
He breathed the spirit of the song ; 
And if the words were sweet and 
strong 
He set his royal signet there ; 


TENNYSON 


Abiding with me till I sail 
To seek thee on the mystic deeps, 
And this electric force, that keeps 
A thousand pulses dancing, fail. 


CXXVI 


Love is and was my lord and king, 
And in his presence I attend 
To hear the tidings of my friend, 
Which every hour his couriers bring. 


Love is and was my king and lord, 
And will be, tho’ as yet I keep 
Within the court on earth, and sleep 

Encompass’d by his faithful guard, 


And hear at times a sentinel 
Who moves about from place to place, 
And whispers to the worlds of space, 
In the deep night, that all is well. 


CXXVII 


And all is well, tho’ faith and form 
Be sunder’d in the night of fear ; 
Well roars the storm to those that hear 
A deeper voice across the storm, 


Proclaiming social truth shall spread, 
And justice, even tho’ thrice again 
The red fool-fury of the Seine 

Should pile her barricades with dead. 


But ill for him that wears a crown, 
And him, the lazar, in his rags! 
They tremble, the sustaining crags ; 

The spires of ice are toppled down, 


And molten up, and roar in flood ; 
The fortress crashes from on high, 
The brute earth lightens to the sky, 

And the great A®on sinks in blood, 


And compass’d by the fires of hell ; 
While thou, dear spirit, happy star, 
O’erlook’st the tumult from afar, 

And smilest, knowing all is well. 


CX XIX 


Dear friend, far off, my lost desire, 
So far, so near in woe and weal, 
O loved the most, when most I feel 
There is a lower and a higher ; 


Known and unknown, human, divine ; 
Sweet human hand and lips and eye ; 
Dear heavenly friend that canst not 

die, 

Mine, mine, for ever, ever mine ; 


ro 


nas 

Strange friend, past, present, and to be ; 
Loved deeplier, darklier understood ; 
Behold, I dream a dream of good, 

And mingle all the world with thee. 


CXxXxX 


Thy voice is on the rolling air ; 
I hear thee where the waters run ; 
Thou standest in the rising sun, 
And in the setting thou art fair. 


What art thou then? I cannot guess; 
But tho’ I seem in star and flower 
To feel thee some diffusive power, 

I do not therefore love thee less. 


My love involves the love before ; 

My love is vaster passion now ; 

Tho’ mix’d with God and Nature thou, 
I seem to love thee more and more. 


Far off thou art, but ever nigh ; 

I have thee still, and I rejoice ; 

I prosper, circled with thy voice ; 
I shall not lose thee tho’ I die. 


CXXXI 


O living will that shalt endure 
When all that seems shall suffer shock, 
Rise inthe spiritual rock, 
Flow thro’ our deeds and make them 
pure, 


That we may lift from out of dust 

A voice as unto him that hears, 

A cry above the conquer’d years 
To one that with us works, and trust, 


With faith that comes of self-control, 
The truths that never can be proved 
‘Until we close with all we loved, 
And all we flow from, soul in soul, 
1838-49, 1850. 


TO THE QUEEN! 


REVERED, beloved—O you that hold 

A nobler office upon earth 

Than arms, or power of brain, or birth 
Could give the warrior kings of old, 


Victoria,—since your Royal grace 
To one of less desert allows 
This laurel greener from the brows 
Of him that utter’d nothing base ; 


1Prefixed to the first edition of Tennyson’s 
Poems published after he became Poet Laureate. 


BRITISH POETS 





And should your greatness, and the care 
That yokes with empire, yield you time 
To make demand of modern rhyme 

If aught of ancient worth be there ; 


Then—while a sweeter music wakes, 
And thro’ wild March the throstle calls, 
Where all about your palace-walls 

The sun-lit almond-blossom shakes— 


Take, Madam, this poor book of song ; 
For tho’ the faults were thick as dust 
In vacant chambers, I could trust 

Your kindness. May you rule us long, 


And leave us rulers of your blood 
As noble till the latest day ! 
May children of our children say, 


‘¢ She wrought her people lasting good ; 


‘* Her court was pure ; her life serene ; 

- God gave her peace ; her land reposed ; 
A thousand claims to reverence closed 

In her as Mother, Wife, and Queen ; 


** And statesmen at her council met 
Who knew the seasons when to take 
Occasion by the hand, and make 

The bounds of freedom wider yet 


‘‘ By shaping some august decree 
Which kept her throne unshaken still, 
Broad-based upon her people’s will, 

And compass’d by the inviolate sea.” 

1851. 


THE EAGLE 
FRAGMENT 


HE clasps the crag with crooked hands, 
Close to the sun in lonely lands, 
Ring’d with the azure world, he stands. 


The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls : 
He watches from his mountain walls, 
And like a thunderbolt he falls. 

1851. 


COME NOT WHEN I AM DEAD 


CoME not, when I am dead, 
To drop thy foolish tears upon my 
grave, 
To trample round my fallen head, 
And vex the unhappy dust thou 
wouldst not save. 
There let the wind sweep and the plover 
cry; 
But thou, go by. 


Child, if it were thine error or thy crime 
I care no longer, being all unblest : 
Wed whom thou wilt, but I am sick of- 
time, , 
And I desire to rest. 
Pass on, noee heart, and leave me where 
le ; 


Go by, go by. 1851. 


ODE ON THE DEATH OF THE DUKE 
OF WELLINGTON 


I 


Bury the Great Duke 
With an empire’s lamentation ; 
Let us bury the Great Duke 
To the noise of the mourning of a 
mighty nation ; 
Mourning when their leaders fall, 
Warriors carry the warrior’s pall, 
And sorrow darkens hamlet and hall. 


II 


Where shall we lay the man whom we 
deplore ? 

Here, in streaming London’s central 
roar. 

Let the sound of those he wrought for, 

And the feet of those he fought for, 

Kcho round his bones for evermore. 


Ill 


Lead out the pageant : sad and slow, 

As fits an universal woe, 

Let the long, long procession go, 

And let the sorrowing crowd about it 
grow, 

And let the mournful martial music 
blow ; 

The last great Englishman is low. 


IV 


Mourn, for to us he seems the last, 

Remembering all his greatness in the 
past, ° 

No more in soldier fashion will he greet 

With lifted hand the gazer in the street. 

O friends, our chief state-oracleis mute ! 

Mourn for the man of long-enduring 
blood, — 

The statesman-warrior, moderate, reso- 
lute, 

Whole in himself, a common good. 

Mourn for the man of amplest influence, 

Yet clearest of ambitious crime, 

Our greatest yet with least pretence, 

Great in council and great in war, 





TENNYSON 


Foremost captain of his time, 

Rich in saving common-sense, 

And, as the greatest only,are, 

In his simplicity sublime. 

O good gray head which all men knew, 

O voice from which their omens all men 
drew, 

O iron nerve to true occasion true, 

O fallen at length that tower of strength 

Which stood four-square to all the winds 
that blew! 

Such was he whom we deplore. 

The long self-sacrifice of life is o’er. 

The great World-victor’s victor will be 
seen no more. 


v 


Allis over and done, 

Render thanks to the Giver, 

England, for thy son. 

Let the bell be toll’d. 

Render thanks to the Giver, 

And render him to the mould. 

Under the cross of gold 

That shines over city and river, 

There he shall rest for ever 

Among the wise and the bold. 

Let the bell be toll’d, 

And a reverent people behold 

The towering car, the sable steeds. 

Bright let it be with its blazon’d deeds, 

Dark in its funeral fold. 

Let the bell be toll’d, 

And a deeper knell in the heart be 
knoll’d ; 

And the sound of the sorrowing anthem 
roll’d 

Thro’ the dome of the golden cross; 

And the volleying cannon thunder his 
loss ; 

He knew their voices of old, 

For many a time in many a clime 

His captain’s-ear has heard them boom 

Bellowing victory, bellowing doom. 

When he with those deep voices 
wrought, 

Guarding realms and kings from shame, 

With those deep voices our dead cap- 
tain taught 

The tyrant, and asserts his claim 

In that dread sound to the great name 

Which he has worn so pure of blame, 

In praise and in dispraise the same, 

A man of well-attemper’d frame. 

O civic muse, tosuch a name, 

To such a name for ages long, 

To such a name, ; 

Preserve a broad approach of fame, 

And ever-echoing avenues of song! 


J*5 
VI 


‘* Who is he that cometh, like an hon- 
or’d guest, 

With banner and with music, with sol- 
dier and with priest, 

With a nation weeping, and breaking 
on my rest? ”— 

Mighty Seaman, this is he 

Was great by land as thou by sea. 

Thine island loves thee well, 
famous man, 

The greatest sailor since our world be- 


thou 


gan. 

Now, to the roll of muffled drums, 

To thee the greatest soldier comes ; 

For this is he 

Was great by land asthou by sea. 

His foes were thine ; he kept us free; 

O, give him welcome, this is he 

Worthy of our gorgeous rites, 

And worthy to be laid by thee ; 

For this is England’s greatest son, 

He that gain’d a hundred fights, 

Nor ever lost an English gun ; 

This is he that far away 

Against the myriads of Assaye 

Clash’d with his fiery few and won; 

And underneath another sun, 

Warring on a later day, 

Round affrighted Lisbon drew 

The treble works, the vast designs 

Of his labor’d rampart-lines, 

Where he greatly stood at bay, 

Whence he issued forth anew, 

And ever great and greater grew, 

Beating from the wasted vines 

Back to France her banded swarms, 

Back to France with countless blows, 

Till o’er the hills her eagles flew 

Beyond the Pyrenean pines, 

Follow’d up in valley and glen 

With blare of bugle, clamor of men, 

Roll of cannon and clash of arms, 

And England pouring on her foes, 

Such a war had such aclose. 

Again their ravening eagle rose 

In anger, wheel’d on Europe-shadowing 
wings, : 

And barking for the thrones of kings ; 

Till one that sought but Duty’s iron 
crown 

On that loud Sabbath shook the spoiler 
down; 

A day of onsets of despair ! 

Dash’d on every rocky square, 

Their surging charges foam’d them- 
selves away ; 

Last, the Prussian trumpet blew ; 


516 


Thro’ the long-tormented air 

Heaven flash’d a sudden jubilant ray, 

And down we swept and charged and 
overthrew. 

So great a soldier taught us there 

What long-enduring hearts could do 

In that world-earthquake, Waterloo! 

Mighty Seaman, tender and true, 

And pure as he from taint of craven 
guile, 

O saviour of the silver-coasted isle, 

O shaker of the Baltic and the Nile, 

If aught of things that here befall 

Touch a spirit among things divine, 

If love of country move thee there at all. 

Be glad, because his bones are laid by 
thine! 

And thro’ the centuries let a people’s 
voice 

In full acclaim, 

A people’s voice, 

The proof and echo of all human fame, 

A people’s voice, when they rejoice 

At civic revel and pomp and game, 

Attest their great commander’s claim 

With honor, honor, honor, honor to him, 

Kternal honor to his name. 


VII 


A people’s voice! we are a people yet. 

Tho’ all men else their nobler dreams 
forget, 

Confused by brainless mobs and lawless 
Powers, 

Thank Him who isled us here, and 
roughly set 

His Briton in blown seas and storming 


showers, 

We have a voice with which to pay the 
debt 

Of boundless love and reverence and 
regret 


To those great men who fought, and 
kept it ours. 

And keep it ours, O God, from brute 
contro} ! . 

O Statesmen, guard us, guard the eye, 
the soul 

Of Europe, keep our noble England 


whole, 

And save the one true seed of freedom 
sown 

Betwixt a people and their ancient 
throne, 


That sober freedom out of which there 
springs 

Our loyal passion for our temperate 
kings ! [kind 

For, saving that, ye help to save man- 


BRITISH POETS 





Till public wrong be crumbled into dust, 

And drill the raw world for the march 
of mind, 

Till crowds at length be sane and crowns 
be just. 

But wink no more in slothful overtrust. 

Remember him who led your hosts ; 

He bade you guard the sacred coasts. 

Your cannons moulder on the seaward 
wall; 

His voice is silent in your council-hall 

For ever ; and whatever tempests lour 

For ever silent ; even if they broke 

In thunder, silent ; yet remember all 

He spoke among you, and the Man who 
spoke ; 

Who never sold the truth to serve the 
hour, 

Nor palter’d with Eternal God for power; 

Who let the turbid streams of rumor 
flow . 

Thro’ either babbling world of high and 
low ; 

Whose life was work, whose language 
rife 

With rugged maxims hewn from life; 

Who never spoke against a foe ; 

Whose eighty winters freeze with one 
rebuke 

All great self-seekers trampling on the 
right. 

Truth-teller was our England’s Alfred 
named ; 

Truth-lover was our English Duke ! 

Whatever record leap to light 

He never shall be shamed. 


Vill 


Lo! the leader in these glorious wars 

Now to glorious burial slowly borne, 

Follow’d by the brave of other lands, 

He, on whom from both her open hands 

Lavish Honor shower’d all her stars, 

And affluent Fortune emptied all her 
horn. 

Yea, let all good things await 

Him who cares not to be great 

But as he saves or serves the state. 

Not once or twice in our rough island- 
stor 

The path of duty was the way to glory. 

He that walks it, only thirsting 

For the right, and learns to deaden 

Love of self, before his journey closes, 

He shall find the stubborn thistle burst- 
ing 

Into glossy purples, which out-redden 

All voluptuous garden-roses. 

Not once or twice in our fair island-story 


TENNYSON 


The path of duty was the way to glory. 

He, that ever following her commands, 

On with toil of heart and knees and 
hands, 

Thro’ the long gorge to the far light has 
won 

His path upward, and prevail’d, 

Shall find the toppling crags of Duty 
scaled 

Are close upon the shining table-lands 

To which our God Himself is moon and 
sun. 

Such was he: his work is done. 

But while the races of mankind endure 

Let his great example stand 

Colossal, seen of every land, 

And keep the soldier firm, the statesman 
pure ; 

Till in alllands and thro’ all human story 

The path of duty be the way to glory. 

And let the land whose hearths he saved 
from shame 

For many and many an age proclaim 

At civic revel and pomp and game, 

And when the long-illumined cities 
flame, 

Their ever-loyal iron leader’s fame, 

With honor, honor, honor, honor to him, 

Eternal honor to his name. 


IX 


Peace, his triumph will be sung 

By some yet unmoulded tongue 

Far on in summers that we shall not see. 

Peace, it is a day of pain 

For one about whose patriarchal knee 

Late the little children clung. 

O peace, it is a day of pain 

For one upon whose hand and heart and 
brain 

Once the weight and fate of Europe 
hung. 

Ours the pain, be his the gain! 

More than is of man’s degree 

Must be with us, watching here 

At this, our great solemnity. 

Whom we see not we revere ; 

We revere, and we refrain 

From talk of battles loud and vain, 

And brawling memories all too free 

For such a wise humility 

As befits a solemn fane : 

We revere, and while we hear 

The tides of Music’s golden sea 

Setting toward eternity, 

Uplifted high in heart and hope are we, 

Until we doubt not that for one so true 

There must be other nobler work to do 

Than when he fought at Waterloo, 


SL, 


And Victor he must ever be. 

For tho’ the Giant Ages heave the hill 

And break the shore, and evermore 

Make and break, and work their will, 

Tho’ world on world in myriad myriads 
roll 

Round us, each with different powers, 

And other forms of life than ours, 

What know we greater than the soul ? 

On God and Godlike men we build our 
trust. 

Hush, the Dead March wails in the 

people’s ears ; 

The dark crowd moves, and there are 
sobs and tears ; 

The black earth yawns ; 
appears ; 

Ashes to ashes, dust to dust ; 

He is gone who seem’d so great.-— 

Gone, but nothing can bereave him 

Of the force he made his own 

Being here, and we believe him 

Something ‘far advanced in State, 

And that he wears a truer crown 

Than any wreath that man can weave 
him. 

Speak no more of his renown, 

Lay your earthly fancies down, 

And in the vast cathedral leave him, 

God accept him, Christ receive him ! 

1852. 


the mortal dis- 


HANDS ALL ROUND 


First pledge our Queen this solemn 
night, 

Then drink ‘to England, every 
That man’s the best Cosmopolite 
Who loves his native country best. 

May freedom’s oak for ever live 
With stronger life from day to day ; 
That man’s the true Conservative 
Who lops the moulder’d branch away. 
Hands all round ! 
God the traitor’s hope confound ! 
To this great cause of Freedom drink, my 
friends, 
And the great name of England, round 
and round. 


guest ; 


To all the loyal hearts who long 

To keep our English Empire whole! 
To all our noble sons, the strong 

New England of the Southern Pole ! 
To England under Indian skies, 

To those dark millions of her realm ! 
To Canada whom we love and prize, 

Whatever statesman hold the helm. 

Hands all round ! 


518 


God the traitor’s hope confound! 
To this great name of England drink, my 
friends, [round. 
And allher glorious empire, round and 


To all our statesmen so they be 
True leaders of the land’s desire ! 
To both our Houses, may they see 
Beyond the borough and the shire ! 
We sail’d wherever ship could sail, 
We founded many a mighty state ; 
Pray God our greatness may not fail 
Thro’ craven fears of being great ! 
Hands all round! 
God the traitor’s hope confound ! 
To this great cause of Freedom drink, my 
friends, 
And the great name of England, round 
and round. 1852. 


THE. CHARGE, OF THES LIGHT 
BRIGADE! 


HALF a league, half a league, 
Half a league onward, 
All in the valley of Death 
Rode the six hundred. 
‘* Forward the Light Brigade! 
Charge for the guns!” he said. 
Into the valley of Death 
Rode the six hundred. 


“Forward, the Light Brigade!” 
Was there a man dismay’d? 
Not tho’ the soldier knew 

Some one had blunder’d. 
Theirs not to make reply, 
Theirs not to reason why, 
Theirs but to do and die. 
Into the valley of Death 

Rode the six hundred. 


Cannon to right of them, 
Cannon to left of them, 
Cannon in front of them 
Volley’d and thunder‘d ; 
Storm’d at with shot and shell, 
Boldly they rode and well, 
Into the jaws of Death, 
Into the mouth of hell 
Rode the six hundred. 


Flash’d all their sabres bare, 
Flash’d as they turn’d in air 


1“*On Dec. 2d he wrote the Charge of the 
Light Brigade ina few minutes, after reading 
the description in the Times in which occurred 
the phrase ‘Some one had blundered,’ and this 
was the origin of the metre of his poem,” (Life 
T, 381.) J 


BRITISHSROETS 


Sabring the gunners there, 
Charging an army, while 
All the world wonder’d. 
Plunged in the battery-smoke 
Right thro’ the line they broke ; 
Cossack and Russian 
Reel’d from the sabre-stroke 
Shatter’d and sunder’d. 
Then they rode back, but not, 
Not the six hundred. 


Cannon to right of them, 
Cannon to left of them, 
Cannon behind them 
Volley’d and thunder’d ; 
Storm’d at with shot and shell, 
While horse and hero fell, 
They that had fought so well 
Came thro’ the jaws of Death, 
Back from the mouth of hell, 
All that was left of them, 
Left of six hundred. 


When can their glory fade ? 

O the wild charge they made ! 
All the world wonder’d. 

Honor the charge they made! 

Honor the Light Brigade, 
Noble six hundred! 


December 9, 1854. 


THE BROOK 


I coME from haunts of coot and hern, 
I make a sudden sally, 

And sparkle out among the fern, 
To bicker down a valley. 


By thirty hills I hurry down, 
Or slip between the ridges, 
By twenty thorps, a little town, 
And half a hundred bridges. 


Till last by Philip’s farm I flow 
To join the brimming river, 

For men may come and men may go, 
But I go on forever. 


I chatter over stony ways, 

In little sharps and trebles, 
I bubble into eddying bays, 

I babble on the pebbles. 


With many a curve my banks I fret 
By many a field and fallow, 

And many a fairy foreland set 
With willow-weed and mallow, 


TENNYSON 


259 





I chatter, chatter, as I flow 

To join the brimming river, 
For men may come and men may go, 
But I go on for ever. 


I wind about, and in and out, 
With here a blossom sailing, 

And here and there a lusty trout, 
And here and there a grayling, 


And here and there a foamy flake 
Upon me, as I travel 

With many a silvery water-break 
Above the golden gravel, 


And draw them all along, and flow 
To join the brimming river, 

For men may come and men may go, 
But I go on for ever. 


I steal by lawns and grassy plots, 
I slide by hazel covers ; 

I move the sweet forget-me-nots 
That grow for happy lovers. 


I slip, I slide, I gloom, I glance, 
Among my skimming swallows ; 

I make the netted sunbeam dance 
Against my sandy shallows. 


I murmur under moon and stars 
In brambly wildernesses ; 

I linger by my shingly bars, 
I loiter round my cresses ; 


And out again I curve and flow 
To join the brimming river, 

For men may come and men may go, 
But I go on forever. 1855. 


LYRICS FROM MAUD! 


PART I 


Vv 


A VOICE by the cedar tree 
In the meadow under the Hall! 
She is singing an air that is known to 


me, 

A passionate ballad gallant and gay, 

A martial song like a trumpet’s call ! 
Singing alone in the morning of life, 

In the happy morning of life and of May, 
Singing of men that in battle array, 
Ready in heart and ready in hand, 
March with banner and bugle and fife 
To the death, for their native land. 


1 See the Life of Tennyson, I, 393-406. 


Maud with her exquisite face, 

And a voice pealing up to the sunny 
sky, 

And feet like sunny gems on an English 
green, 

Maud in the light of her youth and her 
grace, 

Singing of Death, and of Honor that 
cannot die, 

Till I well could weep fora time so sor- 
did and mean, 

And myself so languid and base. 

Silence, beautiful voice! ; 

Be still, for you only trouble the mind 

With a joy in which I cannot rejoice, 

A glory I shall not find. 

Still! I will hear you no more, 

For your sweetness hardly leaves me a 
choice . 

But to move to the meadow and fall be- 
fore 

ter feet on the meadow grass, and adore, 
Not her, who is neither courtly nor kind, 
Not her, not her, but a voice. 


XI 


O, let the solid ground 

Not fail beneath my feet 
Before my life has found 

What some have found so sweet ! 
Then let come what come may, 
What matter if I go mad, 
I shall have had my day. 


Let the sweet heavens endure, 
Not close and darken above me 

Before I am quite quite sure 
That there is one to love me! 

Then let come what come may 

To a life that has been so sad, 

I shall have had my day. 


XII 


Birds in the high Hall-garden 
When twilight was falling, 

Maud, Maud, Maud, Maud, 
They were crying and calling. 


Where was Maud ? in our wood ; 
And I—who else ?—was with her, 
Gathering woodland lilies, 
Myriads blow together. 


Birds in our wood sang 
Ringing thro’ the valleys, 
Maud is here, here, here 
In among the lilies. 


520 


I kiss’d her slender hand, 
She took the kiss sedately ; 
Maud is not seventeen, 
But she is tall and stately. 


I to cry out on pride 
Who have won her favor! 
O, Maud were sure of heaven 
If lowliness could save her ! 


I know the way she went 
Home with her maiden posy, 

For her feet have touch’d the meadows 
And left the daisies rosy. 


Birds in the high Hall-garden 
Were crying and calling to her, 

Where is Maud, Maud, Maud ? 
One is come to woo her. 


Look, a horse at the door, 
And little King Charley snarling ! 
Go back, my lord, across the moor, 
You are not her darling. 


XVII 


Go not, happy day, 
From the shining fields, 
Go not, happy day, 
Till the maiden yields. 
Rosy is the West, 
Rosy is the South, 
Roses are her cheeks, 
Anda rose her mouth. 
When the happy Yes 
Falters from her lips, 
Pass and blush the news 
Over glowing ships; 
Over blowing seas, 
Over seas at rest, 
Pass the happy news, 
Blush it thro’ the West ; 
Till the red man dance 
By his red cedar-tree, 
And the red man’s babe 
Leap, beyond the sea. 
Blush from West to East, 
Blush from East to West, 
Till the West is East, 
Blush it thro’ the West. 
Rosy is the West, 
Rosy is the South, 
Roses are her cheeks, 
And a rose her mouth. 


XVIII 


T have led her home, my love, my only 
friend. 
There is none like her, none. 


BRITISH POETS 


And never yet so warmly ran my blood 

And sweetly, on and on 

Calming itself to the long-wish’d-for end, 

Full to the banks, close on the promised 
good. 


None like her, none. 

Just now the dry-tongued laurels’ patter- 
ing talk 

Seem’d her light foot along the garden 
walk, 

And shook my heart to think she comes 
once more. 

But even then F heard her close the door ; 

The gates of heaven are closed, and she 
is gone. 


There is none like her, none, 

Nor will be when our summers have de- 
ceased. 

O, art thou sighing for Lebanon 

In the long breeze that streams to thy 
delicious Kast, 

Sighing for Lebanon, 

Dark cedar, tho’ thy limbs have here in- 
creased, 

Upon a pastoral slope as fair, 

And looking to the South and fed 

With honey’d rain and delicate air, 

And haunted by the starry head 

Of her whose gentle will has changed my 
fate, 

And made my life a perfumed altar- 
flame : 

And over whom thy darkness must have 
spread 

With such delight as theirs of old, thy 
great 

Forefathers of the thornless garden, 
there 

Shadowing the snow-limb’d Eve from 
whom she came? 


Here will I le, while these long branches 
sway, [day 

And you fair stars that crown a happy 

Go in and out as if at merry play, 

Who am no more so all forlorn 

As when it seem’d far better to be born 

To labor and the mattock-harden’d hand 

Than nursed at ease and brought to 
understand 

A sad astrology, the boundless plan 

That makes you tyrants in your iron 
skies, 

Innumerable, pitiless, passionless eyes, 

Cold fires, yet with power to burn and 
brand 

His nothingness into man. 


TENNYSON 





But now shine on, and what care I 

Who in this stormy gulf have found a 
pearl 

The countercharm of space and hollow 


SKY, 

And do accept my madness, and would 
die 

To save from some slight shame one 
simple girl ?— 


Would die, for sullen-seeming Death 
may give 

More life to Love than is or ever was 

In our low world, where yet ’t is sweet 
to live. 

Let no one ask me how it came to pass ; 

It seems that I am happy. that to me 

A livelier emerald twinkles in the grass, 

A purer sapphire melts into the sea. 


Not die, but live a life of truest breath, 

And teach true life to fight with mortal 
wrongs. 

O, why should Love, like men in drink- 
ing songs, 

Spice his fair banquet with the dust of 
death ? 

Make answer, Maud my bliss, 

Maud made my Maud by that long loving 


kiss, 

Life of my life, wilt thou not answer 
this ? 

“The dusky strand of Death inwoven 
here 


With dear Love’s tie, makes Love him- 
self more dear.” 


Is that enchanted moan only the swell 

Of the long waves that roll in yonder 
bay ? 

And hark the clock within, the silver 
knell — 

Of twelve sweet hours that past in bridal 
white, 

And died to live, long as my pulses 
play ; 

But now by this my love has closed her 
sight, 

And given false death her hand, and 
stolen away 

To dreamful wastes where footless fan- 
cies dwell 

Among the fragments of the golden 
day. 

May Hothing there her maiden grace 
affright ! 

Dear heart, I feel with thee the drowsy 
spell. 

My bride to be, my evermore delight, 


521 


My own heart’s heart, my ownest own, 
farewell ; 

It is but for a little space I go. 

And Sena far over moor and 
e 

Beat to the noiseless music of the night ! 

Has our whole earth gone nearer to the 
glow 

Of your soft splendors that you look so 
bright ? 

I have climb’d nearer out of lonely hell. 

Beat, happy stars, timing with things 
below, 

Beat with my heart more blest than 
heart can tell, 

Blest, but for some dark undercurrent 
woe [So ; 

That seems to draw—but it shall not be 

Let all be well, be well. 


XXI 


Rivulet crossing my ground, 

And bringing me down from the Hall 
This garden-rose that I found, 
Forgetful of Maud and me, 

And lost in trouble and moving round 
Here at the head of a tinkling fall, 
And trying to pass to the sea ; 

O rivulet, born at the Hall, 

My Maud has sent it by thee— 

If Tread her sweet will right— 

On a blushing mission to me, 

Saying in odor and color, ‘‘ Ah be 
Among the roses to-night.” 


XXIT 


Come into the garden, Maud, 
For the black bat, night, has flown, 
Come into the garden, Maud, 
Iam here at the gate alone ; 
And the woodbine spices are wafted 
abroad, 
And the musk of the rose is blown. 


For a breeze of morning moves, 
And the planet of love is on high, 
Beginning to faint in the light that she 
loves 
On a bed of daffodil sky, 
To faint in the light of the sun she loves, 
To faint in his ight, and to die. 


All night have the roses heard 
The flute, violin, bassoon ; 
All night has the casement jessamine 
stirr’d 
To the dancers dancing in tune ; 
Till a silence fell with the waking bird, 
And a hush with the setting moon, 


522 


I said to the lily, ‘‘ There is but one, 
With whom she has heart to be gay. 

When will the dancers leave her alone? 
She is weary of dance and play.” 

Now half to the setting moon are gone, 
And half to the rising day ; 

Low on the sand and loud on the stone 
The last wheel echoes away. 


I said to the rose, ‘‘ The brief night goes 
In babble and revel and wine. 
O young lord-lover, what sighs are those, 
For one that will never be thine? 
But mine, but mine,” so I sware to the 
rose, 
‘* For ever and ever, mine.” 


And the soul of the rose went into my 
blood, 
As the music clash’d in the Hall ; 
And long by the garden lake I stood, 
For I heard your rivulet fall 
From the lake to the meadow and on to 
the wood, 
Our wood, that is dearer than all ; 


From the meadow your walks have left 
so sweet 
That whenever a March-wind sighs 
He sets the jewel-print of your feet 
In violets blue as your eyes, 
To the woody hollows in which we 
meet 
And the valleys of Paradise. 


The slender acacia would not shake 
One long milk-bloom on the tree ; 
The white lake-blossom fell 
lake 
As the pimpernel dozed on the lea ; 
But the rose was awake all night for 
your sake, 
Knowing your promise to me; 
The lilies and roses were all awake, 
They sigh’d for the dawn and thee. 


Queen roseof the rosebud garden of 
girls, 
Come hither, the dances are done, 
In gloss of satin and glimmer of pearls, 
@ueen lily and rose in one; [curls, 
Shine out, little head, sunning over with 
To the flowers, and be their sun. 


There has fallen a splendid tear 
From the passion-flower at the gate, 
She is coming, my dove, my dear ; 
She is coming, my life, my fate. 
The red rose cries, ‘She is near, she is 
near ;” 


into the - 


BRITISH POETS 


And the white rose weeps, ‘‘She is 
late ;” 
The larkspur listens, ‘‘I hear, I hear ;” 
And the lily whispers, ‘‘ I wait.” 


She is coming,my own, my sweet ; 
Were it ever so airy a tread, 

My heart would hear her and beat, 
Were it earth in an earthy bed ; 

My dust would hear her and beat, 
Had I lain for a century dead, 

Would start and tremble under her feet, 
And blossom in purple and red. 


PART. I 


II 


SEE whata lovely shell, 

Small and pure as a pearl, 
Lying close to my foot, 

Frail, but a work divine, 
Made so fairily well 

With delicate spire and whorl, 
How exquisitely minute, 

A miracle of design ! 


What is it? a learned man 
Could give it a clumsy name. 
Let him name it who can, 

The beauty would be the same. 


The tiny cell is forlorn, 

Void of the little living will 

That made it stir on the shore. 
Did he stand at the diamond door 
Of his house in a rainbow frill ? 
Did he push, when he was uncurl’d, 
A golden foot or a fairy horn 

Thro’ his dim water-world ? 


Slight, to be crush’d with a tap 
Of my finger-nail on the sand, 
Small, but a work divine, 
Frail, but of force to withstand, 
Year upon year, the shock 

Of cataract seas that snap 

The three-decker’s oaken spine 
Athwart the ledges of rock, 
Here on the Breton strand ! 


Breton, not Briton ; here 

Like a shipwreck’d man on a coast 
Of ancient fable and fear— _ 
Plagued with a flitting to and fro, 

A disease, a hard mechanic ghost 
That never came from on high 

Nor ever arose from below, 

But only moves with the moving eye, 
Flying along the land and the main— 


TENNYSON 


a3 





Why should it look like Maud? 
Am I to be overawed 

By what I cannot but know 

Is a juggle born of the brain? 


Back from the Breton coast, 

Sick of a nameless fear, 

Back to the dark sea-line 

Looking, thinking of all I have lost ; 
An old song vexes my ear, 

But that of Lamech is mine. 


For years, a measureless ill, 

For years, for ever, to part— 
But she, she would love me still; 
And as long, O God, as she 

Have a grain of love for me, 

So long, no doubt, no doubt, 
Shall I nurse in my dark heart, 
However weary, a spark of will 
Not to be trampled out. 


Strange, that the mind, when fraught 

With a passion so intense 

One would think that it well 

Might drown all life in the eye, 

That it should, by being so overwrought, 

Suddenly strike on a sharper sense 

For a shell, or a flower, little things 

Which else would have been past by! 

And now I remember, I, 

When he lay dying there, 

I noticed one of his many rings— 

For he had many, poor worm — and 
thought, 

It is his mother’s hair. 


Who knows if he be dead ? 

Whether I need have fled? 

Am I guilty of blood? 

However this may be, 

Comfort her, comfort her, all things 
good, 

While I am over the sea! 

Let me and my passionate love goby, 

But speak to her all things holy and 
high, 

Whatever happen to me! 

Me and my harmful love go by; 

But come to her waking, find her asleep, 

Powers of the height, Powers of the 





deep, 
And comfort her tho’ I die! 
IV 


O that ’t were possible 

After long grief and pain 

To find the arms of my true love 
Round me once again ! 


When I was wont to meet her 

In the silent woody places 

By the home that gave me birth, 
We stood tranced in long embraces 
Mixed with kisses sweeter, sweeter 
Than anything on earth. 


A shadow flits before me, 

Not thou, but like to thee. 

Ah, Christ, that it were possible 

For one short hour to see 

The souls we loved, that they might tell 


us 
What and where they be! 


It leads me forth at evening, 

It lightly winds and steals 

In a cold white robe before me, 
When all my spirit reels 

At the shouts, the leagues of lights, 
And the roaring of the wheels. 


Half the night I waste in sighs, 
Half in dreams I sorrow after 
The delight of early skies ; 

In a wakeful doze I sorrow 

For the hand, the lips, the eyes, 
For the meeting of the morrow, 
The delight of happy laughter, 
The delight of low replies. 


*T is a morning pure and sweet, 
And a dewy splendor falls 

On the little flower that clings 
To the turrets and the walls ; 
°T is a morning pure and sweet, 
And the light and shadow fleet. 


She is walking in the meadow, 
And the woodland echo rings ; 
In a moment we shall meet. 
She is singing in the meadow, 
And the rivulet at her feet 
Ripples on in light and shadow 
To the ballad that she sings. 


Do I hear her sing as of old, 

My bird with the shining head, 

My own dove with the tender eye ? 

But there rings ona sudden a passionate 
Ory; 

There pagina one dying or dead, 

And asullen thunder is roll’d ; 

For a tumult shakes the city, 

And I wake, my dream is fled. 

In the shuddering dawn, behold, 

Without knowledge, without pity, 

By the curtains of my bed 

That abiding phantom cold ! 


524 


Get thee hence, nor come again, 
Mix not memory with doubt, 
Pass, thou deathlike type of pain, 
Pass and cease to move about ! 

°T is the blot upon the brain 
That will show itself without. 


Then I rise, the eave-drops fall, 
And the yellow vapors choke 
The great city sounding wide ; 
The day comes, a dull red ball 
Wrapt in drifts of lurid smoke 
On the misty river-tide. 


Thro’ the hubbub of the market 

I steal, a wasted frame; 

It crosses here, it crosses there, 

Thro’ all that crowd confused and loud, 
The shadow still the same; 

And on my heavy eyelids 

My anguish hangs like shame. 


Alas for her that met me, 

That heard me softly call, 

Came glimmering thro’ the laurels 
At the: quiet evenfall, 

In the garden by the turrets 

Of the old manorial hall ! 


Would the happy spirit descend 
From the realms of light and song, 
In the chamber or the street, 

As she looks among the blest, 
Should I fear to greet my friend 
Or to say ‘‘ Forgive the wrong,” 
Or to ask her, ‘* Take me, sweet, 
To the regions of thy rest ” ? 


But the broad light glares and beats, 
And the shadow flits and fleets 

And will not let me be ; 

And I loathe the squares and streets, 
And the faces that one meets, 

Hearts with no love for me. 

Always I long to creep 

Into some still cavern deep, 

There to weep, and weep, and weep 
My whole soul out to thee. 1855. 


WILL 


O, WELL for him whose will is strong ! 

He suffers, but he will not suffer long ; : 

He suffers, but he cannot suffer wrong. 

For him nor moves the loud world’s 
random mock, 

Nor all Calamity’s hugest waves con- 
found, 

Who seems a promontory of rock, 


BRITISH. POETS 


That, compass’d round with turbulent 
sound, 

In middle ocean meets the surging shock, 

Tempest-buffeted, citadel-crown’d. 


But ill for him who, bettering not with 
time, 

Corrupts the strength of heaven-de- 
scended Will, 

And ever weaker 

crime, 

Or seeming-genial venial fault, 

Recurring and suggesting still! 

He seems as one whose footsteps halt, 

Toiling in immeasurable sand, 

And o’er a weary sultry land, 

Far beneath a blazing vault, 

Sown in a wrinkle of the monstrous 
hill, 

The city sparkles like a grain of salt. 

1855. 


grows thro’ acted 


ENID'S SONG 


TURN, Fortune, turn thy wheel, and 
lower the proud ; 

Turn thy wild wheel thro’ sunshine, 
storm, and cloud ; 

Thy wheel and thee we neither love nor 
hate. 


Turn, Fortune, turn thy wheel with 
smile or frown ; 

With that wild wheel we go not up or 
down ; 

Our hoard is little, but our hearts are 
great. 


Smile and we smile, the lords of many 
lands ; 

Frown and we smile, the lords of our 
own hands ; 

For man is man and master of his fate. 


Turn, turn thy wheel above the staring 
crowd ; 
Thy wheel and thou are shadows in the 
cloud ; 
Thy wheel and thee we neither love nor 
hate. 
From the Marriage of Geraint, 1859. 


-VIVIEN’S SONG 


In love, if love be love, if love be ours, 

Faith and unfaith can ne’er be equal 
powers : 

Unfaith in aught is want of faith in all. 


——_ 


TENNYSON 528 


J 





It is the little rift within the lute, 

That by and by will make the music 
mute, 

And ever widening slowly silence all. 


The little rift within the lover’s lute, 
Or little pitted speck in garner’d fruit, 
That rotting inward slowly moulders all. 


It is not worth the keeping ; let it go: 

But shall it ? answer, darling, answer, no. 

And trust me not at all or all in all. 
From Merlin and Vivien, 1859. 


ELAINE’S SONG 


SWEET is true love tho’ given in vain, in 
vain ; 
And sweet is death who puts an end to 


pain. 
I know not which is sweeter, no, not I. 


Love, art thou sweet? then bitter death 
must be. 
Love, thou art bitter; sweet is death to 


me. 
O Love, if death be sweeter, let me die. 


Sweet love, that seems not made to fade 
away ; 

Sweet death, that seems to make us love- 
less clay ; 

I know not which is sweeter, no, not I. 


I fain would follow love, if that could 
I needs must follow death, who calls for 


me ; 
Call and I follow, I follow! let me die. 
From Lancelot and Elaine, 1859. 


GUINEVERE 


QUEEN GUINEVERE had fled the court, 
and sat 

There in the holy house at Almesbury 

Weeping, none with her save a little 
maid, 

A novice. One low light betwixt them 
burn’d 

Blurr’d by the creeping mist, for all 
abroad, 

Beneath a moon unseen albeit at full, 

The white mist, like a face-cloth to the 
face, 

Clung to the dead earth, and the land 
was still. 


For hither had she fled, her cause of 
flight 


Sir Modred ; he that like a subtle beast 
Lay couchant with his eyes upon the 


throne, 

Ready ie spring, waitingachance. For 
this 

He chill’d the popular praises of the 
Kin 

With silent smiles of slow disparage- 
ment ; 


And tamper’d with the Lords of the 
White Horse, 

Heathen, the brood by Hengist left ; and 
sought 

To make disruption in the Table Round 

Of Arthur, and to splinter it into feuds 

Serving his traitorous end; and all his 
aims 

Were SPArReRD by strong hate for Lance- 
ot. 


For thus it chanced one morn when all 
the court, 
Green-suited, but with 
mock’d the May, 
Had been—their wont—a-maying and 


plumes that 


return’d, 

That Modred stillin green, all ear and 
eye, 

Climb’d to the high top of the garden- 
wall 


To spy some secret scandal if he might, 

And saw the Queen who sat betwixt her 
best ; 

Enid and lissome Vivien, of her court 

The wiliest and the worst; and more 
than this 

He saw not, for Sir Lancelot passing by 

Spied where he couch’d, and as the gar- 
dener’s hand 

Picks from the colewort a green cater- 
pillar, 

So from the high wall and the flowering 
grove 

Of grasses Lancelot pluck’d him by the 
heel, 

And cast him as a worm upon the way ; 

But when he knew the prince tho’ 
marr’d with dust, 

He, reverencing king’s blood in a bad 


man, 
Made such excuses as he might, and 
these 


Full knightly without scorn. For in 
those days 

No knight of Arthur’s noblest dealt in 
Scorn ; [trim 

But, if a man were halt, or hunch’d, in 

By those whom God had made full- 
limb’d and tall, 


526 


Scorn was allow’d as part of his defect, 

And he was answer’d softly by the King 

And all his Table. So Sir Lancelot holp 

To raise the prince, who rising twice or 
thrice 

Full sharply smote his knees, and smiled, 
and went ; 

But, ever after, the small violence done 

Rankled in him and ruffled all his heart, 

As the sharp wind that ruffles all day 
long 

A little bitter pool about a stone 

On the bare coast. 


But when Sir Lancelot told 

This matter to the Queen, at first she 
laugh’d 

Lightly, to think of Modred’s dusty fall, 

Then shudder’d, as the village wife who 
cries, 

‘‘T shudder, some one steps across my 
grave ;” 

Then laugh’d again, but faintlier, for in- 
deed 

She half-foresaw that he, the subtle beast, 

Would track her guilt until he found, 
and hers 

Would be for evermore a name of scorn. 

Henceforward rarely could she front in 
hall, 

Or elsewhere, Modred’s narrow foxy face, 

Heart-hiding smile, and gray persistent 
eye. 

Henceforward too, the Powers that tend 
the soul, 

To help it from the death that cannot 
die, 

And save it even in extremes, began 

To vex and plague her. Many a time for 
hours, 

Beside the placid breathings of the King, 

In the dead night, grim faces came and 
went 

Before her, or a vague spiritual fear— 

Like to some doubtful noise of creaking 


doors, 

Heard by the watcher in a haunted 
house, 

That keeps the rust of murder on the 
* walls—— 

Held her awake; or if she slept she 
dream’d [stand 


An awful dream. for then she seem’d to 

Onsome vast plain before a setting sun, 

And from the sun there swiftly made at 
her 

A ghastly something, and its shadow flew 

Before it till it touch’d her, and she 
turn’d— 


BRITISH POETS 


When lo! her own, that broadening 
from her feet, 

And blackening, swallow’d all the land, 
and in it 

Far cities burnt, and with a cry she 
woke. y 

And all this trouble did not pass but 


grew, 

Till eventhe clear face of the guileless 
King, 

And trustful courtesies of household life, 

Became her bane; and atthe last she 
said: 

‘¢O Lancelot, get thee hence to thine 
own land, 

For if thou tarry we shall meet again, 

And if we meet again some evil chance 

Will make the smouldering scandal 
break and blaze 

Before the people and our lord the King.” 

And Lancelot ever promised, but re- 
main’d 

And still they metand met. Again she 


said, 
‘QO Lancelot, if thou love me get thee 


hence.” 

And then they were agreed upon a 
night— 

When the good King should not be there 
—to meet 

And part for ever. Vivien, lurking, 
heard. 

She told Sir Modred. Passion-pale they 
met 

And greeted. Hands in hands, and eye 


to eye, 
Low on the border of her couch they sat 
Stammering and staring. It was their 
last hour, 


A madness of farewells. And Modred 


brought 

His creatures to the basement of the 
tower 

For testimony; and crying with full 


voice, 

“Traitor, come out, ye are trapped at 
last,” aroused 

Lancelot, who rushing outward lionlike 

Leapt on him, and hurl’d him headlong, 
and he fell. , 

Stunn’d and his creatures took and bare 
him off, 

And all was still. 
is come, 

And I am shamed for ever; ’ 
said: 

‘* Mine be the shame, mine was the sin ; 
but rise, : 

And fly to my strong castle over-seas. 


Then she, ‘* The end 


> and he 


TENNYSON 


There will I hide thee till my life shall 
end, 

There hold thee with my life against the 
world.” 

She answer’d: ‘‘ Lancelot, wilt thou hold 
me so ? 

Nay, friend, for we have taken our fare- 
wells. 

Would God that thou couldst hide me 
from myself ! 

Mine is the shame, for I was wife, and 
thou 

Unwedded ; yet rise now, and let us fly, 

For I will draw me into sanctuary, 

And bide my doom.” So Lancelot got 
her horse, 

Set her thereon, and mounted on his 
own, 

And then they rode tothe divided way, 

There kiss’d, and parted weeping ; for 
he passed, 

Love-loyal to the least wish of the Queen, 

Back to his land ; but she to Almesbury 

Fled all night long by glimmering waste 
and weald, 

And heard the spirits of the waste and 
weald 

Moan as she fled, or thought she heard 
them moan. 

And in herself she moan’d, ‘‘ Too late, 
too late!” 

Till in the cold wind that foreruns the 
morn, 

_A blot in heaven, the raven, flying high, 

Croak’d, and she thought, ‘‘ He spies a 
field of death ; 

For now the heathen of the Northern 


Sea, 
Lured by the crimes and frailties of the 
court, 


Begin to slay the folk and spoil the land.” 


And when she came to Almesbury she 

spake 

There to the nuns, and said, ‘‘ Mine ene- 
mies 

Pursue me, but, O peaceful Sisterhood, 

Receive and yield me sanctuary, nor ask 

Her name to whom ye pield it till her 
time 

To tell you;” and her beauty, grace, 
and power 

Wrought as acharm upon them, and 
they spared 

To ask it. 


9 


So the stately Queen abode 
For many a week, unknown, among the 
nuns, 


S28 


Nor with them mix’d, nor told her name, 
nor sought, 

Wrapt in her grief, for housel or for 
shrift, 

But communed only with the little 
maid, 

Who pleased her with a babbling heed- 
lessness 

Which often lured her from herself ; 
but now, 

This night, a rumor wildly blown about 

Came that Sir Modred had usurp’d the 
realm 

And leagued him with the 
while the King 

Was waging war on Lancelot. 
she thought, 

‘With what a hate the people and the 
King 

Must hate me,” and bow’d down upon 
her hands 

Silent, until the little maid, who brook’d 

No silence, brake it, uttering ‘* Late ! so 
late ! 

What, hour, I wonder now ?” and when 
she drew 

No answer, by and by began to hum 

An air the nuns had taught her : ‘* Late, 
so late!” 

Which when she heard, the Queen look’d 
up and said, 

‘¢O maiden, if indeed ye list to sing, 

Sing, and unbind my heart that I may 


heathen, 


Then 


weep.” 
Whereat full willingly sang the little 
maid, 


‘* Late, late, so late! and dark the night and 
chill } 
Late, late, so late! but we can enter still. 
Too late, too late! ye cannot enter now. 


‘No light had we; for that we do repent, 
And learning this, the bridegroom will relent. 
Too late, too late! ye cannot enter now. 


“No light! so late! and dark and chill the 
night ! 
O, let us in, that we may find the light! 
Too late, too late ! ye cannot enter now. 


‘Have we not heard the bridegroom is so 
sweet ! 
O, let us in, tho’ late, to kiss his feet ! 
No, no, too late ! ye cannot enter now.” 


So sang the novice, while full pas- 
sionately, 
Her head upon her hands, remembering 
Her thought when first she came, wept 
the sad Queen. 
Then said the little novice, prattling to 
her: 


528 
“QO pray you, noble lady, weep no 
more ; 
But let my words—the words of one so 
small, 


Who knowing nothing knows but to 


obey, 

And if I do not there is penance given— 

Comfort your sorrows, for they do not 
flow 

From evil done; right suream I of that, 

Who sees your tender grace and state- 
liness. 

But weigh your sorrows with our lord 
the King’s, 

And weighing find them less; for gone 
is he 

To wage grim war against Sir Lancelot 
there, 

Round that strong castle where he holds 
the Queen ; 

And Modred whom he left in charge of 


all, 

The traitor—Ah, sweet lady, the King’s 
grief 

For his own self, and his own Queen 
and realm, 

Must needs be thrice as great as any of 
ours ! ; 

For me, I thank the saints, I am not 
great ; 

For if there ever come a grief to me 

I cry my cry in silence, and have done ; 

None knows it, and my tears have 
brought me good. 

But even were the griefs of little ones 

As great as those of great ones, yet this 

rief 

Is added to the griefs the great must 
bear, 

That, howsoever much they may desire 

Silence, they cannot weep behind a 
cloud ; 

As even here they talk at Almesbury 

About the good King and his wicked 
Queen, 

And were I such a King with such a 
Queen, 

Well might I wish to veil her wicked- 
ness, 

But were I such a King it could not be.” 


Then to her own sad heart mutter’d 

the Queen, 

‘© Will the child kill me with her inno- 
cent talk?” 

But openly she answer’d, ‘‘ Must not I, 

If this false traitor have displaced his 
lord, {realm ?” 

Grieve with the common grief of all the 


BRITISH POETS 


‘* Yea,” said the maid, ‘‘that all is 

woman’s grief, 

That she is woman, whose disloyal life 

Hath wrought confusion in the Table 
Round 

Which good King Arthur founded, years 
ago, 

With signs and miracles and wonders, 
there 

At Camelot, ere the coming of the 
Queen.” 


Then thought the Queen within her- 

self again, 

‘Will the child kill me with her foolish 
prate ?” 

But openly she spake and said to her, 

‘*O little maid, shut in by nunnery 
walls, 

What canst thou know of Kings and 
Tables Round, 

Or what of signs and wonders, but the 
signs 

And simple miracles of thy nunnery?” 


To whom the little novice garrulously: 

“Yea, but I know ; the land was full of 
signs 

And wonders ere the coming of the 
Queen. 

So said my father, and himself was 
knight 

Of the great Table—at the founding of | 
it, 

And rode thereto from Lyonnesse; and 
he said 

Thatas he rode, an hour or maybe twain 

After the sunset, down the coast, he 
heard 

Strange music, and he paused, and turn- 
ing—there, 

All down the lonely coast of Lyonnesse, 

Kach with a beacon-star upon his head, 

And with a wild sea-light about his feet, 

He saw them—headland after headland 
flame. 

Far on into the rich heart of the west. 

Aud in the light the white mermaiden 
swam, 

And strong man-breasted things stood 
from the sea, 

And sent a deep sea-voice thro’ all the 
land, 

To which the little elves of chasm and 
cleft 

Made answer, sounding like a distant 
horn. 

So said my father—yea, and further- 
more, 


TENNYSON 


Next morning, while he past the dim-lit 
woods 
Himself beheld three spirits mad with 


JOY 

Come dashing down on a tall wayside 
flower, 

That shook beneath them as the thistle 
shakes 

When ee gray linnets wrangle for the 
seed. 

And still at evenings on before his 
horse 

The flickering fairy-circle wheel’d and 
broke 

Flying, and link’d again, and wheel’d 
and broke 

Flying, for all the land was full of life. 

And when at last he came to Camelot, 

A wreath of airy dancers hand-in-hand 

Swung ce the lighted lantern of the 
hall; 

And in the hall itself was such a feast 

As never man had dream’d ; for every 
knight 

Had whatsoever meat he long’d for 
served 

By hands unseen ; and even as he said 

Down in the cellars merry bloated things 

Shoulder’d the spigot, straddling on the 
butts 

While the wine ran; so glad were spirits 
and men 

Before the coming of the sinful Queen.” 


Then spake the “Queen and somewhat 


bitterly, 

‘‘ Were they so glad? ill prophets were 
they all, 

Spirits and men. Could none of them 
foresee, 


Not even thy wise father with his signs 
And wonders, what has fallen upon the 
realm ?”’ 


To whom the novice garrulously 
again : 
** Yea, one, a bard, of whom my father 
said, 
Full many a noble war-song had he sung, 
Even in the presence of an enemy’s 


fleet, 

Between the steep cliff and the coming 
wave ; 

And many a mystic lay of life and 
death 


Had chanted on the smoky mountain- 


ops, 
When round him bent the spirits of the 
hills 


34 


ao 


With all their dewy hair blown back 
like flame. 

So said my father—and that night the 
bard 

Sang Arthur’s glorious wars, and sang 
the King 

As wellnigh more than man, and rail'd 
at those 

Who call’d him the false son of Gorlois. 

For there was no man knew from 
whence he came ; 

But after tempest, when the long wave 


broke 

All down the thundering shores of Bude 
and Bos, 

There came a day as still as heaven, and 
then 

They found a naked child upon the 
sands 


Of dark Tintagil by the Cornish sea, 

And that was Arthur, and they foster’d 
him 

Till he by miracle was approven King ; 

And that his grave should be a mystery 

From all men, like his birth; and could 
he find 

A woman in her womanhood as great 

As he was in his manhood, then, he 
sang, 

The twain together well might change 
the world. 

But even in the middle of his song 

He falter’d, and his hand fell from the 
harp, 

And pale he turn’d and reel’d, and would 
have fallen, 

But that they stay’d him up; nor would 
he tell 

His vision ; but what doubt that he fore- 
saw 

This evil work of Lancelot and the 
Queen ?” 


Then thought the Queen, ‘‘ Lo! they 

have set her on, 

Our simple-seeming abbess and her nuns, 

To play upon me,” and bow’d her head 
nor spake. 

Whereat the novice crying, with clasp’d 
hands, 

Shame on her own garrulity garrulously, 

Said the good nuns would check her 
gadding tongue 

Full often, ‘‘ and, sweet lady, if I seem 

To vex an ear too sad to listen to me, 

Unmannerly, with pratiling and the 
tales 

Which my good father told me, check 
me too 


537 


Nor let me shame my father’s memory, 
one 

Of noblest manners, tho’ himself would 
say 

Sir Lancelot had the noblest; and he 
died, 

Kill’d in a tilt, come next, five summers 
back, 

And left me; but of others who remain, 

And of the two first-famed for cour- 
tesy— 

And pray you check me if I ask amiss—- 

But pray you, which had noblest, while 
you moved 

Among them, Lancelot or our lord the 
King?” 


Then the pale Queen look’d up and 

answer'd her : 

‘*Sir Lancelot, as became a noble knight, 

Was gracious to all ladies, and the same 

In open battle or the tilting- field 

Forbore his own advantage, and the 
King 

In open battle or the tilting-field 

Forbore his own advantage, and these 
two 

Were the most nobly manner’d men of 
all% 

For manners are not idle. but the fruit 

Of loyal nature and of noble mind.” 


‘* Yea,” said the maid, ‘‘ be manners 
such fair fruit? 
Then Lancelot’s needs must be a thou- 
sand-fold 
Less noble, being, as all rumor runs, 
The most disloyal friend in all the 
world.” 


To which a mournful answer made 

the Queen : 

‘‘O, closed about by narrowing nunnery- 
walls, 

What knowest thou of the world and all 
its lights 

And shadows, all the wealth and all the 
woe? 

If ever Lancelot, that most noble knight, 

Were for one hour less noble than him- 


self, 

Pray for him that he scape the doom of 
fire 

And weep for her who drew him to his 
doom.” 

‘‘Yea,” said the little novice, *‘ I pray 


for both ; 
But I should all as soon believe that his, 


BRITISH POETS 


Sir Lancelot’s, were as noble as the 


King’s, 
As I could think, sweet lady, yours 
would be 
Such as they are, were you the sinful 
Queen.” 
So she, like many another babbler, 


hurt 

Whom she would soothe, and harm’d 
where she would heal : 

For here a sudden flush of wrathful heat 

Fired all the pale face of the Queen, who 
cried: 

‘Such as thou art be never maiden more 

For ever! thou their tool, set on to 
plague 

And play upon and harry me, petty spy 

And traitress!” When that storm of 
anger brake 

From Guinevere, aghast the maiden rose, 

White as her veil, and stood before the 
Queen 

As tremulously as foam upon the beach 

Stands in a wind, ready to break and fly, 

And when the Queen had added, ‘* Get 
thee hence!” 

Fled frighted. Then that other left 
alone 

Sigh’d, and began to gather heart again, 

Saying in herself: ‘* The simple, fearful 
child 

Meant nothing, but my own too-fearful 
guilt, 

Simpler than any child, betrays itself. 

But help me, Heaven, for surely 1 re- 
pent ! 

For what is true recente but in 
thought— 

Not even in inmost thought to think 
again 

The sins that made the past so pleasant 
to us? 

And I have sworn never to see him more, 

To see him more.” 


And even in saying this, 
Her memory from old habit of the mind 
Went slipping back upon the golden days 
In which she saw him first, when Lan- — 
celot came, 
Reputed the best knight and goodliest 
man, 
Ambassador, to yield her to his lord 
Arthur, and led her forth, and far ahead 
Of his and her retinue moving, they, 
Rapt in sweet talk or lively, all on love 
And sport and tilts and pleasure,—for 
the time 


TENNYSON 


Was may-time, and as yet no sin was 
dream’d,— 

Rode under groves that look’d a paradise 

Of blossom, over sheets of hyacinth 

That seem’d the heavens upbreaking 
thro’ the earth, 

And on from hill to hill, and every day 

Beheld at noon in some delicious dale 

The silk pavilions of King Arthur raised 

For brief repast or afternoon repose 

By couriers gone before ; and on again, 

Till yet once more ere set of sun they 
saw 

The Dragon of the great Pendragonship, 

That crown’d the state pavilion of the 
King, 

Blaze by the rushing brook or silent 
well, 


But when the Queen immersed in such 
a trance, 
And moving thro’ the past unconscious- 


ly, 

Came ie that point where first she saw 
the King 

Ride toward her from the city, sigh’d to 
find 

Her journey done, glanced at 
thought him cold, 

High, self-contain’d, and passionless, not 
like him, 

“Not like my _ Lancelot’—while she 
brooded thus 

And grew half-guilty in her thoughts 


him, 


again, 

There. rode an armed warrior to the 
doors. 

A murmuring whisper thro’ the nunnery 
ran, 

Then onasuddenacry, ‘“‘ The King!” 
She sat 

Stiff-stricken, listening ; but whenarmed 
feet 

Thro’ the long gallery from the outer 
doors 

Rang coming, prone from off her seat 
she fell, 

And grovell’d with her face against the 
floor 


There with her milk-white arms and 
shadowy hair 

She made her face a darkness from the 
King, 

And in the darkness heard his armed feet 

Pause by her ; then came silence, then a 
voice, 

Monotonous and hollow like a ghost’s 

Denouncing judgment, but, though 
changed, the King’s : 





x4 


‘* Liest thou here so low, the child of 

one 

Thonor’d, happy, dead before thy shame? 

Well is it that no child is born of thee. 

The children born of thee are sword and 
fire, 

Red ruin, and the breaking up of laws, 

The craft of kindred and the godless 
hosts 

Of heathen swarming o’er the Northern 
Sea ; 

Whom I, while yet Sir Lancelot,: my 
right arm, 

The mightiest of my knights, abode with 


me, 

Have everywhere about this land of 
Christ 

In twelve great battles ruining over- 
thrown. 


And knowest thou now from whence I 
come—from him, 

From waging bitter war with him ; and 
he, 

That did not shun to smite me in worse 
way, 

Had yet that grace of courtesy in him 
left, 

He spared to ift his hand against the 
King 

Who made him knight. 
knight was slain ; 

And many more and all his kith and 
kin 

Clave to him, and abode in his. own land. 

And many more when Modred raised 
revolt, 

Forgetful of their troth and fealty, clave 

To Modred, anda remnant stays with 
me. 

And of this remnant will Ileavea part, 

True men who love me still, for whom I 
live, 

To guard thee in the wild hour coming 
on, 

Lest but a hair of this low head be 
harm/’d. 

Fear not ; thou shalt be guarded till my 
death. 

Howbeit I know, if ancient prophecies 

Have err’d not, that I march to meet my 
doom. 

Thou hast not made my life so sweet to 


But many a 


me 

That I the King should greatly care to 
live ; 

For thou hast spoilt the purpose of my 
life: 

Bear with me for the last time whilel 
show, 


jot 


Even for thy sake, the sin which thou 
hast sinn’d. [law 

For when the Roman left us, and their 

Relax’d its hold upon us, and the ways 

Were fill’d with rapine, here and there 
a deed 

Of prowess 
wrong, 

But I was first of all the kings who drew 

The knighthood-errant of this realm and 
all 

The realms together under me, their 
Head, 

In that fair Order of my Table Round, 

A glorious company, the flower of men, 

To serve as model for the mighty world, 

And be the fair beginning of a time. 

I made them lay their hands in mine 
and swear 

To reverence the King, as if he were 

Their conscience, and their conscience 
as their King, 

To break the heathen and uphold the 
Christ, 

To ride abroad redressing human wrongs, 

To speak no slander, no, nor listen to it, 

To honor his own word as if his God’s, 

To lead sweet lives in purest chastity, 

To love one maiden only, cleave to her, 

And worship her by years of noble deeds, 

Until they won her; for indeed I knew 

Of no more subtle master under heaven 

Than is the maiden passion for a maid, 

Not only to keep down the base in man, 

But teach high thought, and amiable 
words 

And courtliness, and the desire of fame, 

And love of truth, and all that makes a 
man. 

And all this throve before I wedded thee, 

Believing, ‘‘ Lo, mine helpmate, one to 
feel 

My purpose and rejoicing in my joy!” 

Then came thy shameful sin with Lance- 
lot; 

Then came the sin of Tristram and Isolt ; 

Then others, following these my 
mightiest knights, 

And drawing foul ensample from fair 
names, 

Sinn’d also, till the loathsome opposite 

Of all my heart had destined did obtain, 

And all thro’ thee! so that this life of 
mine 

I guard as God’s high gift from scathe 
and wrong, 

Not greatly care tolose ; but rather think 

How sad it were for Arthur, should he 
live, 


done redress’d a random 


BRITISH@POERTS 





To sit once more within his lonely hall, 

And miss the wonted number of my 
knights, 

And miss to hear high talk of noble deeds 

As in the golden days before thy sin. 

For which of us who might be left could 
speak 

Of the pure heart, nor seem to glanceat 
thee ? 

And in thy bowers of Camelot or of Usk 

Thy shadow still would glide from room 
to room, 

And I should evermore be vext with thee 

In hanging robe or vacant ornament, 

Or ghostly footfall echoing on the stair. 

For think not, tho’ thou wouldst not 
love thy lord, 

Thy lord has wholly lost his love for 
thee. 

Tam not made of so slight elements. 

Yet must [leave thee, woman, to thy 
shame. 

IT hold that man the worst of public foes 

Who a for his own or children’s 
sake, 

To save oe blood from scandal, lets the 
wire 

Whom he knows false abide and rule 
the house : 

For being thro’ his cowardice allow’d 

Her station, taken everywhere for pure, 

She like a new disease, unknown to men, 

Creeps, no precaution used, among the 
crowd, 

Makes wicked lightnings of her eyes, and 
saps 

The fealty of our friends, and stirs the 
pulse 

With devil’s leaps, and poisons half the 
young. 

Worst of the worst were that man he 
that reigns ! 

Better the King’s waste hearth and 
aching heart 

Than thou reseated in thy place of light, 

The mockery of my people and their 
bane!” 


He paused, and in the pause she crept 

an inch 

Nearer, and laid her hands about his feet. 

Far off a solitary trumpet blew. 

Then waiting by the doors the war-horse 
neigh’d 

As at a friend’s voice, and he spake 
again : 


‘“Yet think not that I come to urge 
thy crimes ; 


TENNYSON 


586 





I did not come to curse thee, Guinevere, 

I, whose vast pity almost makes me die 

Tosee thee, laying there thy golden head, 

My pride in happier summers, at my feet. 

The wrath which forced my thoughts on 
that fierce law, 

The doom of treason and the flaming 
death,— 

When first I learned thee hidden here,— 
is past. 

The pang—which, while I weigh’d thy 
heart with one 

Too wholly true to dream untruth in 
thee, 

Made my tears burn—is also past—in 

art. 

And all is past, the sin is sinn’d, and I, 

Lo, I forgive thee, as Eternal God 

Forgives ! do thou for thine own soul the 
rest. 

But how to take last leave of all I loved ? 

O golden hair, with which I used to play 

Not knowing! O  imperial-moulded 
form, 

And beauty such as never woman wore, 

Until it came a kingdom’s curse with 
thee— 

I cannot touch thy lips, they are not 
mine, 

But Lancelot’s; nay, they never were 
the King’s. 

I cannot take thy hand ; that too is flesh, 

And in the flesh thou hast sinn’d: and 
mine own flesh, 

Here looking down on thine polluted, 
cries, 

‘I loathe thee ;’ yet not less, O Guine- 
vere, 

For I was ever virgin save for thee, 

My love thro’ flesh hath wrought into 
my life 

So far that my doom is, I love thee still. 

Let no man dream but that I love thee 
still. 

Perchance, and so thou purify thy soul, 

And so thou lean on our fair father 
Christ, 

Hereafter in that world where all are 


ure 

We Bans may meet before high God, and 
thou 

Wilt spring to me, and claim me thine, 
and know 

Tam thine husband—not a smaller soul, 

Nor Lancelot, nor another. Leave me 


that, 
‘TI charge thee, my last hope. Now must I 
hence. [ blow. 


Thro’ the thick night I hear the trumpet 


They summon me their King to lead 
mine hosts 

Far down to that great battle in the west, . 

Where I must strike against the man 
they call 

My sister’s son—no kin of mine, who 
leagues 

With Lords of the White Horse, heathen, 
and knights, 

Traitors—and strike him dead, and meet 
myself 

Death, or I know not what mysterious 
doom. 

And thou remaining here wilt learn the 
event ; 

But hither shall I never come again, 

Never lie by thy side, see thee no more— 

Farewell!” 


And while she grovell’d at his feet, 
She felt the King’s breath wander o’er 
her neck, 
And in the darkness o’er her fallen head 
Perceived the waving of his hands that 
blessed. 


Then, listening till those armed steps 
were gone, 
Rose the pale Queen, and in her anguish 


found 
The casement: ‘‘ peradventure,” so she 
thought, 


‘If I might see his face, and not be 
seen.” 

And lo, he sat on horseback at the door! 

And near him the sad nuns with each a 
light 

Stood, and he gave them charge about 
the Queen, 

To guard and foster her for evermore. 

And while he spake to these his helm 
was lower’d, 

To which for crest the golden dragon 
clung 

Of Britain ; so she did not see the face, 

Which then was as an angel’s, but she 
saw, 

Wet with the mists and smitten by the 
lights, 

The Dragon of the great Pendragonship 

Blaze, making all the night a steam of 
fire. 

And even then he turn’d; and more and 
more 

The moony vapor rolling round the King, 

Who seem’d the phantom of a giant in 


it, 
Enwound him fold by fold, and made 
him gray 


534 


And grayer, till himself became as mist 
Before her, moving ghostlike to his 
doom. 


Then she stretch’d out her arms and 

cried aloud, 

‘*O Arthur !” there her voice brake sud- 
denly, 

Then—as a stream that spouting from a 
cliff 

Fails in mid air, 
base 

Re-makes itself, and flashes down the 
vale— 

Went on in passionate utterance : 


but gathering at the 


‘*Gone—my lord! 
Gone thro’ my sin to slay and to be slain ! 
And he forgave me, and I could not 
speak. 
Farewell? I should have answer’d his 
farewell. 
His mercy choked me. 
the King, 
My own true lord! how dare I call him 
mine ? 
The shadow of another cleaves to me, 
And makes me one pollution. He, the 


Gone, my lord 


King, 

Cal’d me polluted. Shall I kill myself ? 

What help in that? I cannot kill my 
sin, 

If soul be soul, nor can I killmy shame ; 

No, nor by living can I live it down. 

The days will grow to weeks, the weeks 
to months, 

The months will add themselves and 
make the years, 

The years will roll into the centuries, 

And mine will ever be a name of scorn. 

I must not dwell on that defeat of fame. 

Let the world be; that is but of the 
world— 

What else? what hope? I think there 
was a hope, 

Except he mock'd me when he spake of 
hope 

His hope bia call’d it; 
mocks, 

For mockery is the fume of little hearts. 

And blessed be the King, who hath for- 
given 

My wickedness to him, and left me hope 

That in mine own heart I can live down 
sin 

And be his mate hereafter in the heavens 

Before high God! Ah great and gentle 
lord, . 

Who wast, 


but he never 


as 1s the conscience of a saint 


BRITISH POETS 


Among his warring senses, to thy 
knights— 

To whom my false voluptuous pride, 
that took 

Full easily all impressions from below, 

Would not look up, or half-despised the 


height 

To which I would not or I could not 
climb— 

I thought I could not breathe in that 
fine air, 


That pure severity of perfect light— 
I yearn’d for warmth and color which I 


found 

In Lancelot—now I see thee what thou 
art, 

Thou art ‘thé highest and most human 
too, 

Not Lancelot, nor another. Is there 
none 

Will tell the King I love him tho’ so 
late ? 

Now—ere he goes to the great battle? 
none! 


Myself must tell him in that purer life, 
But now it were too daring. Ahmy God, 
What might I not have made of thy fair 


world, 

Had I but loved thy highest creature 
here? 

It was my duty to have loved the 
highest ; 


It sur ely” was my profit had T known ; 

It would have been my pleasure had I 
seen. 

We needs must love the highest when 
we see it, 

Not Lancelot, nor another.” 


Here her hand 
Grasp’d made her veil her eyes. She 
look’d and saw 
The novice, weeping, suppliant, and said 
to her, 
‘“Yea, little 
given?” 
Then glancing up beheld the holy nuns 
All round her, weeping; and her heart 
was loosed 
Within her, and she wept with these 
and said : 


maid, for am J not for- 


‘¢Ye know me then, that wicked one, 
who broke 
The vast design.and purpose of the King, 
O, shut me round with narrowing nun- 
nery walls, 
Meek maidens, from the voices crying, 
‘Shame !’ 


TENNYSON 


535 





I must not scorn myself; he loves me 
still. 

Let no one dream but that he loves me 
still. 

So let me, if you do not shudder at me, 

Nor shun to call me sister, dwell with 


you ; 

Wear black and white, and bea nun 
like you, 

Fast with your fasts, not feasting with 
your feasts ; . 

Grieve with your griefs, not grieving at 


your joys, 

But not rejoicing; mingle with your 
rites ; 

Pray and be pray’d for; lie before your 
shrines ; 


Do each low office of your holy house ; 

Walk your dim cloister, and distribute 
dole 

To poor sick people, richer in His eyes 

Who ransom’d us, and haler too than IT; 

And treat their loathsome hurts and heal 
mine own ; 

And so wear out in alms-deed and in 
prayer 

The sombre close of that voluptuous day 

Which wrought the ruin of my lord the 
King.” 


She said. They took her to themselves ; 

and she 

Still hoping, fearing ‘‘ Isit yet too late?” 

Dwelt with them, till in time their ab- 
bess died. 

Then ie for her good deeds and her pure 
ife, 

And for the power of ministration in her, 

And likewise for the high rank she had 
borne, 

Was chosen abbess, there, an abbess, 
lived 

For three brief years, and there, an ab- 
bess, passed 

To where beyond these voices there is 


peace. 1859. 
TITHONUS 

THE woods decay, the woods decay and 
fall, 

The vapors weep their burthen to the 
ground, 

Man comes and tills the field and lies be- 
neath, 


And after many a summer dies the swan. 
Me only cruel immortality 

Consumes; [I wither slowly in thine arms, 
Here at the quiet limit of the world, 


A white-hair’d shadow roaming like a 
dream 

The ever-silent spaces of the East, 

Far-folded mists, and gleaming halls of 
morn. . 

Alas! for this gray 
man— 

So glorious in his beauty and thy choice, 

Who madest him thy chosen, that he 
seem’d 

To his great heart none other thana 
God ! 

I ask’d thee, ‘‘ Give me immortality.” 

Then didst thou grant mine asking with 
a smile, 

Like wealthy men who care not how 
they give. 

But thy strong Hours indignant work’d 
their wills, 

And beat me down 
wasted me, 

And tho’ they could not end me, left me 
maim’d 

To dwell in presence of immortal youth, 

Immortal age beside immortal youth, 

And all I was in ashes. Can thy love, 

Thy beauty, make amends, tho’ even 
now, 

Close over us, the silver star, thy guide, 

Shines in those tremulous eyes that fill 
with tears 

To hear me? Let me go; take back thy 

ift. 

Why should a man desire in any way 

To vary from the kindly race of men, 

Or pass beyond the goal of ordinance 

Where all should pause, as is most meet 
for all? 

A soft air fans the cloud apart; there 
comes 

A glimpse of that dark world where I 
was born. 

Once more the old mysterious glimmer 
steals 

From thy pure brows, and from thy 
shoulders pure, 

And bosom beating with a heart renew’d. 

Thy cheek begins to redden thro’ the 
gloom, ; 

Thy sweet eyes brighten slowly close to 
mine, 

Ere yet they blind the stars, and the 
wild team 

Which love thee, yearning for thy yoke, 
arise, 

And shake the darkness from their 
loosen’d manes, 

And beat the twilight into flakes of fire. 

Lo! ever thus thou growest beautiful 


shadow, once a 


and marr’d and 


536 


BRITISH* POETS 





In silence, then before thine answer 
given 


Departest, and thy tears are on my 
cheek. 

Why wilt thou ever scare me with thy 
tears, 

And make me tremble lest a saying 
learnt, 

In days far-off, on that dark earth, be 
true? 


‘The Gods themselves cannot recall 

their gifts.” 
Ay me! ay me! with what another 

heart 

In days far-off, and with what other 
eyes 

I used to watch—if I be he _ that 
watch’d— 

The lucid outline forming round thee; 
saw 

The dim curls kindle into sunny rings; 

Changed with thy mystic change, and 
felt my blood 

Glow with the glow that slowly crim- 
son’d all 

Thy presence and thy portals, while I 


lay, 

Mouth, forehead, eyelids, growing dewy- 
warm 

With kisses balmier than half-opening 
buds 

Of April, and could hear the lips that 
kiss’d 


Whispering I knew not what of wild 
and sweet, 

Like that strange song I heard Apollo 
sing, 

While Ilion like a mist rose into towers. 

Yet hold me not for ever in thine 

Kast ; 

How can my nature longer mix with 
thine? 

Coldly thy rosy shadows bathe me, cold 

Are all thy lights, and cold my wrink- 
led feet 

Upon thy glimmering thresholds, when 
the steam 

Floats up from those dim fields about 
the homes [die, 

Of happy men that have the power to 

And grassy barrows of the happier dead. 

Release me, and restore me to the 
ground. [grave ; 

Thou seest all things, thou wilt see my 

Thou wilt renew thy beauty morn by 
morn, [courts, 

I earth in earth forget these empty 

And thee returning on thy silver wheels. 


THE SAILOR BOY 


HE rose at dawn and, fired with hope, 
Shot o’er the seething harbor-bar, 
And reach’d the ship and caught the 

rope, 
And whistled to the morning star. 


And while he whistled long and loud 
He heard a fierce mermaiden cry, 

‘“O boy, tho’ thou art young and proud, 
I see the place where thou wilt lie. 


‘The sands and yeasty surges mix 
In caves about the dreary bay, 
And on thy ribs the limpet sticks, 
And in thy heart the scrawl shall 


play.” 


‘* Fool,” he answer’d, ‘** death is sure 

To those that stay and those that roam, 
But I will nevermore endure 

To sit with empty hands at home. 


‘‘My mother clings about my neck, 
My sisters crying, ‘Stay for shame ; 
My father raves of death and wreck,— 
They are all to blame, they are all to 
blame. 


> 


‘God help me! save I take my part 
Of danger on the roaring sea, 
A devil rises in my heart, 
Far worse than any death to me.” 
1861. 


MILTON 
(ALCAICS) 


O MIGHTY-MOUTH’D inventor of harmo- 
nies, 
O skill’d to sing of Time or Eternity, 
God-gifted organ-voice of England, 
Milton, a name to resound for ages; 
Whose Titan angels, Gabriel, Abdiel, 
Starr’d from Jehovah’s gorgeous armo- 
ries, 
Tower, as the deep-domed empyrean 
Rings to the roar of an angel onset ! 
Me rather all that bowery loneliness, 
The brooks of Eden mazily murmuring, 
And bloom profuse and cedar arches 
Charm, as a wanderer out in ocean, 
Where some refulgent sunset of India 
Streams o’er a rich ambrosial ocean isle, 
And crimson-hued the stately palm- 
woods 
Whisper in odorous heights of even. 
1863. 


TENNYSON 


5a2 





THE VOYAGE 


WE left behind the painted buoy 
That tosses at the harbor-mouth ; 

And madly danced our hearts with joy, 
As fast we fleeted to the south. 

How fresh was every sight and sound 
On open main or winding shore ! 

We knew the merry world was round, 
And we might sail for evermore. 


Warm broke the breeze against the 


row, © 
Dry sang the tackle, sang the sail ; 
The lady’s-head upon the prow 
eas the shrill salt, and sheer’d the 
ale. 
The ried seas swell’d to meet the keel, 
And swept behind ; so quick the run 
We felt the good ship shake and reel, 
We seem ’d to sail into the sun! 


How oft we saw the sun retire, 

And burn the threshold of the night, 
Fall from his Ocean-lane of fire, 

And sleep beneath his pillar’d light ! 
How oft the purple-skirted robe 

Of twilight slowly downward drawn, 
As thro’ the slumber of the globe 

Again we dash’d into the dawn! 


New stars all night above the brim 
_ Of waters lighten’d into view ; 
They climb’d as quickly, for the rim 
Changed every moment as we flew. 
Far ran the naked moon across 
The houseless ocean’s heaving field, 
Or flying shone, the silver boss 
Of her own halo’s dusky shield. 


The peaky islet shifted shapes, 
High towns on hills were dimly seen ; 
We passed long lines of Northern capes 
And dewy Northern meadows green. 
We came to warmer waves, and deep 
Across the boundless east we drove, 
Where those long swells of breaker 
sweep 
The nutmeg rocks and isles of clove. 


By peaks that flamed, or, all in shade, 

Gloom’d the low coast and quivering 
brine 

With ashy rains, that spreading made 
Fantastic plume or sable pine ; 

By sands and steaming flats, and floods 
Of mighty mouth, we scudded fast, 

And hills and scarlet-mingled woods 
Glow’d for a moment as we passed. 


O hundred shores of happy climes, 

How swiftly stream’d ye by the bark! 
At times the whole sea burn’d, at times 
With wakes of fire we tore the dark ; 

At times a carven craft would shoot 
From havens hid in fairy bowers, 
With naked limbs and flowers and fruit, 
But we nor paused for fruit nor 
flowers. 


For one fair Vision ever fled 
Down the waste waters day and night, 
And still we follow’d where she led, 
In hope to gain upon her flight. 
Her face was evermore unseen, 
And fixed upon the far sea-line ; 
But each man murmur’d, ‘‘ O my queen, 
I follow till I make thee mine!” 


And now we lost her, now she gleam’d 
Like Fancy made of golden air. 

Now nearer to the prow she seem’d 
Like Virtue firm, like Knowledge fair, 

Now high on waves that idly burst 
Like Heavenly Hope she crown’d the 

sea, 

And now, the bloodless point reversed, 

She bore the blade of Liberty. 


And only one among us—him 
We pleased not—he was 
pleased ; 
He saw not far, his eyes were dim, 
But ours he swore were all diseased. 
‘* A ship of fools,” he shriek'd in spite, 
‘“A ship of fools,” he sneer’d and 
wept, 
And overboard one stormy night 
He cast his body, and on we swept. 


seldom 


And never sail of ours was furl’d, 
Nor anchor dropped at eve or morn ; 
We loved the glories-of the world, 
But laws of nature were our scorn. 
For blasts would rise and rave and cease, 
But whence were those that drove the 
sail 
Across the whirlwind’s heart of peace, 
And to and thro’ the counter gale? 


Again to colder climes we came, 
For still we follow’d where she led ; 
Now mate is blind and captain lame, 
And half the crew are sick or dead, 
But, blind or lame or sick or sound, 
We follow that which flies before ; 
We know the merry world is round, 
And we may sail for evermore. 
1864. 


538 





NORTHERN FARMER 


OLD STYLE 


WHEER ’asta bean saw long and mea 
liggin’ ’ere aloan? 

Noorse? thoort nowt 0’ anoorse ; whoy, 
Doctor ’s abean an’ agoan ; 

Says that I moant ’a naw moor aale, but 
I beant a fool; 

Git ma my aale, fur I beant a-gawin’ 
to break my rule. 


Doctors, they knaws nowt, fur a says 
what ’s nawways true ; 

Naw soort o’ koind o’ use to saay the 
things that a do. 

I ’ve ’ed my point o’ aale ivry noight 
sin’ I bean ’ere. 

An’ I’ve ‘ed my quart ivry market- 
noight for foorty year. 


Parson ’s a bean loikewoise, an’ a sittin’ 
ere o’ my bed. 

“The Amoighty ’s a taakin o’ you! to 
‘issén, my friend,” a said, 

An’ a towd ma my sins, an’ ’s toithe 
were due, an’ I gied it in hond ; 

I done moy duty boy ’um, as I ’a done 
boy the lond. 


Larn’d a ma’ bea. I reckons I ’annot 
sa mooch to larn. 

But a cast oop, thot a did, *bout Bessy 
Marris’s barne. 

Thaw a knaws I hallus voated wi’ 
Squoire an’ choorch an’ staate, 

An’ i’ the woost o’ toimes I wur niver 
agin the raate. 


An’ Thallus coom’d to ’s choorch afoor 
moy Sally wur dead, 

An’ ’eard ’um a bummin’ awaay loike a 
buzzard-clock 2 ower my ’ead, 

An’ I niver knaw’d whot a mean’d but 
I thowt a’ad summut to saay, 

An’ I thowt a said whot a owt to’asaid, 
an’ I coom’d awaay. 


Bessy Marris’s barne! tha knaws she 
laaid it to mea. 

Mowt a bean, mayhap, for she wur a 
bad un, shea. 

’Siver, I kep ‘um, I kep ’um, my lass, 
tha mun understond ; 

I done moy duty boy ’um, as I ’a done 
boy the lond. 


1 ow as in hour. 
Tennyson’s. | 
2 Cockchafer, 


[The notes on this poem are 


BRITISH POETS 


But Parson acooms an’a goas, an’ a 
says it easy an’ freea : 
‘The Amoighty ’s a taakin o’ you to 
’issen, my friend,” says ’ea. 

I weant saay men be loiars, thaw sum- 

mun said it in ’aaste ; 
But ’e reads wonn sarmin a weeak, an’ I 
‘a stubb’d Thurnaby waaste. 


D’ ya moind the waaste, my lass? naw, 
naw, tha was not born then ; 
Theer wur a boggle in it, I often ’eard 
"um mysen ; 

Moast loike a butter-bump,! fur I ’eard 
"um about an’ about, 

But I stubb’d ’um oop wi’ the lot, an’ 
raaved an’ rembled ’um out. 


Keaper’s it wur ; fo’ they fun ’um theer 
a-laaid of ’is faace 

Down i’ the woild ’enemies? afoor I 
coom’d to the plaace. 

Noaks or Thimbleby—toaner® ’ed shot 
"um as dead as a naail. 

Noaks wur ’ang’d for it oop at ’soizo— 
but git ma my aale. 


Dubbut loodk at the waaste; theer 
warn’t not feead for a cow ; 

Nowt at all but bracken an’ fuzz, an’ 
loook at it now— 


Warn’t worth nowt a haacre, an’ now 


theer ’s lots o’ feead, 
Fourscoor yows# upon it, an’ some on it 
down 1’ seead.® 


Nobbut a bit on it ’s left, an’ I mean’d to 
’a stubb’d it at fall, 

Done it ta-year I mean’d, an’ runn’d plow 
thruff it an’ all, 

If Godamoighty an’ parson “ud nobbut let 
ma aloan,— . 

Mea, wi’ haate hoonderd haacre 0’ 
Squoire’s, an lond o’ my oan. 


Do Godamoighty knaw what a’s doing 
a-taakin’ o’ mea ? 

I beant wonn as saws ’ere a bean an yon- 
der a pea; 

An’ Squoire ’ull be sa mad an’ all—a 
dear, a’ dear! 

And I ’a managed for Squoire coom 
Michaelmas thutty year. 


A mowt ’a taaen owd Joanes, as’ant not 
a ’aapoth o’ sense, 

Or a mowt a’ taaen young Robins—a 
niver mended a fence; 


8 One or other, 
5 Clover, 


1 Bittern. 2 Anemones, 
4ouasin hour. 


TENNYSON 


But Godamoighty a moost taake mea an’ 
taake ma now, 

Wi aaf the cows to cauve an’ Thurnaby 
hoalms to plow! 


Looédk ’ow quoloty smoiles when they 
seeas ma a passin’ boy, 

Says to thessen, naw doubt, 
man a bea sewer-loy !” 

Fur they knaws what I bean to Squoire 
sin’ fust a coom’d to the ’All; 

I done moy duty by Squoire an’ I done 
moy duty boy hall. 


‘What a 


Squoire’s i? Lunnon, an’ summun I 
reckons ’ull ’a to wroite, 

For whoa ’s to howd the lond ater mea 
thot muddles ma quoit ; 

Sartin-sewer I bea thot a weant niver 
give it to Joanes, 

Naw, nor a moant to Robins—a niver 
rembles the stoans. 


But summun ‘ull come ater mea mayhap 
wi’ ’is kittle o’ steam 

Huzzin’ an’ maazin’ the blessed fealds 
wi’ the divil’s oan team. 

Sin’ IT mun doy I mun doy, thaw loife 
they says is sweet, 

But sin’ I mun doy I mun doy, for I 
couldn abear to see it. 

What atta stannin’ theer fur, an’ doesn 
bring ma the aale? 

Doctor ’s a ’toattler, lass, an a’s hallus 1’ 
the owd taale ; 

I weant break rules fur Doctor, 
naw moor nor a floy ; 

Git ma my aale, I tell tha, an’ if I mun 
doy I mun doy. 1864. 


a knaws 


THE FLOWER! 


ONCE in a golden hour 
I cast to earth a seed. 
Up there came a flower, 
The people said, a weed. 


To and fro they went 
Thro’ my garden-bower, 
And muttering discontent 
Cursed me and my flower. 


Then it grew so tall 
It wore a crown of light, 
But thieves from o’er the wall 
Stole the seed by night ; 


1 See the Life of Tennyson II, 10-11, 


oo7 


Sow’d it far and wide 

By every town and tower, 
Till all the people cried 

‘* Splendid is the flower.” 


Read my little fable.: 
He that runs may read. 
Most can raise the flowers now 
For all have got the seed. 


And some are pretty enough, 
And some are poor indeed ; 

And now again the people 
Call it but a weed. 1864. 

IN THE VALLEY OF CAUTERETZ 


AtLalong the valley, stream that flashest 
white, 

Deepening thy voice with the deepening 
of the night, 


All along the valley, where thy waters 


flow, 
I walk’d with one I loved two and thirty 
years ago. 
Ail ene the valley, while I walk’d to- 


day, 

The two and thirty years were a mist 
that rolls away ; 

For all along the valley, down thy rocky 
bed, 

Thy living voice to me was as the voice 
of the dead, 

And all along the v alley , by rock and 
cave and tree, 

The voice of the dead was a livi ing voice 
to me. 1864. 


A DEDICATION 


DEAR, near and true,-—no truer Time 
himself 

Can prove. you, tho’ he make you ever- 
more 


Dearer and nearer, as the rapid of life 
Shoots to the fall,—take this and pray 





that he 

Who wrote it, honoring your sweet faith 
in him, 

May trust himself ; ; and after praise and 
scorn, [world, 

As one who feels the immeasurable 


Attain the wise indifference of the wise ; 
And after autumn past—if left to pass 
His autumn into seeming-leafless days— 
Draw toward the long frost and longest 
night, {fruit 
Wearing his w isdom lightly, like the 
Which in our winter woodland looks a 
flower. 1864. 


540 


WAGES 


GLoRY of warrior, glory of orator, glory 
of song, 
Paid with a voice flying by to be lost 
on an endless sea— 
Glory of Virtue, to fight, to struggle, to 
right the wrong— 
Nay, but she aim’d not at glory, no 
lover of glory she ; 
Give her the glory of going on, and still 
to be. 


The wages of sin is death: if the wages 
of Virtue be dust, 
Would she have heart to endure for 
the life of the worm and the fly ? 
She desires no isles of the blest, no quiet 
seats of the just, 
To rest in a golden grove, or to bask 
in a summer sky ; 
Give her the wages of going on, and not 
to die. 1868. 


FROM THE COMING OF ARTHUR 


MERLIN'S RIDDLE 


RAIN, rain, and sun! a rainbow in the 
sky ! 

A young man will be wiser by and by ; 

Anold man’s wit may wander ere he die. 


Rain, rain, and sun! a rainbow on the 
lea ! 

And truth is this to me, and that to thee; 

And truth or clothed or naked let it be. 


Rain, sun, and rain! and the free blos- 
som blows; 

Sun, rain, andsun! and where is he who 
knows? 

From the great deep tothe great deep 
he goes. 


TRUMPET SONG 


Blow trumpet, for the world is white 
with May ! 

Blow trumpet, the long night hath roll’d 
away ! 

Blow thro’ the living world—‘‘ Let the 
King reign !” 


Shall Rome or Heathen rule in Arthur’s 
realm ? 

Flash brand and lance, fall battle-axe 
upon helm, 

Fall battle-axe, and flash brand! 
the King reign ! 


Let 


BRITISHARGETS 


Strike for the King and live! his knights 
have heard 

That God hath told the King a secret 
word, 

Fall battle-axe, and flash brand! 
the King reign ! 


Let 


Blow trumpet! he will lift us from the 
dust. 

Blow trumpet! live the strength, and 
die the lust! 

Clang battle-axe, and clash brand! Let 
the King reign ! 


Strike for the King and die! and if thou 
diest, 

The King is king, and ever wills the 
highest. 

Clang battle-axe, and clash brand! Let 
the King reign ! 


Blow, for our Sun is mighty in his May ! 

Blow, for our Sun is mightier day by 
day ! 

Clang battle-axe, andclash brand! Let 
the King reign ! 


The King willfollow Christ, and we the 
King, : 

In whom high God hath breathed a 
secret thing. 

Fall battle-axe, and clash brand! Let 
the King reign ! 1869. 


THE HIGHER PANTHEISM 


THE sun, the moon, the stars, the seas, 
the hills and the plains,— 

Are not these, OSoul, the Vision of Him 
who reigns ? 


Is not the Vision He, tho’ He be not that 
which He seems? 

Dreams are true while they last, and do 
we not live in dreams ? 


Earth, these solid stars, this weight of 
body and limb, 

Are they not sign and symbol of thy 
division from Him ? 


Dark is the world to thee; thyself art 
the reason why, 

For is He not all but thou, that hast 
power to feel ‘Iam I” ? 


Glory about thee, without thee; and 
thou fulfillest thy doom, 

Making Him broken gleams anda stifled 
splendor and gloom, 


TENNYSON : 


Speak to Him, thou, for He hears, and 
Spirit with Spirit can meet— 
Closer is He than breathing, and nearer 

than hands and feet. . 


God is law, say the wise; O soul, and 
let us rejoice, 

For if He thunder by law the thunder is 
yet His voice. 


Law is God, say some; no God at all, 
says the fool, 

For all we have power to see isa straight 
staff bent in a pool ; 


And the ear of man cannot hear, and the 
. eye of man cannot see ; 
But if we could see and hear, this 
Vision—were it not He? 1870. 


FLOWER IN THE CRANNIED WALL 


FLOWER in the crannied wall, 

I pluck you out of the crannies, 

I hold you here, root and all, in my 
hand, 

Little flower—but if I could understand 

What you are, root and all, and all in 
all, 

I should know what God and man is. 

1870. 


NORTHERN FARMER 
NEW STYLE 


Dosn’t thou ’ear my ’erse’s legs, as they 
canters awaay ? 

Proputty, proputty, proputty—that’s 
what I ’ears ’em saay. 

Proputty, proputty, proputty—Sam, 
thou’s an ass for thy pains ; 
Theer’s moor sense i’ one 0’ ‘is legs, nor 

in all thy brains. 


Woa—theer’s a craw to pluck wi’ tha, 
Sam: yon ’s parson’s ’ouse— 
Dosn’t thou knaw that a man mun be 

eather a man or a mouse ? 
Time to think on it then; for thou’ll be 
twenty to weeak.} 
Proputty, proputty—woa then, woa—let 
ma ’ear mysen speak. 


Me an’ thy muther, Sammy, ’as bean 
a-talkin’ o’ thee ; 

Thou’s bean talkin’ to muther, an’ she 
bean a-tellin’ it me. 

Thowll not marry for munny-—-thou’s 
sweet upo’ parson’s lass— 


1 This week. 


541 


Noa—thou ’11 marry for luvv—-an’ we 
boath on us thinks tha an ass. 


Seea’d her to-daay goa by—Saaint’s-daay 
—they was ringing the bells. 

She’s a beauty, thou thinks——an’ soa is 
scoors 0’ gells, 

Them as ’as munny an’ all—wot’s a 
beauty ?—the flower as blaws. 

But proputty, proputty sticks, an’ pro- 
putty, proputty grows. 

Do’ant be stunt ;} taake time. I knaws 
what maakes tha sa mad. 

Warn’t I craazed fur the lasses mysén 
when I wur a lad? 

But I knaw’d a Quaaker feller as often 
’as towd ma this: 

‘*PDoant thou marry for munny, but goa 
wheer munny is!” 


An’ I went wheer munny war; an’ thy 
muther coom to ’and, 

Wi lots o’ munny laaid by, an’ a nicetish 
bit o’ land. 

Maaybe she warn’t a beauty—I niver giv 
it a thowt— 

But warn’t she as good to cuddle an’ kiss 
as a lass as ’ant nowt? 


Parson’s lass ’ant nowt, an’ she weant ’a 
nowt when ’e’s dead, 

Mun be a guvness, lad, or summut, and 
addle 2 her bread. 

Why? fur ’e ’s nobbut a curate, an’ 
weant niver get hissén clear, 

An’ ’e maade the bed as ’e ligson afoor 
’e coom’d to the shere. 


An’ thin ’e coom’d to the parish wi’ lots 
o’ Varsity debt, 

Stook to his taail they did, an’ ’e ’ant 
got shut on ’em yet. 

An’’e ligs on ’is back 7 the grip, wi’ 
noan to lend ’im a shove, 

Woorse nor a far-welter’d? yowe; fur, 
Sammy, ’e married fur luvy. 


Luvv ? what’s luvv ? thou can luvv thy 
lass an’ ’er munny too, 

Maakin’ ’em goa togither, as they’ve good 
right to do. 

Couldn Iluvy thy muther by cause ’o 
‘er munny laaid by ? 

Naay—fur I luvv’d ’er a vast sight moor 
fur it; reason why. 


1 Obstinate. 2 Karn. : 
3 Or, fow-welter’d,—said of a sheep lying onits 
back in the furrow. 


542 


BRITISH POETS 





Ay, an’ thy muther says thou wants to 
marry the lass, 

Cooms of a gentleman burn; an’ we 
boath on us thinks tha an ass. 

Woa then, proputty, wiltha ?—an ass as 
near as mays nowt 1— 

Woa then, wiltha? dangtha !—the bees 
is as fell as owt.? 


Break me a bit o’ the esh for his ’ead, 
lad, out o’ the fence! 

Gentleman burn! whats gentleman 
burn? is it shillins an’ pence ? 

Proputty, proputty’s ivrything ’ere, an’, 
Saminy, I’m blest 

If itis n’t the saame oop yonder, fur 
them as ’as it ’s the best. 


Tis ’n them as ’as munny as breaks into 
’ouses an’ steals, 

Them as ’as coats to their backs an’ 
taakes their regular meals. 

Noa, but it ’s them as niver knaws wheer 
a meal’s to be ’ad. 

Taake my word for it Sammy, the poor 
in a loomp is bad. 


Them or thir feythers, tha sees, mun ’a 
bean a laazy lot, 

Fur work mun ’a gone to the gittin’ whin- 
iver munny was got. 

Feyther ’ad ammost nowt; leastways ’is 
munny was ‘id. 

But ’e tued an’ moil’d issén dead, an’ ’e 
died a good un, ’e did. 


Loo6k thou theer wheer Wrigglesby beck - 


cooms out by the 7ill! 

Feyther run oop to the farm, an’ I runs 
oop to the mill ; 

An’ I’ll run oop to the brig, an’ that 
thou ‘Il live to see ; 

And if thou marries a good un I ’1l leave 
the land to thee. 


Thim’s my noations, Sammy, wheerby 
I means to stick ; 

But if thou marries a bad un, I ’ll leave 
the land to Dick.— 

Coom oop, proputty, proputty—that’s 
what I ’ears ’im saay-— 

Proputty, proputty, proputty—canter 
an’ canter awaay. 1870. 


ENGLAND AND AMERICA IN 1782 


O THOU that sendest out the man 
To rule by land and sea, 


1 Makes nothing. 
2 The flies are as fierce as anything. 


Strong mother of a lion-line, 
Be proud of those strong sons of thine 
Who wrench’d their rights from thee! 


What wonder if in noble heat 
‘Those men thine arms withstood, 
Retaught the lesson thou hadst taught, 
And in thy spirit with thee fought— 
Who sprang from English blood! 


But thou rejoice with liberal joy, 

Lift up thy rocky face, 
And shatter, when the storms are black, 
In many a streaming torrent back, 

The seas that shock thy base! 


Whatever harmonies of law 

The growing world assume, 
Thy work is thine—the single note 
From that deep chord which Hampden 


smote 
Will vibrate to the doom. _ 1872. 


THE VOICE AND THE PEAK 


THE voice and the Peak, 
Far over summit and lawn, 
The lone glow and long roar 
Green-rushing from the rosy thrones 
of dawn! 


All night have I heard the voice 
Rave over the rocky bar, 

But thou wert silent in heaven, 
Above thee glided the star. 


Hast thou no voice, O Peak. 
That standest high above all? 
‘‘T am the voice of the Peak, 
I roar and rave, for I fall. 


‘* A thousand voices go 
To North, South, East, and West ; 
They leave the heights and are troubled, 
And moan and sink to their rest.. 


‘*' The fields are fair beside them, 
The chestnut towers in his bloom ; 
But they—they feel the desire of the 


_ deep 
Fall, and follow their doom. 


‘The deep has power on the height, 
And the height has power on the deep ; 
They are raised for ever and ever, 
And sink again into sleep.” 


Not raised for ever and ever, 
But when their cycle is o’er, 


TENNYSON 


The valley, the voice, the peak, the star 
Pass, and are found no more. 


The Peak is high and flush’d 
At his highest with sunrise fire ; 

The Peak is high, and the stars are high, 
And the thought of a man is higher. 


A deep below the deep, 

And a height beyond the height! 
Our hearing is not hearing, 

And our seeing is not sight. 


The voice and the Peak 
Far into heaven withdrawn, 
The lone glow and long roar 
Green-rushing from the rosy thrones 
of dawn! 1874. 


LYRICS FROM QUEEN MARY 


MILKMAID’S SONG 


SHAME upon you, Robin, 
Shame upon you now ! 
Kiss me would you? with my hands 
Milking the cow? 
Daisies grow again, 
Kingcups blow again, 
And you came and kiss’d me milking 
the cow. 


Robin came behind me, 
Kiss’d me well, I vow. 
Cuff him could I? with my hands 
Milking the cow ? 
Swallows fly again, 
Cuckoos cry again, 
And you came and kiss’d me milking 
the cow. 


Come, Robin, Robin, 
Come and kiss me now ; 
Help it can I ? with my hands 
Milking the cow ? 
Ringdoves coo again, 
All things woo again. 
Come behind and kiss me milking 
the cow! 


LOW, LUTE, LOW! 


HAPLESS doom of woman happy in be- 
trothing ! 
Beauty passes like a breath, and love is 
lost in loathing. 
Low, my lute ; speak low, my lute, but 
say the world is nothing— 
Low, lute, low! 


543 


Love will hover round the flowers when 
they first awaken ; 

Love will fly the fallen leaf, and not be 
overtaken. 

Low, my lute! O, low, my lute ! we fade 
and are forsaken— 

Low, dear lute, low! 
1875. 


MONTENEGRO 


THEY rose to where their sovran eagle 
sails, 

They kept their faith, their freedom, on 
the height, 

Chaste, frugal, savage, arm’d by day 
and night 

Against the Turk ; whose inroad _no- 
where scales 

Their headlong passes, but his footstep 
fails, 

And red with blood the Crescent reels 
from fight 

Before their dauntless hundreds, in 
prone flight 

By thousands down the crags and thro’ 
the vales. 

O smallest among peoples! rough rock- 
throne 

Of Freedom! warriors beating back the 
swarm 

Of Turkish Islam for five hundred years, 

Great Tsernogora,! never since thine own 

Black ridges drew the cloud and brake 
the storm 

Has breathed a race of mightier moun- 
taineers. £STT, 


THE REVENGE! 


A BALLAD OF THE FLEET 


I 


At Flores in the Azores Sir Richard 
Grenville lay, 

Anda pinnace, like a flutter’d bird, 
came flying from far away ; 

‘“Spanish ships of war at sea! we have 

sighted fifty-three !” 

sware Lord Thomas Howard: 

‘Hore God Iam no coward ; 

But I cannot meet them here, for my 
ships are out of gear, 

And the half my men are sick. 
fly, but follow quick. 

We are six ships of the line; can we 
fight with fifty-three?” 


1 See the Life of Tennyson, II. 251-2. 


Then 


I must 


544 


BRITISH POETS 





II 


Then spake Sir Richard Grenville: ‘1 
know you are no coward ; 

You fly them for a moment to fight with 
them again. 

But I’ve ninety men and more that are 
lying sick ashore. 

I should count myself the coward if I 
left them, my Lord Howard, 

To these Inquisition dogs and the devil- 
doms of Spain.” 


Til 


So Lord Howard past away with five 
ships of war that day, 

Till he melted like a cloud in the silent 
summer heaven; 

But Sir Richard bore in hand all hissick 
men from the land 

Very carefully and slow, 

Men of Bideford in Devon, 

And we laid them on the ballast down 
below : 

For we brought them all aboard, 

And they blest him in their pain, that 
they were not left to Spain, 

To the thumb-screw and the stake, for 
the glory of the Lord. 


Vi 


He had only a hundred seamen to work 
the ship and to fight 

And he sailed away from Flores till the 
Spaniard came in sight, 

With his huge sea-castles heaving upon 
the weather bow. 

‘Shall we fight or shall we fly ? 

Good Sir Richard, tell us now, 

For to fight is but to die ! 

There ‘Il be little of us left by the time 
this sun be set.” 

And Sir Richard said again: ‘‘ We be all 
good English men. 

Let us bang these dogs of Seville, the 
children of the devil, 

For I never turn’d my back upon Don or 
devil yet.” 


Vv 


Sir Richard spoke and he laugh’d, and 
we roar’d a hurrah, and so 

The little Revenge ran on sheer into the 
heart of the foe, 

With her hundred fighters on deck, and 
her ninety sick below ; 








For half of their fleet to the right and 
half to the left were seen, 

And the little Revenge ran on thro’ the 
long sea-lane between. 


VI 


Thousands of their soldiers look’d down 
from their decks and laugh’d, 

Thousands of their seamen made mock 
at the mad little craft 

Running on and on, till delay’d 

By their mountain-like San Philip that, 
of fifteen hundred tons, 

And up-shadowing high above us with 
her yawning tiers of guns, 

Took the breath from our sails, and we 
stay’d. 

VII 


And while now the great San Philip 
hung above us like a cloud 

Whence the thunderbolt will fall 

Long and loud, - 

Four galleons drew away 

From the Spanish fleet that day, 

And two upon the larboard and two 
upon the starboard lay, 

And the battle-thunder broke from them 
all. 

VIII 


But anon the great San Philip, she be- 
thought herself and went, 

Having that within her womb that had 
left her ill content ; 

And the rest they came aboard us, and 
they fought us hand to hand, 

For a dozen times they came with their 
pikes and musqueteers, 

And a dozen times we shook ’em off as a 
dog that shakes his ears 

When he leaps from the water to the 
land. 

IX 


And the sun went down, and the stars 
came out far over the summer 
sea, 

But never a moment ceased the fight of 
the one and the fifty-three. 

Ship after ship, the whole night long, 
their high-built galleons came, 


| Ship after ship, the whole night long, 


with her battle-thunder and flame; 
Ship after ship, the whole night long, 
drew back with her dead and her 
shame. 
For some were sunk and many were 
shatter’d, and so could fight us no 
more— 


TENNYSON 





God of battles, was ever a battle like 
this in the world before ? 


x 


For he said, ‘‘ Fight on! fight on!” 

Tho’ his vessel was all but a wreck ; 

And it chanced that, when half of the 
short summer night was gone, 

With a grisly wound to be drest he had 
left the deck, . 

But a bullet struck him that was dress- 
ing it suddenly dead, 

And himself he was wounded again in 
the side and the head, 

And he said, ‘‘ Fight on! fight on!” 


XI 


And the night went down, and the sun 
smiled out far over the summer 


sea, 

And the Spanish fleet with broken sides 
lay round us all in a ring ; 

But they dared not touch us again, for 
they fear’d that we still could 
sting, 

So they watch’d what the end would be. 

And we had not fought them in vain, 

But in perilous plight were we, 

Seeing forty of our poor hundred were 
slain, 

And half of the rest of us maim’d for 
life 

In the crash of the cannonades and the 
desperate strife ; 

And the sick men down in the hold were 
most of them stark and cold, 

And the pikes were all broken or bent, 
and the powder was all of it spent ; 

And the masts and the rigging were 
lying over the side ; 

But Sir Richard cried in his English 
pride : 

‘We have fought such a fight for a day 
and a night 

As may never be fought again ! 

We have won great glory, my men ! 

And a day less or more 

At sea or ashore, 

We die—does it matter when ? 

Sink me the ship, Master Gunner—sink 
her, split her in twain ! 

Fall into the hands of God, not into the 
hands of Spain!” 


XII 


And the gunner said, ‘‘ Ay, ay,” but the 
seamen made reply : 


35 





545 





‘* We have children, we have wives, 

And the Lord hath spared our lives. 

We will make the Spaniard promise, if 
we yield, to let us go; 

We shall live to fight again and to strike 
another blow.” 

And the lion there lay dying, and they 
yielded to the foe. 


XIII 


And the stately Spanish men to their 
flagship bore him then, 

Where they laid him by the mast, old 
Sir Richard caught at last, 

And they praised him to his face with 
their courtly foreign grace ; 

But he rose upon their decks, and he 
cried : 

‘‘T have fought for Queen and Faith 
like a valiant man and true; 

I have only done my duty as a man is 
bound to do. 

With a joyful spirit I Sir Richard Gren- 
ville die!” 

And he fell upon their decks, and he 
died. 


XIV 


And they stared at the dead that had 
been so valiant and true, 

And had holden the power and glory of 
Spain so cheap 

That he dared her with one little ship 
and his English few ; 

Was he devil or man? He was devil for 
aught they knew, 

But they sank his body with honor down 

into the deep. 

And they mann‘d the Revenge with a 
swarthier alien crew, 

And away she sail’d with her loss and 
long’d for her own ; 

When a wind from the lands they had 
ruin’d awoke from sleep, 

And the water began to heave and the 
weather to moan, 

And or ever that evening ended a great 
gale blew, 

And a wave like the wave that is raised 
by an earthquake grew, 

Till it smote on their hulls and their sails 
and their masts and their flags, 

And the whole sea plunged and fell on 
the shot-shatter’d navy of Spain, 

And the little Revenge herself went 
down by the island crags 

To be lost evermore in the main. 

1878. 


546 


THE DEFENCE OF LUCKNOW} 


I 


BANNER of England, not for a season, O 
banner of Britain, hast thou 
Floated in conquering battle or flapped 

to the battle-cry ! 
Never with mightier glory than when 
we had rear’d thee on high 
Flying at top of the roofs in the ghastly 
siege of Lucknow— 

Shot thro’ the staff or the halyard, but 
ever we raised thee anew, 

And ever upon the topmost roof our 
banner of England blew. 


II 


Frail were the works that defended the 
hold that we held with our lives— 

Women and children among us, God 
help them, our children and wives! 

Hold it we might—and for fifteen days 
or for twenty at most. 
‘‘ Never surrender, I charge you, but 
every man die at his post !” 
Voice of the dead whom we loved, our 
Lawrence, the best of the brave; 

Cold were his brows when we kiss’d 
him—we laid him that night in 
his grave. 
“ Every man die at his post!” and there 
. hail’d on our houses and halls 
Death from their rifle bullets, and death 
from their cannon-balls, 

Death in our innermost chamber, and 
death at our slight barricade, 

Death while we stood with the musket, 
and death while we stooped to the 
spade, 

Death to the dying, and wounds to the 
wounded, for often there fell, 

Striking the hospital wall, crashing 
thro’ it, their shot and their shell, 

Death—for their spies were among us. 
their marksmen were told of our 
best, 

So that the brute bullet broke thro’ the 
brain that could think for the 


rest ; 

Bullets would sing by our foreheads, 
and bullets would rain at our 
feet— 


1 ‘** The old flag used during the defence of the 
Residency, was hoisted on the Lucknow flagstaff 
by General Wilson, and the soldiers who still 
survived from the siege were all mustered on 
parade in honor of this poem, when my son 
Lionel (who died on his journey from India) 
visited Lucknow. A tribute overwhelmingly 
touching.” (Tennyson.) 


BRITISH POETS 


Fire from ten thousand at once of the 
rebels that girdled us round— 

Death at the glimpse of a finger from 
over the breadth of a street, 

Death from the heights of the mosque 
and the palace, and death in the 
ground ! 

Mine? yes, a mine! Countermine! 
down, down! and creep thro’ the 
hole! ~ 

Keep the revolver in hand! you can 
hear him—the murderous mole ! 

Quiet, ah! quiet—wait till the point of 
the pickaxe be thro’! 

Click with the pick, coming nearer and 
nearer again than before— 

Now let it speak, and you fire, and the 
dark pioneer is no more; 

And ever upon the topmost roof our 
banner of England blew! 


Til 


Ay, but the foe sprung his mine many 
times, and it chanced on a day 

Soon as the blast of that underground 
thunder-clap echo’d away 

Dark thro’ the smoke and the sulphur 
like so many fiends in their hell— 

Cannon-shot, musket-shot, volley on 
volley, and yell upon yell— 

Fiercely on all the defences our myriad 
enemy fell. 

What have they done? where is it? 
Out yonder. Guard the Redan! 

Storm at the Water-gate! storm at the 
Bailey-gate ! storm, and it ran 

Surging and swaying all round us, as 
ocean on every side 

Plunges and heaves at a bank that is 
daily drowned by the tide— 

So many thousands that, if they be bold 
enough, who shall escape ? 

Kill or be kill’d, live or die, they shall 
know we are soldiers and men ! 

Ready ! take aim at their leaders—their 
masses are gapp’d with our grape— 

Backward they reel like the wave, like 
the wave fingering forward again, 

Flying and foil’d at the last by the 
handful they could not subdue ; 

And ever upon the topmost roof our 
banner of England blew! 


IV 


Handful of men as we were, we were 
English in heart and in limb, 

Strong with the strength of the race to 
command, to obey, to endure, 


TENNYSON 


Each of us fought as if hope for the gar- 
rison hung but on him; 

Still—could we watch at all points? we 
were every day fewer and fewer. 

There was a whisper among us, but only 
a whisper that past : 

** Children and wives—if the tigers leap 
into the fold unawares— 

Every man die at his post—and the foe 
may outlive us at last— 

Better to fall by the hands that they 
love, than to fall into theirs!” 

Roar upon roar in a moment two mines 
by the enemy sprung 

Clove into perilous chasms our walls and 
our poor palisades. 

Riflemen, true is your heart, but be sure 
that your hand beas true ! 

Sharp is the fire of assault, better aimed 
are your flank fusilades— 

Twice do we hurl them to earth from 
the ladders to which they had 
clung, 

Twice from the ditch where they shelter 
we drive them with hand-gre- 
nades ; 

And ever upon the topmost roof our 
banner of England blew ! 


Vv 


Then on another wild morning another 
wild earthquake out-tore 

Clean from our lines of defence ten or 
twelve good paces or more. 

Riflemen, high on the roof, hidden there 
from the light of the sun 

One has leaped up on the breach, crying 
out: ‘‘ Follow me, follow me !”— 

Mark him—he falls! then another and 
him too, and down goes he. 

Had they been bold enough then, who 
can tell but the traitors had won ? 

Boardings and rafters and doors—an 
embrasure ! make way for the gun ! 

Now double-charge it with grape ! 
charged and we fire, and they run. 

Praise to our Indian brothers, and let 
the dark face have his due! 

Thanks to the kindly dark faces who 
fought with us, faithful and few, 

Fought with the bravest among us, and 
drove them, and smote them, and 
slew, 

That ever upon the topmost roof our 
banner in India blew. 


VI 


Men will forget what we suffer and not 
what we do, We can fight! 


It is’ 


547 


But to be soldier all day, and be sentinel 
all thro’ the night— 

Ever the mine and assault, 
their lying alarms, 

Bugles and drums in the darkness, and 
shoutings and soundings to arms, 

Ever the labor of fifty that had to be 
done by five, 

Ever the marvel among us that one 
should be left alive, 

Ever the day with its traitorous death 
from the loopholes around, 

Ever the night with its coffinless cor pse 
to be laid in the ground, 

Heat like the mouth of a hell, or a deluge 
of cataract skies, 

Stench of old offal decaying, and infinite 
torment of flies, 

Thoughts of the breezes of May blowing 
over an English field, 

Cholera, scurvy, and fever, the wound 
that would not be heal’d, 

Lopping away of the limb by the pitiful- 
pitiless knife,— 

Torture and trouble in vain,—for it never 
could save us a life, 

Valor of delicate. women who tended 
the hospital bed, 

Horror of women in travail among the 
dying and dead, 

Grief for our perishing children, and 
never a moment for grief, 

Toil and ineffable weariness, faltering 
hopes of relief, 

Havelock baffled, or beaten, or butcher’d 
for all that we knew— 

Then day and night, day and night, com- 
ing down on the still-shatter’d 
walls 

Millions of musket-bullets, and thou- 
sands of cannon-balls— 

But ever upon the topmost roof our 
banner of England blew. 


our sallies, 


VII 


Hark cannonade, fusillade! is it true 
what was told by the scout, 
Outram and Havelock breaking their 
way through the fell mutineers ? 

Surely the pibroch of Europe is ringing 
again in our ears? 

All ona sudden the garrison utter a 
jubilant shout, 

Havelock’s glorious Highlanders answer 
with conquering cheers, 

Sick from the hospital echo them, women 
and children come out, 

Blessing the wholesome white faces of 
Havelock’s good fusileers, 


548 


BRITISH SePOLIS 





Kissing the war-harden’d hand of the 
Highlander wet with their tears ! 

Dance to the pibroch !—saved! we are 
saved !—is it you? is it you? 

Saved by the valor of Havelock, saved 
by the blessing of heaven ! 

‘‘Hold it for fifteen days!” we have 
held it for eighty-seven ! 

And ever aloft on the palace roof the old 
banner of England blew. 1879. 


RIZPAH! 


Li 


WAILING, wailing, wailing, the wind 
over land and sea— 

And Willy’s voice in the wind, ‘‘ O 
mother, come out to me!” 

Why should he call me to-night, when 
he knows that 1 cannot go? 

For the downs are as bright as day, and 
the full moon stares at the snow. 


We should be seen, my dear ; they would 
spy us out of the town. 

The loud black nights for us, and the 
storm rushing over the down, 

WhenI cannot see my own hand, but 
am led by the creak of the chain, 

And grovel and grope for my son till I 
find myself drenched with the 
rain. 


Anything fallen again? nay—what was 
there left to fall? 

T have taken them home, I have num- 
ber’d the bones, I have hidden 
them all. 

What am I saying? and what are you ? 
do you come as a spy! 

Falls ? what falls? who knows? As the 
tree falls so must it lie. 


Who let her in? how long has she been ? 
you—what have you heard ? 

Why did you sit so quiet? you never 
have spoken a word. 

O—to pray with me—yes—a lady—none 
of their spies— 

But the night has crept into my heart, 
and begun to darken my eyes. 


Ah—you, that have lived so soft, what 
should you know of the night, 

The blast and the burning shame and 
the bitter frost and the fright? 

I have done it, while you were asleep— 
you were only made for the day. 


1 See the Life of Tennyson II, 249-251. 


I have gather’d my baby together—and 
now you may go your way. 


Nay—for it’s kind of you, madam, to sit 
by an old dying wife. 

But say nothing hard of my boy, I have 
only an hour of life. 

I kiss’d my boy in the prison, before he 
went out to die. 

‘“'They dared me to do it,” he said, and 
he never has told me a lie. 

I whipped him for robbing an orchard 
once when he was but a child— 

‘‘The farmer dared me to do it,” he said ; 
he was always so wild— 

And idle—and could n’t be idle—my 
Willy—he never could rest. 

The King should have made him a sol- 
dier, he would have been one of . 
his best. 


But he lived witha lot of wild mates, 
and they never would let him be 
good ; 

They swore that he dare not rob the 
mail, and he swore that he would ; 

And he took no life, but he took one 
purse, and when all was done 

He flung it among his fellows—‘‘I ll 
none of it,” said my son, 


I came into court to the judge and the 
lawyers. I told them my tale, 

God’s own truth—but they kill’d him, 
they kill’d him for robbing the 
mail. 

They hang’d him in chains for a show— . 
we had always borne a good 
name— 

To be hang’d fora thief—and then put 
away—is n’t that enough shame? 

Dust to dust—low down-—let us hide! 
but they set him so high 

That all the ships of the world could 
stare at him, passing by. 

God ‘ll pardon the hell-black raven and 
horrible fowls of the air, 

But not the black heart of the lawyer 
who kill’d him and hang’d him 
there. 


And the jailer forced me away. I had 
bid him my last good-bye ; 

They had fasten’d the door of his cell. 
‘‘Q mother!” I heard him cry. 

I could n’t get back tho’ I tried, he had 
something further to say, 

And now I never shall know it, The 
jailer forced me away, 


TENNYSON 


Then since I could n’t but hear that cry 
of my boy that was dead, 

They seized me and shut me up: they 
fasten’d me down on my bed. 

‘“ Mother, O mother! ”—he cail’d in the 
dark to me year after year— 

They beat me for that, they beat me— 
you know that I could n’t but 

near: 

And then at the last they found I had 
grown so stupid and still 

They let me abroad again—but the crea- 
tures had worked their will. 


Flesh of my flesh was gone, but bone of 
my bone was left— 

I stole them all from the lawyers—and 
you, will you call it a theft ?— 

My baby, the bones that had suck’d me, 

the bones that had laughed and 
had cried— 

Theirs? O, no! they are mine—not 
theirs—they had moved in my 
side. 


Do you think I was scared by the bones ? 
I kiss’d ’em, I buried ’em all— 

I can’t dig deep, Iam old—in the night 
by the churchyard wall. 

My Willy ‘ll rise up whole when the 
trumpet of judgment ’ll sound, 

But I charge you never to say that I 

. laid him in holy ground. 


They would scratch him up—they would 
hang him again on the cursed tree. 

Sin? O, yes, we are sinners, I know—let 
all that be, 

And read me a Bible verse of the Lord’s 
goodwill toward men— 

** Full of compassion and mercy, the 
Lord ”—let me hear it again ; 

‘* Full of compassion and mercy—long- 
suffering.” Yes, O, yes! 

For the lawyer is born but to murder— 
the Saviour lives but to bless. 

He ’\l never put on the black cap except 
for the worst of the worst, 

And the first may be last—I have heard 
it in church—and the last may be 
first. 

Suffering—O, long-suffering—yes, as the 
Lord must know, 

Year after year in the mist and the wind 
and the shower and the snow. 


Heard, have you? what? they have told 
you he never repented his sin. 

How do they know it? are they his 
mother? are you of his kin? 





549 


Heard! have you ever heard, when the 
storm on the downs began, 

The wind that ’ll wail like a child and 
the sea that ‘ll moan like a man? 


Election, Election, and Reprobation— 
it ’s all very well. 

But I go to-night to my boy, and I shall 
not find him in hell. 

For I cared so much for my boy that the 
Lord has look’d into my care, 

And He means me I ’m sure to be happy 
with Willy, I know not where. 


And if he be lost—but to save my soul, 
that is all your desire— 

Do you think that I care for my soul if 
my boy be gone to the fire? 
Ihave been with God in the dark—go, 

go, you may leave me alone— 

You never have borne a child—you are 
just as hard as a stone. 

Madam, I beg your pardon! I think 
that you mean to be kind, 

But I cannot hear what you say for my 
Willy’s voice in the wind— 

The snow and the sky so bright—he 
used but to call in the dark, 

And he calls to me now from the 
church and not from the gibbet— 
for hark! 

Nay—you can hear it yourself—it is 
coming—shaking the walls— 
Willy—the moon ’s in a cloud Good- 

night. Iam going. He calls. 
1880. 





SONG FROM THE SISTERS 


O DIVINER air, 

Thro’ the heat, the drowth, the dust, the 
glare, 

Far from out the west in shadowing 
showers, 

Over all the meadow baked and bare, 

Making fresh and fair 

All the bowers and the flowers, 

Fainting flowers, faded bowers, 

Over all this weary world of ours, 

Breathe, diviner Air ! 


O diviner light, 

Thro’ the cloud that roofs our noon with 
night, 

Thro’ the blotting mist, the blinding 
showers, 

Far from out a sky for ever bright, 

Over all the woodland’s flooded bowers, 


J 


BREPISH PORTS 





Over all the meadow’s drowning flowers, 
Over all this ruin’d world of ours, 
Break, diviner light ! 1880. 


TO VIRGIL} 


RoMAN VIRGIL, thou that singest Ilion’s 
lofty temples robed in fire, 

Ilion falling, Rome arising, wars, and 
filial faith, and Dido’s pyre ; 


Landscape-lover, lord of language more 
than he that sang the ‘‘ Works and 
Days,” 

All the chosen coin of fancy flashing out 
from many a golden phrase ; 


Thou that singest wheat and woodland, 
tilth and vineyard, hive and horse 
and herd ; 

All the charm of all the Muses 
often flowering in a lonely word ; 


Poet of the happy Tityrus piping under- 
neath his beechen bowers ; 

Poet of the poet-satyr whom the laugh- 
ing shepherd bound with flowers ; 


Chanter of the Pollio, glorying in the 
blissful years again to be, 

Summers of the snakeless meadow, un- 
laborious earth and oarless sea ; 


Thou that seest Universal Nature moved 
by Universal Mind ; 

Thou majestic in thy sadness at the 
doubtful doom of human kind ; 


Light among the vanish’d ages; star 
that gildest yet this phantom 
shore ; 

Golden branch amid the shadows, kings 
and realms that pass to rise no 
more ; 


Now thy Forum roars no longer, fallen 
every purple Ceesar’s dome— 

Tho’ thine ocean-roll of rhythm sound 
forever of Imperial Rome— . 


Now the Rome of slaves hath perish’d, 
and the Rome of freemen holds her 
place, 

I, from out the Northern Island sunder’d 
once from all the human race, 


1“ To Virgil was written at the request of the 
Mantuans for the nineteenthcentenary of Virgil’s 
Death.” (Life of Tennyson, II, 320.) 


I salute thee, Mantovano, I that loved 
thee since my day began, 
Wielder of the stateliest measure ever 
moulded by the lips of man. 
1882. 


‘“FRATER AVE ATQUE VALE” 


Row us out from Desenzano, to your 
Sirmione row ! 

So they row’d, and there we landed—‘‘ O 
venusta Sirmio!” 

There to me thro’ all the groves of olive 
in the summer glow, 

There beneath the Roman ruin where the 
purple flowers grow, 

Came that ‘‘ Ave atque Vale” ” of the 
Poet’s hopeless woe, 

Tenderest of Roman _ poets nineteen 
hundred years ago 
‘Frater Ave atque Vale” 

wander’d to and fro 
Gazing at the Lydian laughter of the 
Garda Lake below 
Sweet Catullus’s all-but-island, olive- 
silvery Sirmio ! 1883. 


——asio wc 


EPILOGUE TO THE CHARGE OF 
THE HEAVY BRIGADE 


And here the Singer for his art 
Not all in vain may plead 

‘‘ The song that nerves a nation’s heart 
Is in itself a deed.” 1885. 


VASTNESS 


Many a hearth upon our dark globe sighs 
after many a vanish’d face, 

Many a planet by many a sun may roll 
with the dust of a vanish’d race. 


Raving politics, never at rest—as this 
poor earth’s pale history runs,— 

What is it all but a trouble of ants in the 
gleam of a million million of suns? 


Lies upon this side, lies upon that side, 
truthless violence mourn’d by the 
wise, 

Thousands of voices drowning his own 
in a popular torrent of lies upon 
lies ; 


Stately purposes, valor in battle, glorious 
annals of army and fleet, 

Death for the right cause, death for the 
wrong cause, trumpets of victory, 
groans of defeat ; 


TENNYSON 


Innocence seethed in her mother’s milk, 
and Charity setting the martyr 
aflame ; 

Thraldom who walks with the banner of 
Freedom, and recks not to ruin a 
realm in her name. 


Faith at her zenith, or all but lost in the 
gloom of doubts that darken the 
schools ; 

Craft with a bunch of all-heal in her 
hand, follow’d up by her vassal 
legion of fools; 


Trade flying over a thousand seas with 
her spice and her vintage, her silk 
and her corn ; 

Desolate offing, sailorless harbors, fam- 
ishing populace, wharves forlorn ; 


Star of the morning, Hope in the sun- 
rise; gloom of the evening, Life 
at a close ; 

Pleasure who flaunts on her wide down- 
way with her flying robe and her 
poison’d rose ; 


Pain that has crawl'd from the corpse of 
Pleasure, a worm which writhes 
all day, and at night 

Stirs up again in the heart of the sleeper, 
and stings him back to the curse 
of the light ; 


Wealth with his wines and his wedded 
harlots; honest Poverty, bare to 
the bone ; 

Opulent Avarice, lean as Poverty ; Flat- 
tery gilding the rift in a throne ; 


Fame blowing out from her golden trum- 
pet a jubilant challenge to Time 
and to Fate ; 

Slander, her shadow, sowing the nettle 
on all the laurell’d graves of the 
great ; 


Love for the maiden, crown’d with mar- 
riage, no regrets for aught that 
has been, 

Household happiness, gracious children, 
debtless competence, golden mean; 


National hatreds of whole generations, 
and pigmy spites of the village 
spire ; 

Vows that will last to the last death- 
ruckle, and vows that are snapted 
in a moment of fire; 


537 


He that has lived for the lust of the 
minute, and died in the doing it, 
flesh without mind ; 

He that has nail’d all flesh to the Cross, 
ir ae died out in the love of his 

ind ; 


Spring and Summer and Autumn and 
Winter, and all these old revolu- 
tions of earth; — 

All new-old revolutions of Empire— 
change of the tide—what is all of 
it worth? 


‘What the philosophies, all the sciences, 


poesy, varying voices of prayer, 
All that is noblest, all that is basest, all 
that is filthy with all that is fair? 


What is it all, if we all of us end but in 
being our own corpse-coffins at 
last ? 

Swallow’d in Vastness, lost in Silence, 
drown’d in the deeps of a meaning- 
less Past? 


What but a murmur of gnats in the 
gloom, or a moment’s anger of 
bees in their hive ?— 


Peace, let it be! for I loved him, and 
love him for ever: the dead are 
not dead but alive. 1885. 


MERLIN AND THE GLEAM! 


O YouNG Mariner, 

You from the haven 
Under the sea-cliff, 
You that are watching 
The gray Magician: 
With eyes of wonder, 
Tam Merlin, 


- And Jam dying, 


Tam Merlin 
Who follow the Gleam. 


Mighty the Wizard 

Who found me at sunrise 
Sleeping and woke me 
And learn’d me Magic! 
Great the Master, 

And sweet the Magic, 
When over the valley, 

In early summers, 

Over the mountain, 

On human faces, 


1See the Life of Tennyson, IT, 366. 


552 BRITISH POETS 





And all around me, Clouds and darkness 
Moving to melody, Closed upon Camelot ; 
Floated the Gleam. Arthur had vanish’d 
I knew not whither, | 
Once at the croak of a Raven who The king who loved me, 
crossed it, And cannot die ; 
A barbarous people, For out of the darkness 
Blind to the magic ne - Silent and slowly 
And deaf to the melody, The Gleam, that had waned to a wintry 
Snarl’d at and cursed me. glimmer 
A demon vexed me, On icy fallow 
The light retreated, And faded forest, 
The landskip darken’d, Drew to the valley 
The melody deaden’d, . Named of the shadow, 
The Master whisper’d, And slowly brightening 
‘* Follow the Gleam.” Out of the glimmer, 
And slowly moving again to a melody 
Then to the melody, Yearningly tender, 
Over a wilderness Fell on the shadow, 
Gliding, and glancing at No longer a shadow, 
Elf of the woodland, But clothed with the Gleam. 


Gnome of the cavern, 

Griffin and Giant, 

And dancing of Fairies 

In desolate hollows, 

And wraiths of the mountain, 

And rolling of dragons 

By warble of water, 

Or cataract music But eager to follow, 

Of falling torrents, I saw, whenever 

Whttadiune elles In passing it glanced upon 
Hamlet or city, 


That under the Crosses 
The dead man’s garden, 
he mortal hillock, 
Would break into blossom ; 
And so to the land’s 
Last limit I came— 
And can no longer, 
But die rejoicing, 
For thro’ the Magic 
Of Him the Mighty, 
And rough-ruddy faces Who taught me in childhood, 
Of lowly labor, There on the border 
a a (eT Of boundless Ocean, 
Chg ede Geer And all but in Heaven 
Hovers the Gleam. 


And broader and brighter 
The Gleam flying onward, 
Wed to the melody, 

Sang thro’ the world ; 
And slower and fainter, 
Old and weary, 


Down from the mountain 
And over the level, 

And streaming and shining on 
Silent river, 

Silvery willow, 

Pasture and plowland, 
Innocent maidens, 

Garrulous children, 
Homestead and harvest, 
Reaper and gleaner, 


Then, with a melody 


Stronger and statelier, Not of the sunlight, 
Led me at length Not of the moonlight, 
To the city and palace Not of the starlight ! 
Of Arthur the King ; O young Mariner, 
Touch’d at the golden Down to the haven, 
Cross of the churches, Call your companions, 
Flash’d on the tournament, Launch your vessel 
Flicker’d and bicker’d And crowd your canvas, 
From helmet to helmet, And, ere it vanishes 
And last on the forehead Over the margin, 

Of Arthur the blameless After it, follow it, 


* Rested the Gleam. Follow the Gleam. 1889, 


TENNYSON 





FAR—FAR—AWAY 
(FOR MUSIC) 


WHAT sight so lured him thro’ the fields 
he knew 
As where earth’s green stole 
heaven’s own hue, 
Far—far—away ? 


into 


What sound was dearest in his native 
dells ? 
The mellow lin-lan-lone of evening bells 
Far—far—away. 


What vague world-whisper, mystic pain 
or joy. 
Thro’ those three words would haunt 
him when a boy, ' 
Far—far—away ? 


A whisper from his dawn of life? a 
breath 

From some fair dawn beyond the doors 
of death 
Far—-far—away ? 


Far, far, how far? from o’er the gates of 
birth, 
The faint horizons, all the bounds of 
earth, 
Far—far—away ? 


What charm in words, acharm no words 
could give? 
O dying words, can Music make you live 
Far—far—away ? 1889. 


THE THROSTLE 


‘‘ SUMMER is coming, summer is coming. 
I know it, I know it, I know it. 
Light again, leaf again, life again, love 

again !” 
Yes, my wild little Poet. 


Sing the new year in under the blue. 
Last year you sang it as gladly. 
‘““ New, new, new, new!” Is it then so 
new 
That you should carol so madly ? 


‘“‘Love again, song again, nest again, 
- young again,” 
ever a prophet ‘© crazy ! 
And hardly a daisy as yet, little friend, 
See, there is hardly a daisy. 


‘‘ Here again, here, here, here, happy 
year !” 


oo 





O warble unchidden, unbidden ! 
Summer is coming, is coming, my dear, 
And all the winters are hidden. 

1889. 


THE OAK 


LIVE thy Life, 
Young and old, 

Like yon oak, 

Bright in spring, 
Living gold ; 


Summer-rich 
Then; and then 

Autumn-changed, 

Soberer-hued 
Gold again. 


All his leaves 
Fallen at length, 

Look, he stands, 

Trunk and bough, 


Naked strength. 1889. 


CROSSING THE BAR! 


SUNSET and evening star, 
And one clear call for me! 
And may there be no moaning of the 
bar, 
When I put out to sea, 


But such a tide as moving seems asleep, 
Too full for sound and foam, 
When that which drew from out the 
boundless deep 
Turns again home. 


Twilight and evening bell, 
And after that the dark ! 
And may there be no sadness of fare- 
well, 
When I embark ; 


For tho’ from out our bourne of Time 
and Place 
The flood may bear me far, 
I hope to see my Pilot face to face 
When I have-crossed the bar. 1889. 


1“ Orossing the Bar was written in my father’s 
eighty-first year, on a day in October... . 

‘*T said, ‘ That is the crown of your life’s work ;’ 
he answered, ‘It came in a moment.’ He ex- 
plained the ‘Pilot’ as ‘That Divine and Unseen 
Who is always guiding us.’ 

‘‘ A few days before his death he said to me: 
‘Mind you put Crossing the Bar at the end of all 
editions of my poems,’” (Life of Tennyson, II., 
367, ) F 


ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING 


LIST OF REFERENCES 


EDITIONS 


Poetical Works, edited by C. Porter and H. Clarke, 6 volumes, Crowell ; 
Poetical Works, 5 volumes, Dodd, Mead & Co.; 6 volumes, Scribner’s ; 
Cambridge Edition, 1 volume, Houghton, Mifflin & Co.; * Globe Edition, 
1 volume, The Macmillan Co. Letters, edited by F. G. Kenyon, 2 vo- 
lumes. The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett Barrett, 
2 volumes. 


BioGRAPHY 


* Kenyon (F. G.), Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, edited with 
biographical additions. Horne (R. H.), Life and Letters of Mrs. Brown- 
ing. Ineram (J. H.), Elizabeth Barrett Browning (Famous Women Se- 
ries). See also L’Estrange’s Life of M. R. Mitford, and The Friendships 
of M. R. Mitford; The Letters of M. R. Mitford; Macpherson’s Memoirs 
of Anna Jameson ; and Forster’s Life of Landor. 


REMINISCENCES AND EarLy CRITICISM 


Horne (R. H.), A New Spirit of the Age, 1844. Rircuie (Anne Thack- 
eray), Records of Tennyson, Ruskin, Robert and Elizabeth Barrett 
Browning. * Mirrorp (M. R.), Recollections of a Literary Life. Corn- 
ripGE (Sara), Memoirs and Letters, Vol. I, Chap. 12 (letter of 1844 to John 
Kenyon); Vol. II, Chap. 12 (letter of 1851 to Ellis Yarnall). Bayne 
(Peter), Essays in Biography and Criticism (1st Series): Mrs. . Barrett 
Browning. Roscozr (W. C.), Poems and Essays, Vol. If. Ossox1 (Mar- 
garet Fuller), Art, Literature and the Drama. Por (EK. A.), Works, Vol. 
IV (1890). Hawrnorne, Italian Note-books. Hrintarp (G.. 8.), Six 
Months in Italy. * W. W. Srory and his Friends, edited by Henry 
James. 

LATER CRITICISM 


Benson (A. C.), Essays: Elizabeth Barrett Browning. CHEsTERTON 
(G. K.), Twelve Types. Darmestrerer (Mary J.), Menage de Poétes; in 
the Revue de Paris, Vol. 5, p. 295 and p. 788. *Gossr (E. W.), Critical 
Kit-Kats: The Sonnets from the Portuguese, etc. Muinsanp (J.), Littera- 
ae anglaise et philosophie. Monrreur (Emile), Ecrivains modernes de 

PAngleterre, Vol. II. Scuuyzer (E.), Italian Influences. * STEDMAN 
(EK. C.), Victorian Poets. Trxre (Joseph), Etudes de littérature euro- 
peene. Taytor (Bayard), At Home and Abroad. 


Soe 


ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING 


SONNETS FROM THE PORTUGUESE!’ 


I 


I THOUGHT once how Theocritus had 
sung 

Of the sweet years, the dear and wished- 
for years, 

Who each one ina gracious hand appears 

To bear a gift for mortals, old or young: 

And, as I mused it in his antique tongue, 

I saw, in gradual vision through my 
tears, 

The sweet, sad years, the melancholy 
years, 

Those of my own life, who by turns had 
flung 

A shadow across me. 
was ’ware, 

So weeping, how a mystic Shape did 


Straightway I 


move 

Behind me, and drew me backward by 
the hair ; 

And a voice said in mastery, while I 
strove,— 


““Guess now who holds thee ? ”—‘‘Death,” 
Isaid. But, there, 

The silver answer rang,—‘‘ Not Death, 
but Love.” 


II 


But only three in all God’s universe 

Have heard this word thou hast said,— 
Himself, beside 

Thee speaking, and me listening! and 
replied 

One of us... that was God,... 
laid the curse 

So darkly on my eyelids, as to amerce 

My sight from seeing thee,—that if I 
had died, 

The deathweights, placed there, would 
have signified 


and 


Less absolute exclusion. ‘‘Nay” is 
worse 

From God than from all others, O my 
friend ! 

Men could not part us with their worldly 
jars, 





Nor the seas change us, nor the tempests 
bend ; 

Our hands would touch for all the 
mountain-bars : 

And, heaven being rolled between us at 
the end, 

We should but vow the faster for the 
stars. 


II 2 


UNLIKE are we, unlike, O princely Heart ! 

Unlike our uses and our destinies. 

Our ministering two angels look surprise 

On one another, as they strike athwart 

Their wings in passing. Thou, bethink 
thee, art 

A guest for queens to social pageantries, 

With gages from a hundred brighter 
eyes 

Than tears even can make mine, to play 
thy part 

Of chief musician. What hast thou to 
do 

With looking from the lattice-lights at 
me, 

A poor, tired, wandering singer, sing- 
ing through 

The dark, and leaning up acypress tree ? 

The chrism is on thine head,—on mine, 
the dew,— 


‘And Death must dig the level where 


these agree. 


IV 

THovu hast thy calling to some palace- 
floor, 

Most gracious singer of high poems! 
where 

The dancers will break footing, from the 
care : 

Of watching up thy pregnant lips for 
more. 


1 See the Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Brown- 
ing, I, 316-317. 

2 See the Letters of Robert Browning and Eliz- 
abeth Barrett Barrett, I, 74-75. (May 24, 1845.) 


555 


BRITISH POETS 





556 

And dost thou lift this house’s latch too 
poor 

For hand of thine? and canst thou think 
and bear 


To let thy music drop here unaware 

In folds of golden fulness at my door? 
Look up and see the casement broken in, 
The bats and owlets builders in the roof ! 
My cricket chirps against thy mandolin. 
Hush, call no echo’ up in further proof 
Of desolation ! there’s a voice within 
That weeps ... asthoumust sing... 

alone, aloof. 


Vv 


I LIFT my heavy heart up solemnly, 

As once Electra her sepulchral urn, 

And looking in thine eyes, I overturn 

The ashes at thy feet. Behold and see 

What a great heap of grief lay hid in 
me, 

And how the red wild spar kles dimly 
burn 

Through the ashen grayness. 
foot in scorn 

Could tread them out to darkness utterly, 


If thy 


It might be well perhaps. But if in- 
stead 
Thou wait beside me for the wind to 


blow 
The gray dust up, 
thine head, 
O my Beloved, will not shield thee so, 
That none of all the fires shall scorch 
and shred 


. those laurels on 


The hair beneath. Stand farther off 
then! go. 
VI 1 
Go from me. Yet I feel that I shall 
stand 
Henceforward in thy shadow. Never- 
more 


Alone upon the threshold of my door 

Of individual life, I shall command 

The uses of my soul, nor lift my hand 

Serenely in the sunshine as before, 

Without the sense of that which I for- 
bore— 

Thy touch upon the palm. 
land 

Doom takes to part us, leaves thy heart 
in mine 

With pulses that beat double. 


do 


The widest 


What I 


1 See the Letters of R. B. and E. B. B., I, 74-%, 
and 144, 


And what I dream include thee, as the 


wine 

Must taste of its own grapes. And when 
I sue 

God for myself, He hears that name of 
thine, 

And sees within my eyes the tears of 
two. 

VII 

THE face of all the world is changed, I 
think, 

Since first I heard the footsteps of thy 
soul 

Move still, oh, still, beside me, as they 
stole 


Betwixt me and the dreadful outer brink 

Of obvious death, where I, who thought. 
to sink, 

Was caught up into love, and taught 
the whole 

Of life in a new rhythm. The cup of 
dole 

God gave for baptism, Iam fain to drink, 

And praise its sweetness, Sweet, with 
thee anear. 

The names of country, 
changed away 

For where thou art or shalt be, there or 
here ; 

And this... this lute and song ... 
loved yesterday, 

(The singing angels know) are only dear 

Because thy name moves right in what 
they say. 


heaven, are 


vit} 


WHAT can I give thee back, O liberal 

And princely giver, who hast brought 
the gold 

And purple of thine heart, unstained, 
untold, 

And laid them on the outside of the 
wall 

For such as I to take or leave withal, 

In unexpected largesse ? am I cold, 

Ungrateful, that for these most manifold 

High gifts, I render nothing back at all? 

Notso ; not cold,—but very poor instead. 

Ask God who knows. For frequent 
tears have run 

The colors from my life, and left so dead 

And pale a stuff, it were not fitly done 

To give the same as pillow to thy head. 

Go farther! let it serve to trample on. 


1 With this Sonnet and thenext, compare the 
Letters, I, 183-5. 


_ ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING 


Ix 


CAN it be right to give what Ican give? 

To let thee sit beneath the fall of tears 

As salt as mine, and hear the sighing 
years 

Re-sighing on my lips renunciative 

Through those infrequent smiles which 
fail to live 

For all thy adjurations ? 

That this can scarce be right! 
not peers, 

So to be lovers ; and I own, and grieve, 

That givers of such gifts as mine are, 
must 

Be counted with the ungenerous. 
alas ! 

I will not soil thy purple with my dust, 

Nor breathe my poison on thy Venice- 
glass, 

Nor give thee any love—which were 
unjust. 

Beloved, I only love thee! let it pass. 


O my fears, 
We are 


Out, 


x 


YET, love, mere love, is beautiful indeed 

And worthy of acceptation. Fire is 
bright, 

Let temple burn, or flax ; an equal light 

Leaps in the flame from cedar-plank or 
weed : 

And loveis fire. And when I say at need 

I love thee... mark!... I love thee—in 
thy sight 

I stand transfigured, glorified aright, 

With conscience of the new rays that 
proceed 

Out of my face toward thine. 
nothing low 

In love, when love the lowest : meanest 

creatures 
Who love God, God accepts while loving 


There’s 


So. 

And what I feel, across the inferior 
features 

Of what I am, doth flash itself, and show 

How that great work of Love enhances 
Nature's. 


XI 


AND therefore if to love can be desert, 

Iam not all unworthy. Cheeks as pale 

As these you see, and trembling knees 
that fail 

To bear the burden of a heavy heart,— 

This weary minstrel-life that once was 
girt 

To climb Aornus, and can scarce avail 

To pipe now ’gainst the valley nightingale 


557 


A melancholy music,—why advert 

To these things? O Beloved, it is plain 

Iam not of thy worth nor for thy place ! 

And yet, because I love thee, I obtain 

From that same love this vindicating 
grace, _ 

To live onstillin love,and yet in vain,— 

To bless thee, yet renounce thee to thy 
face. 


SIs 


INDEED this very love which is my boast, 

And which, when rising up from breast 
to brow, 

Doth crown me with a ruby large enow 

To draw men’s eyes and prove the inner 
cost ,— 

This love even, all my worth, to the utter- 
most, 

I should not love withal, unless that thou 

Hadst set me an example, shown me 
how, 

When first thine earnest eyes with mine 
were crossed, 

And love called love. 
not speak 

Of love even, asa good thing of my own: 

Thy soul hath snatched up mine all faint 
and weak, 

And placed it by thee on a golden 


And thus, I can- 


throne,— 

And that Ilove (O soul, we must be 
meek !) 

Is by thee only, whom I love alone. 

XI 

AND wilt thou have me fashion into 
speech 

The love I bear thee, finding words 
enough, 


And hold the torch out, while the winds 
are rough, 

Between our faces, to cast light on 
each ?— 

I drop it at thy feet. I cannot teach 

My hand to hold my spirit so far off 

From myself—me—that I should bring 
thee proof 

In words, of love hidin me out of reach. 

Nay, let the silence of my womanhood 

Commend my woman-love to thy be- 


lief ,— 

Seeing that I stand unwon, however 
wooed, 

And rend the garment of my life, in 
brief, 


By a most dauntless, voiceless fortitude, 
Lest one touch of this heart convey its 
grief. 


558 


BRITISH POETS 





xiv1 


If thou must love me, let it be for nought 

Except for love’s sake only. Do not say 

‘*T love her for her smile—her look—her 
way 

Of speaking 
thought 

That falls in well with mine, and certes 
brought 

A sense of pleasant ease on such a 
day ”— 

For these things in themselves, Beloved, 
may 

Be changed, or change for thee,—and 
love, so wrought, 

May be unwrought so. Neither love me 
for 

Thine own dear pity’s wiping my cheeks 
dry,— 

A creature might forget to weep, who 
bore 

Thy comfort long, 
thereby ! 

But love me for love’s sake, that ever- 


gently,—for a trick of 


and lose thy love 


more 

Thou mayst love on, through love’s eter- 
nity. 

XV 

ACCUSE me not, beseech thee, that I 
wear 

Too calm and sad a face in front of 
thine ; 


For we two look two ways, and can- 
not shine 

With the same sunlight on our brow 
and hair. 

On me thou lookest with no doubting 
care, 

As on a bee shut ina crystalline ; 

Since sorrow hath shut me safe in love’s 
divine, 

And to spread wing and fly in the outer 
air 

Were most impossible failure, if I strove 

To fail so. But I look on thee—on thee— 

Beholding, besides love, the end of love, 

Hearing oblivion beyond memory ; 

As one who sits and gazes from above, 

Over the rivers to the bitter sea. 


XVI 2 


AND yet, because thou overcomest so, 
Because thou art more noble and lke a 
king, 


1Compare the Letters, I, 256, 274-5, 506, 508. 
2Compare the Letters, I, 545, 


Thou canst prevail against my fears and 
fling 

Thy purple round me, till my heart 
shall grow 

Too close against thine heart henceforth 


to know 

How it shook when alone. Why, con- 
quering 

May prove as lordly and complete a 
thing 


In lifting upward, as in crushing low! 

And as a vanquished soldier yields his 
sword 

To one who lifts him from the bloody 
earth, 

Even so, Belovéd, I at last record, 

Here ends my strife. If thow invite me 
forth, 

I rise above abasement at the word. 

Make thy love larger to enlarge my 
worth. 


XVII 


My poet, thou canst touch on all the 
notes 

God set between His After and Before, 

And strike up and strike otf the general 
roar 

Of the rushing worlds a melody that 
floats 

In a serene air purely. Antidotes 

Of medicated music, answering for 

Mankind’s forlornest uses, thou canst 


pour 

From thence into their ears. God’s will 
devotes 

Thine to such ends, and mine to wait on 
thine. 


How, Dearest, wilt thou have me for 
most use? 

A hope, to sing by gladly ? or a fine 

Sad memory, with thy songs to inter- 


fuse ? 

A shade, in which to sing—of palm or 
pine ? . 

A grave, on which to rest from singing? 
Choose. 


XVIII 


I NEVER gave a lock of hair away 

To a man, Dearest, except this to thee, 

Which now upon my fingers thought- 
fully, 

I ring out to the full brown length and 


say 

“Take it.” My day of youth went yes- 
terday : 

My hair no longer bounds to my foot’s 
glee, 


ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING 


So7 








Nor plant [it from rose or myrtle-tree, 

As girls do, any more; it only may 

Now shade on two pale cheeks the mark 
of tears, 

Taught drooping from the head that 
hangs aside 
Through sorrow’s trick. 

funeral-shears 
ao oo this first, but love is justi- 
ed,— 
Take it thou, finding pure, frqm all those 
years, 
The tH my mother left here when she 
ied. 


I thought the 


XIX 


THE soul’s Rialto hath its merchandise ; 

I barter curl for curl upon that mart, 

And from my poet’s forehead to my 
heart 

Receive this lock which outweighs ar- 
gosies,— 

As purply black, as erst to Pindar’s eyes 

The dim purpureal tresses gloomed 


athwart 

The nine white Muse-brows. For this 
counterpart, 

The bay-crown’s shade, Belovéd, I sur- 
mise, 


Still lingers on thy curl, it is so black ! 

Thus, with a fillet of smooth-kissing 
breath, 

I tie the shadows safe from gliding back, 

And lay the gift where nothing hin- 
dereth ; 

Here on my heart, as on thy brow, to 
lack 

No natural heat till mine grows cold in 
death. 


3 ee! 


BELOVED, my Beloved, when I think 

That thou wast in the world a year ago, 

What time I sat alone here in the snow 

And saw no footprint, heard the silence 
sink 

No moment at thy voice, but, link by 
link, 

Went counting all my chains as if that 
SO 

They never could fall off at any blow 

Struck by thy possible hand,—why, thus 
I drink 

Of life’s great cup of wonder ! 
ful, 

Never to feel thee thrill the day or night 

With personal act’ or speech,—nor ever 
cull 


Wonder- 


1 Compare the Letters, I, 147, 


Some prescience of thee with the blos- 
soms white 

Thou sawest growing ! 
dull, 

Who cannot guess God’s presence out of 
sight. 


Atheists are as 


ert 


SAY over again, and yet once over again, 

That thou dost love me. Though the 
word repeated 

Should seem ‘‘a cuckoo-song,” as thou 
dost treat it, 

Remember, never to the hill or plain, 

Valley and wood, without her cuckoo- 
strain 

Comes the fresh Spring in all her green 
completed. 

Beloved, I, amid the darkness greeted 

By a doubtful spirit-voice, in that doubt’s 
pain 

Cry, ‘‘ Speak once more—thou lovest ! ” 
Who can fear : 

Too many stars, though each in heave1 
shall roll, 

Too many flowers, though each shall 
crown the year? 

Say thou dost love me, love me, love me 
—toll 

The silver iterance !—only minding, 
Dear, 

To love me also in silence with thy soul. 


XXII 
WHEN our two souls stand up erect and 
strong, 
Face to face, silent, drawing nigh and 
nigher, 
Until the lengthening wings break into 
fire 


At either curvéd point,—what bitter 


wrong 

Can the earth do to us, that we should 
not long 

Be here contented ? 
ing higher, 

The angels would press on us and aspire 

To drop some golden orb of perfect song 

Into our deep, dear silence. Let us stay 

Rather on earth, Belovéd,—where the 
unfit 

Contrarious moods of men recoil away 

And isolate pure spirits, and permit 

A place to stand and love in for a day, 

With darkness and the death-hour round- 
ing it. 


Think. In mount- 


1 Compare the Letters, I, 336, 


560 


BRITISH POETS 





xxi 1 


Is it indeed so? If I lay here dead, 

Wouldst thou miss any life in losing 
mine? 

And would the sun for thee more coldly 
shine 

Because of grave-damps falling round 
my head ? 

I marvelled, my Belovéd, when I read 


Thy thought so in the letter. I am 
thine— 

But . . . somuch to thee? CanI pour 
thy wine 


While my hands tremble ? 
soul, instead 

Of dreams of death, resumes life’s lower 
range, 

Then, love me, Love! 
breathe on me! 

As brighter ladies do 
strange, 

For love, to give up acres and degree, 

I yield the grave for thy sake, and ex- 
change 

My near sweet view of Heaven, for earth 
with thee ! 


Then my 


look on me— 


not count it 


XXIV 


Let the world’s sharpness, like a clasp- 
ing knife, 

Shut in upon itself and do no harm 

In this close hand of Love, now soft and 


warm. 

And let us hear no sound of human 
strife 

After the click of the shutting. Life 
to liife— 


IT lean upon thee, Dear, without alarm, 

And feel as safe as guarded by a charm 

Against the stab of worldlings, who if 
rife 

Are weak to injure. Very whitely still 

The lilies of our lives may reassure 


Their blossoms from their roots, ac- 
cessible 

Alone to heavenly dews that drop not 
fewer, 


Growing straight, out of man’s reach, 
on the hill. [us poor. 
God only, who made us rich, can make 


XXV 
A HEAVY heart, Belovéd, have I horne 
From year to year until I saw thy face, 
And sorrow after sorrow took the place 
Of all those natural joys as ightly worn 


1Compare the Letters, I, 337, 345, 350. 


As the stringed pearls, each lifted in its 
turn 

By a_ beating heart at dance-time. 
Hopes apace 

Were changed to long despairs, till God’s 
own grace 

Could scarcely lift above the world for- 
lorn 

My heavy heart. Then thou didst bid 
me bring 

And let it drop adown thy calmly great 

Deep being! Fast it sinketh, as a thing 

Which its own nature doth precipitate, 

While thine doth close above it, media- 
ting , 

Betwixt the stars and the unaccom- 
plished fate. 


XXVI 


IT LIVED with visions for my company 

Instead of men and women, years ago, 

And found them gentle mates, nor 
thought to know 

A sweeter music than they played to 
me. 

But soon their trailing purple was not 


free 

Of this world’s dust, their lutes did 
silent grow, 

And I myself grew faint and blind be- 
low 

Their vanishing eyes. 
come—to be, 

Beloved, what they seemed. 
shining fronts, 

Their songs, their splendors (better, yet 
the same, 

As river-water hallowed into fonts), 

Met in thee, and from out thee over- 
came 

My soul with satisfaction of all wants: 

Because God’s gifts put man’s best 
dreams to shame. 


Then THOU didst 


Their 


xxvil 


My own Beloved, who hast lifted me 

From this drear flat of earth where I 
was thrown, 

And, in betwixt the languid ringlets, 
blown 

A life-breath, till the forehead hope- 
fully 

Shines out again, as all the angels see, 

Before thy saving kiss! My own, my 
own, 

Who camest to me when the world was 
gone, 


1 Compare the Letters, I, 595. 


ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING 


And I who looked for only God, found 
thee ! 

I find thee ; I am safe, and strong, and 
glad. 

As one who stands in dewless asphodel 

Ree peck yard on the tedious time he 

a 

In the upper life,—so I, with bosom- 
swell, 

Make witness, here, between the good 
and bad, 

That Love, as strong as Death, retrieves 
as well. 


xxvurl 


My letters! all dead paper, 
white ! 

And yet they seem alive and quivering 

Against my tremulous hands which 
loose the string 

And let them drop down on my knee 
to-night. 

This said,—he wished to have me in his 
sight 

Once, as a friend: this fixed a day in 
spring 

To come and touch 
simple thing, 

Yet I wept for it !—this, 


mute and 


Py ehand ss)... 8 


. the paper’s 


light . 

Said, ore z, love thee; and I sank and 
quailed 

As if God’s future thundered on my 
past. 

This said, J am thine—and so its ink has 
paled 

With lying at my heart that beat too 
fast. 

And this . . . O Love, thy words have 


ill availed 
If, what this said, I dared repeat at last ! 


XXIX 


I THink of thee !—my thoughts do twine 
and bud 

About thee, as wild vines, about a tree, 

Put out broad leaves, and soon there’s 
nought to see 

Except the straggling green which hides 
the wood. 

Yet, O my palm-tree, be it understood 

I will not have my thoug hts instead of 


thee 

Who art dearer, better! Rather, in- 
stantly 

Renew thy presence; as a strong tree 
should, 


1 Compare the Letters, I, 6, 70, 365. 
36 


561 





ne ae boughs and set thy trunk all 

are, 

And let these bands of greenery which 
insphere thee 

Drop heavily down,—burst, shattered, 
everywhere ! 

Because, in this deep joy to see and hear 
thee 

And breathe within thy shadow a new 


ales 
Ido not think of thee—I am too near 
thee. 


XXX 


I SEE thine image through my tears to- 
night, 

And yet to-day I saw thee smiling. 
How 

Refer the cause ?—Beloved, is it thou 
Or I, who makes me sad ? The acolyte 
Amid the chanted joy and thankful rite 
May so fall flat, with pale insensate 


brow, 

On the altar-stair. I hear thy voice and 
vow, 

Perplexed, uncertain, since thou art 


out of sight, 

As he, in his swooning ears, the choir’s 
Amen. 

Beloved, dost thou love ? or did I see all 

The glory as I dreamed, and fainted 
when 

Too vehement light dilated my ideal, 

For my soul’s eyes? Will that hght 
come again, 

As now these tears come—falling hot 
and real? 


XXXI 


THovu comest! allis said without a word. 

I sit beneath thy looks as children do 

In the noon-sun, with souls that tremble 
through 

Their happy eyelids from an unaverred 

Yet prodigal inward joy. Behold, I 
erred 

In that last doubt ! and yet I cannot rue 

The sin most, but the occasion—that we 


two 

Should for a moment stand unminis- 
tered 

By a mutual presence. Ah, keep near 
and close, 


Thou dovelike help! and, when 
fears would rise, 

With thy broad heart serenely inter- 
pose : 


Brood aon with thy divine sufficiencies 


my 


562 


BRITISH POETS 





These thoughts which tremble when 
bereft of those, 


Like callow birds left desert to the 


skies. 
EXEX CNG: 

THE first time that the sun rose on thine 
oath 

To love me, I looked forward to the 
moon 

To slacken all those bonds which seemed 
too soon 

And quickly tied to make a lasting 
troth. 


Quick-loving hearts, I thought, may 
quickly loathe ; 

And, looking on myself, I seemed not 
one 


For such man’s love ;—more like an out- 
of-tune 

Worn viol, a good singer would be 
wroth 


To spoil his song with, and which, 
snatched in haste, 

Is laid down at the first ill-sounding 
note. 

I did not wrong myself so, but I placed 

A wrong on thee. For perfect strains 
may float 

’Neath master-hands, from instruments 
defaced ,— 

And great souls, at one stroke, may do 
and doat. 


XXXII 


YES, call me by my pet-name! let me 
hear 

The name I used to run at, when achild, 

From innocent play, and leave the cow- 
slips piled, 

To glance up in some face that proved 


me dear 

With the look of its eyes. I miss the 
clear 

Fond voices which, being drawn and 
reconciled 


Into the music of Heaven’s undefiled, 

Call me no longer. Silence on the bier, 

While I call God—call God !—So let thy 
mouth 

Be heir to those who are now exanimate. 

Gather the north flowers to complete the 
south, 

And catch the early love up in the late. 

Yes, call me by that name,—and I, in 
truth, 

With the same heart, will answer and 
not wait. 


XXIV 
WITH the same heart, I said, I'll answer 
thee 
As those, when thou shalt call me by my 
name— 
Lo, the vain promise! is the same, the 
same, 


Perplexed and ruffled by life’s strategy ? 
When called before, I told how hastily 
I dropped my flowers or brake off froma 


game, 

To run and answer with the smile that 
came 

At play last moment, and went on with 
me 

Through my obedience. When Ilanswer 
now, 

I drop a grave thought, break from soli- 
tude; 

Yet still my heart goes to thee—ponder 
how-- 


Not as to asingle good, but all my good !1 

Lay thy hand on it, best one, and allow 

That no child’s foot could run fast as 
this blood. 


XXXV 


Ir I leave all for thee, wilt thou ex- 
change 

And be all to me? Shall I never miss 

Home-talk and blessing and the common 
kiss 

That comes to each in turn, nor count it 
strange, 

When I look up, to drop on anew range 

Of walls and floors, another home than 
this ? 

Nay, wilt thou fill that place by me 
which is 

Filled by dead eyes too tender to know 
change? 

That’s hardest. 
tried, 

To conquer grief, tries more, as all. 
things prove ; 

For grief indeed is love and grief beside. 

Alas, I have grieved so I am hard to love. 

Yet love me—wilt thou? Open thine 
heart wide, 

And fold within the wet wings of thy 


If to conquer love, has 


dove. 
<x Xa 
WHEN we met first and loved, I did not 
build 
Upon the event with marble. Could it 
mean 


1 Compare the Letters, I, 361. 


ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING 


563 





To last, a love set pendulous between 

Sorrow and sorrow? Nay, I rather 
thrilled, 

Distrusting every light that seemed to 
gil 

The onward path, and feared to overlean 

A finger even. And, though I have 
grown serene 

And strong since then, I think that God 
has willed 


A still renewable fear ... O love, O 
ESA 5s 

Lest these enclaspéd hands should never 
hold, 

This mutual kiss drop down between us 
both 

As an peepee thing, once the lips being 
cold. 

And Love, be false! if he, to keep one 
oath, 

Must lose one joy, by his life’s star fore- 
told. 

XXXVII 

PARDON, oh, pardon, that my soul should 
make, 

Of all that strong divineness which I 
know 


For thine and thee, an image only so 

Formed of the sand, and fit to shift and 
break. 

It is that distant years which did not 
take 

Thy sovranty, recoiling with a blow, 

Have forced my swimming brain to un- 
dergo 

Their doubt and dread, and blindly to 
forsake 

Thy purity of likeness and distort 

Thy worthiest love to a worthless coun- 
terfeit : 

As if a shipwrecked Pagan, safein port, 

His guardian sea-god to commemorate, 

Should set a sculptured porpoise, gills a- 

- snort 
And vibrant tail, within the temple-gate. 


XXXVII 
First time he kissed me, he but only 
kissed 
The fingers of this hand wherewith I 
write ; 
And ever'since, it grew more clean and 
white, 


Slow to world-greetings, quick with its 
Oh,-lst,” 

When the angels speak. A ring of 
amethyst 


I could not wear here, plainer to my 
sight, 

Than that first kiss. 
in height 

The first, and sought the forehead, and 
half missed, 

Half falling on the hair. O beyond meed ! 

That was the chrism of love, which 
love’s own crown, 

With sanctifying sweetness, did precede. 

The third upon my lips was folded down 

In perfect, purple state ; since when, in- 
deed, 

I have been proud and said, ‘‘ My love, 
my own.” 


The second passed 


XXXIX 


BECAUSE thou hast the power and own’st 
the grace 

To look through and behind this mask 
of me 

(Against which years have beat thus 
blanchingly 

With their rains), and behold my soul’s 
true face, 

The dim and weary witness of life’s 


race,— 

Because thou hast the faith and love to 
see, 

Through that same soul’s distracting 
lethargy, 


The patient angel waiting for a place 

In the new Heavens,—because nor sin 
nor woe, 

Nor God’s infliction, nor death’s neigh- 
borhood, 

Nor all which others viewing, turn to 


£0, 
Nor all which makes me tired of all, self- 
viewed,— 


Nothing repels thee, ... Dearest, teach 


me so 

To pour out gratitude, as thou dost, 
good ! 

XL 

OH, yes! they love through all this world 
of ours! 

I will not gainsay love, called love 
forsooth, 

I have heard love talked in my early 
youth, 

And since, not so long back but that the 
flowers 


Then gathered, smell still. Mussulmans 
and Giaours 
Throw kerchiefs at a smile, and have no 


ruth 


564 


BRITISH SPOETS 





For any weeping. Polypheme’s white 
tooth 

Slips on the 
showers, 

The shell is over-smooth,—and not so 


nut if, after frequent 


much 

Will turn the thing called love, aside to 
hate, 

Or else to oblivion. But thou art not 
such 


A lover, my Belovéd! thou canst wait 

Through sorrow and sickness, to bring 
souls to touch, 

And think it soon when others cry ‘‘ Too 
late.” 


XLI 


I THANK all who have loved me in their 
hearts, 

With thanks and love from mine. 
thanks to all 

Who paused a little near the prison-wall 

To hear my music in its louder parts 

Ere they went onward, each one to the 
mart’s 

Or temple’s occupation, beyond call. 

But thou, who, in my voice’s sink and 
fall 

When the sob took it, thy divinest Art’s 

Own instrument didst dr op down at thy 


Deep 


foot 

To hearken whatI said between my 
tears,... 

Instruct me how to thank thee! Oh, to 
shoot ~ 


My soul’s full meaning into future years, 
That they should lend it utterance, and 


salute 

Love that endures, from Life that dis- 
appears ! 

XLII 

‘“< My ee noe not copy fae my 
ast” 

I wrote that o1 once; and thinking at my 
side 


My ministering life-angel justified 

The word by his appealing look upeast 

To Rig vinte throne of God, I turned at 

ast, 7: 

And there, instead, saw thee, not unallied 

To angels in thy soul! Then I, long 
tried 

By natural ills, received the comfort fast, 

While budding, at thy sight, my pilgrim’s 
staff 


1A sonnet of Mrs. Browning’s, of 1844, begins 
with this line. See also the Letters, i Ost. 


Gave out green leaves with morning 
dews impearled. 

I seek no copy now of life’s first half : 

Leave here the pages with long musing 
curled, 

And write me new my future’s epigraph, 

New angel mine, unhoped for in the 


world ! 
XLII 

How do I love thee? Let me count the 
Ways. 

I love thee to the depth and breadth and 
height 

My soul can reach, when feeling out of 
sight 


For the ends of Being and ideal Grace. 

1 love thee to the level of everyday’s 

Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light. 

ITlove thee freely, as men strive for 
Right ; 

I love thee purely, as they turn from 
Praise. 

I love thee with the passion put to use 

In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s - 
faith. 

I love thee with a love I seemed to lose 

With my lost saints,—I love thee with 
the breath, 

Smiles, tears, of all my life !—and, if God 
choose, 

I shall but love thee better after death. 


XLIV 


BELOVED, thou hast brought me many 
flowers 

Plucked in the garden, all the summer 
through 

And winter, “and it Seemed as if they grew 

In this close room, nor missed the sun 
and showers. 

So, in the hike name of that love of ours, 

Take back these thoughts which here un- 
folded too, 

And which on warm and cold days I 
withdrew 

From my heart’s ground. 
beds and bowers 

Be overgrown with bitter weeds and rue, 

And wait thy weeding ; yet here’s eglan- 
tine, 

Here's ivy !—take them, as I used to do 

Thy flowers, and keep them where they 
shall not pine. 

Instruct thine eyes to keep their colors 
true, 

And tell thy soul their roots are left in 
mine. [1847.] 1850. 


Indeed, those 


ROBERT BROWNING 


LIST OF REFERENCES 
EDITIONS 


~ Porticat Works, 9 volumes, The Macmillan Co. Riverside Edition, 6 
volumes, Houghton & Mifflin. Globe Edition, 2 volumes, edited by Aug- 
ustine Birrell, The Macmillan Co. Cambridge Edition, 1 volume, 
Houghton & Mifflin. Selections, 2 volumes; Smith, Elder & Co., 1872 
(Browning’s own selection). Selections, 2 volumes, edited by C. Porter 
and H. Clarke, Crowell (The same, with additional poems subsequent to 
1872). 


BroGRAPHY 


Orr (Alexandra L.), Life and Letters of Robert Browning, 1891. 
*Suarp (Win.), Life of Browning (Great Writers Series), 1890. Cary 
(EK. L.), Browning as Poet and Man. Waven (A. R.), Robert Browning 
(The Westminster Biographies), 1900. Douaias (James), Biography of 
Robert Browning (Bookman Series). * Cuestrerton (G. I.), Browning 
(English Men of Letters), 1903. * DowpeNn (E.), Browning (The Temple 
Biographies), 1904. See also Forster’s Life of Landor, Hallam Tennyson’s 
Life of Tennyson, The Letters of Robert Browning and Elizabeth Barrett 
Barrett, and The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, 


REMINISCENCES AND EARLY CRITICISM 


* GossE (KE. W.), Robert Browning; Personalia, 1890. Rircure (Anne 
Thackeray), Records of Tennyson, Ruskin, Robert and Elizabeth Brown- 
ing, 1892. Durry (C. G.), Conversations with Carlyle. * W. W. Srory 
and his Friends. Farrar (fF. W.), Men I have Known. Bronson (K.), 
The Century, Vol. XXXVII, p. 920: Browning in Asolo. Bronson (Ix), 
The Century, Vol. XLI, p. 572: Browning in Venice. Lampert (L. V.), 
Chatauquan, Vol. XXXV, p. 590: The Brownings in Florence. Horne 
(R. H.), A New Spirit of the Age, 1844. Powett (T.), The Living Authors 
of England, 1849. Ossorr (M. F.), Art, Literature and the Drama. 
Hawruorne, Italian Note-Books. Bagrnor (W.), Literary Studies, Vol. 
Il: Wordsworth, Tennyson and Browning; or Pure, Ornate and Gro- 
tesque Art in English Poetry (Originally in National Review, Novy- 
ember, 1864). Nerriesuip (J. T.), Essays on Robert Browning’s Poetry, 
1868. Morris (William), Review of Men and Women, 1856. 

565 


5,66 BRIPISH PORTS 
INTRODUCTIONS TO BROWNING 


ALEXANDER (W. H.), An Introduction to the Poetry of Robert Brown- 
ing. * Berpor (E.), The Browning Cyclopeedia, a Guide to the Study of 
the Works of Robert Browning. Cuicaco BrRownineG Society, Browning’s 
Poetry, Outline Studies. Cooker (Bancroft), An introduction to Robert 
Browning. Cooker (G. W.), A Guide-Book to the Poetic and Dramatic 
Works of Robert Browning. Corson (Hiram), An Introduction to the 
Study of Robert Browning’s Poetry. DeErrries (EK. P.), Browning Primer. 
FoTHERInGcuaM (J.), Studies of the Mind and Art of Browning. HoLianp 
(F. M.), Stories from Robert Browning. Krnestanpn (W. G.), Robert 
Browning, Chief Poet of the Age. Morineux (M. A.), A Phrase-Book 
from the Poetic and Dramatic Works of Robert Browning. Morison 
(Jeanie), Sordello, an outline Analysis of Mr. Browning’s Poem. ORR 
(Alexandra L.), A Handbook to the Works of Robert Browning. Symons 
(A.), An Introduction to the Study of Browning. Wuzson (F. M.), A 
Primer on Browning. : 

(The above books are for the most part more elementary than could. be 
needed to-day by any person of ordinary intelligence. Some of them 
however, especially that of Berdoe, and in a less degree those of Corson, 
G. W. Cooke, and Mrs. Orr, contain much valuable information not else- 
where so easily obtainable.) 


LATER CRITICISM 


* Beatry (Arthur), Browning’s Verse-Form, its Organic Character. 
* Berpor (E.) Browning’s Message to his Time; his Religion, Philosophy 
and Science. Birretit (Augustine), Essays and Addresses. * BrrrELi 
(Augustine), Obiter Dicta, Vol. I: On the Alleged Obscurity of Mr. 
Browning’s Poetry. * Browning Socrery (of London): Browning 
Studies; Selected Papers of Members of the Browning Society, Edited 
by Edward Berdoe. * Boston Brownine Society: Selected Papers. 
Brooke (5. A.), The Poetry of Browning. Burton (R.), Literary Likings : 
Renaissance in Browning’s Poetry. CarrEnTER (W. Boyd), The Reli- 
gious Spirit in the Poets. * Cuapman (J. J.), Emerson and Other Hssays. 
Cuurcn (R. W.), Dante and Other Essays: Sordello. Cooks (G. W.), 
Poets and Problems. Curtis (G. W.), From the Easy Chair; Robert 
Browning in Florence. DarmrstTrTER (Mary J.), Revue de Paris, October, 
1898: Ménage de Poétes. *Downprn (E.), Studies in Literature: Mr. 
Tennyson and Mr. Browning; Transcendental Movement in Literature. 
Downpen (E.), Transcripts and Studies: Mr. Browning’s Sordello. EVERETT 
(C.C.), Essays Theological and Literary. Fawcerrt (C.), Agnosticism and 
Other Essays: The Browning Craze. Forman (H. B.), Our Living Poets. 
Hurron (R. H.), Literary Essays. James (Henry), Essays in London and 
Elsewhere. Jenkin (Fleming), Papers Literary, Scientific, etc.: The 
Agamemnon and Trachiniae. * LAawron (W. ©.), The Classical Element 
in Browning’s Poetry. Masnite (H. W.), Essays in Literary Interpreta- 


ROBERT BROWNING 567 


tion. Mirsanp (Joseph), Littérature anglaise et philosophie. Moriry 
(John), Studies in Literature: The Ring and the Book. Onrenanrr (Mar- 
garet), The Victorian Age of English Literature, Vol. I. Pater (Walter), 
Essays from the Guardian. Sarnrsspury (George), Corrected Impressions. 
*SanTAYANA (George), Interpretations of Poetry and Religion: The 
Poetry of Barbarism— Walt Whitman, Robert Browning. * ScueLiina (F. 
E.), Two Essays on-Robert Browning. * StepMAN (EK. C.), Victorian Poets. 
STEPHEN (Leslie), Studies of a Biographer, Vol. UI. * Swinsurneg, Intro- 
duction to the Works of George Chapman, pp. Xiv-xix (a splendid pas- 
sage on the alleged obscurity of Browning). THomson (James), Biographi- 
cal and Critical Studies: Notes on the Genius of Robert Browning ; The 
Ring and the Book ; Browning’s Pacchiarotto. Trices (O. L.), Browning 
and Whitman, A Study in Democracy. Vincent (L. H.), A Few Words 
on Robert Browning. Woopsrerry (G. E.), Makers of Literature: On 
Browning’s Death. 

ArmsTRoNG (R. A.), Faith and Doubt. Austry (A.), The Poetry of the 
Period. Bucuanan (R.), Master Spirits. CuHenry (V.), The Golden 
Guess. Courtney (W.L.), Studies New and Old. Dawson (W. J.), 
Makers of Modern English; Religion of Browning. Drvery (J.), Com- 
parative Estimate of Modern English Poets. Forster (J.), Four Great 
Teachers: John Ruskin, Thomas Carlyle, Ralph Waldo Emerson, and 
Robert Browning. Frisweuu (J. H.), Modern Men of Letters. Ganron 
(A.), Urbana Scripta. Gouitp (E. P.), The Brownings and America. 
Krrnanan (Coulson), Wise Men and a Fool: One Aspect of Browning. 
MacDonatp (George), Imagination and Other Essays: Browning’s 
Christmas Eve. McCormick (W. 8.), Three Lectures on English Liter- 
ature: The Poetry of Robert Browning. Norn (R. B. W.), Essays on 
Poetry and Poets. Sarrazin (G.), La Renaissance de la Poésie anglaise. 
Scupper (V. D.), Life of the Spirit in Modern English Poetry. Swarp 
(Amy), Victorian Poets. Swanwick (A.), Poets the Interpreters of their 
Age. Watrxker (H.), The Great Victorian Poets. 


TRIBUTES IN VERSE 


* Lanvor, Robert Browning. *GriupER (R. W.), Five Books of Song: 
Browning’s Death. Firrp (M.), The Burial of Robert Browning. 
* CarmAN (Bliss), Songs from Vagabondia: The Two Bobbies. * Carman 
(Bliss), More Songs from Vagabondia: In a Copy of Browning. 


BIBsLioGRAPHY 


Frrnivatu (F. J.), A Bibliography of Robert Browning from 1833 to 
1881. Anperson (J. P.), Bibliography of Browning, Appendix to Sharp’s 
Life of Browning. Lrarnep (H. B.), A Hand List for the Student of 
Robert Browning. Nicotn (W. M.), and Wise (T.), Literary Anecdotes 
of the Nineteenth Century: Materials for a Bibliography of Robert 
Browning. 


ROBERT BROWNING 





SONGS FROM PARACELSUS 


Heap cassia, sandal-buds and stripes 

Of labdanum, and aloe-balls, 

Smeared with dullnard an Indian wipes 
From out her hair: such balsam falls 
Down sea-side mountain pedestals, 

From tree-tops where tired winds are 

fain, . 
Spent with the vast and howling main, 
To treasure half their island-gain. 


And strew faint sweetness from some 
old 
Egyptian’s fine worm-eaten shroud 
Which breaks to dust when once un- 
rolled; 
Or shredded perfume, like a cloud 
From closet long to quiet vowed, 
With mothed and dropping arras hung, 
Mouldering her lute and books among, 
As when a queen, long dead, was young. 


Over the sea our galleys went, 
With cleaving prows in order brave 
To a speeding wind and a_ bounding 
wave, 
A gallant armament : 
Kach bark built out of a forest-tree 
Left leafy and rough as first it grew. 
And nailed all over the gaping sides, 
Within and without, with black bull- 
hides, 
Seethed in fat and suppled in flame, 
To bear the playful billows’ game: 
So, each good ship was rude to see, 
Rude and bare to the outward view, 
But each upbore a stately tent 
Where cedar pales in scented row 
Kept out the flakes of the dancing brine, 
Andan awning drooped the mast-below, 
In fold on fold of the purple fine, 


568 


That neither noontide nor starshine 
Nor moonlight cold which maketh mad, 

Might pierce the regal tenement. 
When the sun dawned, oh, gay and glad 
We set the sail and plied the oar ; 

But when the night-wind blew like 
breath, 

For joy of one day’s voyage more, 

We sang together on the wide sea, 

Like men at peace on a peaceful shore ; 

Each sail was loosed to the wind so free, 

Each helm made sure by the twilight 
star, 7 

And in a sleep as calm as death, 

We, the voyagers from afar, 

Lay stretched along, each weary crew 
In a circle round its wondrous tent 
Whence gleamed soft light and curled 

rich scent, . 
And with light and perfume, music 
too: 
So the stars wheeled round, and the 
darkness past, 
And at morn we started beside the mast, 
And still each ship was sailing fast. 


Now, one morn, land appeared—a speck 
Dim trembling betwixt sea and sky : 
‘* Avoid it,” cried our pilot, ‘‘ check 
The shout, restrain the eager eye!” 
But the heaving sea was black behind 
For many a night and many a day, 
And land, though but a rock, drew 
nigh ; 
So, we broke the cedar pales away, 
Let the purple awning flap in the wind, 
And a statue bright was on every 
deck ! 
We shouted, every man of us, 
And steered right into the harbor thus, 
With pomp and peean glorious. 


A hundred shapes of lucid stone ! 
All day we built its shrine for each, 


ROBERT BROWNING 


569 











A shrine of rock for every one, 
Nor paused till in the westering sun 
We sat together on the beach 
To sing because our task was done, 
When lo! what shouts and merry songs ! 
What laughter all the distance stirs ! 
A loaded raft with happy throngs 
Of gentle islanders ! 


‘““Our isles are just at hand,” they 
cried, 
‘‘ Like cloudlets faint in even sleep- 
ing. 


Our temple-gates are opened wide, 
Our olive-groves thick shade are keep- 
in 
For these majestic forms’—they cried. 
Oh, then we awoke with sudden start 
From our deep dream, and knew, too 


late, 
How bare the rock, how desolate, 
Which had _ received our _ precious 
freight 


Yet wecalled out—‘‘ Depart ! 
Our gifts, once given, must here abide. 
Our work is done ; we have no heart 
To mar our work,”—we cried. — 18385. 


PORPHYRIA’S LOVER 


THE rain set early in to-night, 
The sullen wind was soon awake, 
It tore the elm-tops down for spite, 
And did its worst to vex the lake: 
I listened with heart fit to break. 

When glided in Porphyria ; straight 
She shut the cold out and the storm, 
And kneeled and made the cheerless 

grate 
Blaze up, and all the cottage warm ; 
Which done, she rose, and from her 
form 
Withdrew the 
shawl, 
And laid her soiled gloves by, untied 
Her hat and let the damp hair fall, 


dripping cloak and 


1 This is the earliest of Browning’s great series 
of dramatic poems in lyric form. It was first 
printed in the Monthly Repository, 1836, with 
Johannes Agricola in Meditation ; was then 
included in the Dramatic Lyrics (1842); and is 
now classed among the Dramatic Romances. 

Most of Browning’s poems are simply dramatic 
monologues, without stage directions, often 
without even the name of the speaker. The 
reader must remember that it is not Browning 
who is speaking or telling the story; and must 
first notice who is speaking, and under what cir- 
cumstances. Once this is done, most of the al- 
leged “obscurity” of Browning will be found to 
have disappeared forever, 


And, last, she sat down by my side 
And called me. When no voice re- 
plied, 
She put my arm about her waist, 
And made her smooth white shoulder 
bare 
And all her yellow hair displaced, 
And, stooping, made my cheek lie 
there, 
And spread, o’er all, her yellow hair, 
Murmuring how she loved me—she 
Too weak, for all her heart’s en- 
deavor, 
To set its struggling passion free 
From pride, and vainer ties dissever, 
And give herself to me forever. 
But passion sometimes would prevail, 
Nor could to-night’s gay feast re- 
strain 
A sudden thought of one so pale 
For love of her, and all in vain: 
So, she was come through wind and 
su i F2an: 
Be sure I looked up at her eyes 
Happy and proud; at last I knew 
Porphyria worshipped me; surprise 
Made my heart swell, and still it 
- grew 
While I debated what to do. 
That moment she was mine, 
fair, 
Perfectly pure and good: I found 
A thing to do, and all her hair 
In one long yellow string I wound 
Three times her little throat around, 
And strangled her. No pain felt she ; 
Iam quite sure she felt no pain. 
Asa shut bud that holds a bee, 
I warily oped her lids ; again 
Laughed the blue eyes without a stain. 
And I untightened next the tress 


mine, 


About her neck; her cheek once 
more 

Blushed bright beneath my burning 
kiss: 


I propped her head up as before, 
Only, this time my shoulder bore 
Her head, which droops upon it still: 

The smiling rosy little head, 

So glad it has its utmost will, 

That all it scorned at once is fled, 
And I, its love, am gained instead ! 
Porphyria’s love: she guessed not how 

Her darling one wish would be heard. 
And thus we sit together now, 

And all night long we have not 

stirred, 
And yet God has not said a word ! 
1836. 


579 


BRITISH? POETS 


PIPPA PASSES 
A DRAMA 


PERSONS 
PIPPA 
OTTIMA 
SEBALD 
Foreign Students 
GOTTLIEB 
SCHRAMM 


INTRODUCTION 


NEw YEAR’s DAY AT ASOLO IN THE TRE- 
VISAN 


A large mean airy chamber. A girl, Pippa, from 
the silk-mills, springing out of bed. = 

Day! 

Faster and more fast, 

O’er night’s brim, day boils at last: 

Boils, pure gold, o’er the cloud-cup’s 
brim 

Where spurting and suppressed it lay, 

For not a froth-flake touched the rim 

Of yonder gap in the solid gray 

Of the eastern cloud, an hour away ; 

But forth one wavelet, then another, 
curled, 

Till the whole sunrise, not to be sup- 
pressed, 

Rose, reddened, and its seething breast 

Flickered in bounds, grew gold, then 
overflowed the world. 


Oh Day, if I squander a wavelet of thee, 

A mite of my twelve-hours’ treasure, 

The least of thy gazes or glances, 

(Be they grants thouart bound to or gifts 
above measure) 

One of thy choices or one of thy chances, 

(Be they tasks God imposed thee or 
freaks at thy pleasure) 

—My Day, if I squander such labor or 
leisure, 

Then shame fall on Asolo, mischief on 
me! 


Thy long blue solemn hours serenely 
flowing, 

Whence earth, we feel, gets steady help 
and good— 

Thy fitful sunshine-minutes, coming, 
going, 

As if earth turned from work in game- 
some mood— 

All shall be mine! 
me not 


But thou must treat 


JULES 

PHENE 

Austrian Police 

BLUPHOCKS 

LUIGI and his mother 

Poor Girls 

MONSIGNOR and his attendants 


As prosperous ones are treated, those 
who live 

At hand here, and enjoy the higher lot, 

In readiness to take what thou wilt give, | 

And free to let alone what thou re- 
fusest ; 

For, Day, my holiday, if thou ill-usest 

Me, who am only Pippa,—old-year’s sor- 
row, 

Cast off last night, will come again to- 
morrow : 

Whereas, if thou prove gentle, I shall 
borrow 

Sufficient strength of thee for new-year’s 
sorrow. 

All other men and women that this 
earth 

Belongs to, who all days alike possess, 

Make general plenty cure particular 
dearth, 

Get more joy one way, if another, less: 

Thou art my single day, God lends to 
leaven. 

What were all earth else, with a feel of 
heaven,— 

Sole light that helps me through the 
year, thy sun’s! 

Try now! Take Asolo’s Four Happiest 
Ones— 

And let thy morning rain on that superb 

Great haughty Ottima ; can rain disturb 

Her Sebald’s homage? All the while 
thy rain ’ 

Beats fiercest on her shrub-house win- 
dow pane 

He will but press the closer, breathe 
more warm 

Against her cheek; how should she 
mind the storm? 

And, morning past, if mid-day shed a 
gloom 

O’er Jules and Phene,—what care bride 
and groom 

Save for their dear selves? 
marriage day ; 

And while they leave church and go 
home their way, 


'T is their 


ROBERT BROWNING 


ae 





Hand clasping hand, within each breast 
would be 

Sunbeams and pleasant weather spite of 
thee. 

Then, for another trial, obscure thy eve 

With mist,—will Luigi and his mother 
grieve— 

The lady and her child, unmatched, for- 
sooth, 

She in her age, as Luigi in his youth, 

For true content? The cheerful town, 
warm, close 

And safe, the sooner that thou art mo- 


rose, 

Receives them. And yet once again, 
outbreak 

In storm at night on Monsignor, they 
make 


Such stir about,—whom they expect 
from Rome 

To visit Asolo, his brothers’ home, 

And say here masses proper to release 

A soul from pain,—what storm dares 
hurt his peace ? 

Calm would he pray, with his own 
thoughts to ward 

Thy thunder off, nor want the angels’ 
guard. 

But Pippa—just one such mischance 
would spoil 

Her day that lightens the next twelve- 
month’s toil 

At wearisome silk-winding, coil on coil! 

And here If let time slip for naught ! 

Aha, you foolhardy sunbeam, caught 

With a single splash from my ewer! ° 

You that would mock the best pursuer, 

Was my basin over-deep? 

One splash of water ruins you asleep, 

And.up, up, fleet your brilliant bits 

Wheeling and counterwheeling, 

Reeling, broken beyond healing : 

Now grow together on the ceiling ! 

That will task your wits. 

Whoever it was quenched fire first, 
hoped to see 

Morsel after morsel flee 

As metrily, as giddily ... 

Meantime, what lights my sunbeam on, 

Where settles by degrees the radiant 
cripple ? 

Oh, is it surely blown, my martagon ? 

New-blown and ruddy as St. Agnes’ 
nipple, 

Plump as the flesh-bunch on some Turk 
bird’s poll! 

Be sure if corals, branching ‘neath the 
ripple [roll 

Of ocean, bud there,—fairies watch un- 


Such turban-flowers ; I say, such lamps 
disperse 

Thick red flame through that dusk green 
universe ! 

I am queen of thee, floweret ! 

And each fleshy blossom 

Preserve I not—(safer 

Than leaves that embower it, 

Or shells that embosom) 

—From weevil and chafer ? 

Laugh through my pane then; solicit 
the bee ; 

Gibe him, be sure; and, in midst of thy 
glee, 

Love thy queen, worship me ! 


‘ 


—Worship whom else? For am I not, 
this day, 

Whate’er I please? What shall I please 
to-day ? 

My morn, noon, eve and night—how 
spend my day ? 

To-morrow I must be Pippa who winds 
silk, 

The whole year round, to earn just bread 
and milk : 

But, this one day, I have leave to go, 

And play out my fancy’s fullest games ; 

I may fancy all day—and it shall be so— 

That I taste of the pleasures, am called 
by the names 

Of the Happiest Four in our Asolo! 


See! Up the hillside yonder, through the 
morning, 

Some one shall love me, as the world 
calls love : 

I am no less than Ottima, take warning ! 

The gardens, and the great stone house 
above, 

And other house for shrubs, all glass in 
front, 

Are mine; where Sebald steals, as he is 
wont, 

To court me, while old Luca yet reposes : 

And therefore, till the shrub-house door 
uncloses, 

I... what now ?—give abundant cause 
for prate 

About me—Ottima, I mean—of late, 

Too bold, too confident she’ll still face 
down . 

The spitefullest of talkers in our town. 

How we talk in the little town below ! 

But love, love, love—there’s better 

love, I know! 

This foolish love was only day’s first 
offer ; 

I choose my next love to defy the scoffer : 


57? 


For do not our Bride and Bridegroom 
sally 

Out of Possagno church at noon ? 

Their house looks over Orcana valley : 

Why should not I be the bride as soon 

As Ottima? For I saw, beside, 

Arrive last night that little bride— 

Saw, if you call it seeing her, one flash 

Of the pale snow-pure cheek and black 
bright tresses, 

Blacker than all except the black eye- 
lash ; 

I wonder she contrives those lids no 
dresses ! 

—So strict was she, the veil 

Should cover close her pale 

Pure cheeks—a bride to look 
scarce touch, 

Scarce touch, remember, Jules! For are 
not such 

Used to be tended, flower-like, every 
feature, 

As if one’s breath would fray the lily of 
a creature ? 

A soft and easy life these ladies lead : 

Whiteness in us were wonderful in- 
deed. 

Oh, save that brow its virgin dimness, 

Keep that foot its lady primness, 

Let those ankles never swerve 

From their exquisite reserve, 

Yet have to trip along the streets like me, 

All but naked to the knee! 

How willshe ever grant her Jules a bliss 

So startling as her real first infant kiss? 

Oh, no—not envy, this! 


at and 


—Not envy, sure !—for if you gave me 

Leave to take or to refuse, 

In earnest, do you think I’d choose 

That sort of new love to enslave me ? 

Mine should have lapped me round from 
the beginning ; 

As little fear of losing it as winning: 

Lovers grow cold, men learn to hate 
their wives, 

And only parents’ love can last our lives. 

At eve the Son and Mother, gentle pair, 

Commune inside our turret: what pre- 
vents 

My being Luigi? While that mossy lair 

Of lizards through. the winter-time is 


stirred 

With each to each imparting sweet in- 
tents 

For ue ey Tatas as brooding bird to 
bird— 


(For I observe of late, the evening walk 
Of Luigi and his mother, always ends 


BRITISH POETS 


Inside our ruined turret, where they talk, 

Calmer than lovers, yet more kind than 
friends) 

—Let me be cared about, kept out of 
harm, 

And schemed for, safe in love as with 
a charm ; 

Let me be Luigi! If I only knew 

What was my mother’s face—my father, 
too! 

Nay, if you come to that, best love of all 

Is God’s; then why not have God’s love 
befall 

Myself as, in the palace by the Dome, 

Monsignor ?—who to-night will bless the 
home 

Of his dead brother; and God bless in 
turn 

That heart which beats, those eyes which 
mildly burn 

With love for all men! I, to-night at 
least, 

Would be that holy and beloved priest. 


Now wait !--even I already seem to 
share 

In God’s love: what does New-year’s 
hymn declare? 

What other meaning do these verses 
bear ? 


All service ranks the same with God: 

If now, as formerly he trod 

Paradise, his presence fills 

Our earth, each only as God wills 

Can work—God’s puppets, best and 
worst, 

Are we; there is no last nor first. 


Say not ‘‘a small event! ” 
‘* small ?” 

Costs it more pain that this, ye call 

A ‘‘great event,” should come to 
pass, 

Than that ? 
Mass 

Of deeds which make up life, one deed 

Power shall fall short in or exceed ! 


Why 


Untwine me from the 


And more of it, and more of it !—oh yes— 

I will pass each, and see their happiness, 

And envy none—being just as great, no 
doubt, 

Useful to men, and dear to God as they ! 

A pretty thing to care about 

So mightily, this single holiday ! 

But let the sun shine! Wherefore re- 
pine ? 

—With thee to lead me, O Day of mine, 


ROBERT BROWNING 


573 





Down the grass path gray with dew, 
Under the pine-wood, blind with boughs, 
Where the swallow never flew 
Nor yet cicala dared carouse— 
No, dared carouse ! 

[She enters the street. 


I. MORNING 


Up the Hillside, inside the Shrub-house. Luca’s 
WIFE, Ortima, and her Paramour, the German 
SEBALD. 


Sebald. [sings] Let the watching 
lids wink ! 
Day’s ablaze with eyes, think ! 


Deep into the night, drink ! 


Ottima. Night? Such may be your 

Rhineland nights, perhaps ; 

But this blood-red beam through the 
shutter’s chink 

—We call such light, the morning: let 
us see ! 

Mind how you grope your way, though ! 
How these tall 


Naked geraniums straggle! Push the 


lattice 

Behind that frame !—Nay, do I bid you? 
—Sebald, 

It shakes the dust down on me! Why, 
of course 

The slide-bolt catches. Well, are you 
content, 

Or must I find you something else to 
spoil ? 


Kiss and be friends. my Sebald! Is ’t 
full morning ? 
Oh, don’t speak then ! 
Seb. Ay, thus it used to be! 
Ever your house was, I remember, shut 
Till mid-day ; I observed that, as I 
strolled 

On mornings through the vale here; 
country girls 

. Were noisy, washing garments in the 
brook, 

Hinds drove the slow white oxen up the 
hills : 

But no, your house was mute, would 
ope no eye ! 

And wisely : you were plotting one thing 
there, : 

Nature, another outside. I looked up— 

Rough white wood shutters, rusty iron 


ars, 
Silent as death, blind in a flood of light. 
Oh, I remember !—and the peasants 
laughed 
And said, ‘‘ The old man sleeps with the 
young wife.” 


This house was his, this chair, this win- 
dow—his. 
Otti. Ah, the clear morning ! 
see Saint Mark’s ; 
That black streak is the belfry. Stop: 
Vicenza 
Should lie... there’s 
enough, that blue ! 
Look o’er my shoulder, follow my finger ! 
Seb. Morning? 
It seems to me a night witha sun added. 
Where’s dew, where’s freshness? That 
bruised plant, I bruised 
In getting through the lattice yestereve, 
Droops as it did. See, here’s my elbow’s 
mark 
I the dust o’ the sill. 
Otti. Oh, shut the lattice, pray ! 
‘Seb. Let meleanout. I cannot scent 
blood here, 
Foul as the morn may be. 
There, shut the world out ! 
How do you feel now, Ottima? There, 
curse ' 
The world and all outside! 


I can 


Padua, plain 


Let us throw 


O 
This mask : how do you bear yourself ? 
Let’s out 
With all of it! 
Otti. 
Seb. 


Best never speak of it. 

Best speak again and yet again 
of it, 

Till words cease to be more than words. 
** His blood,” 

For instance—let those two words mean, 
‘* His blood” 

And nothing more. Notice, I’ll say 
them now, ‘‘ His blood.” 

Ottt. Assuredly if I repented 
The deed— 


_ Seb. Repent? Who should repent, 


or why? 
What puts that in your head? Did I 
once say 
That I repented ? 
Otti. No; Isaid the deed... 


Seb. ‘*The deed” and ‘‘ the event ”’— 
just now it was 
‘Our passion’s fruit”—the devil take 
such cant! 
Say, once and always, Luca was a wittol, 
I am his cut-throat, youare... 
Ottt. Here’s the wine ; 
I brought it when we left the house 
above, 
And glasses too—wine of both sorts. 
Black? White then? 
Seb. But am not I his cut-throat? 
What are you ? 


Sa 


BRITISH POETS 





Otti. There trudges on his business 
from the Duomo 
Benet the Capuchin, with his brown 


hood 

And bare feet ; always in one place at 
church, 

Close under the stone wall by the south 
entry. 

I used to take him for a brown cold 


piece 

Of the wall’s self, as out of it he rose 

To let me pass—at first, I say, I used: 

Now, so has that dumb figure fastened 
on me, 

I rather should account the plastered 
wall 

A piece of him, so chilly does it strike. 

This, Sebald ? 

Seb. No, the white wine—the white 

wine ! 

Well, Ottima, I promised no new year 
Should rise on us the ancient shameful 
way ; 

Nor does it rise. 
black eyes ! 

Do you remember last damned New 
Year’s day ? 


Pour on! To your 


Ott?. You brought those foreign 
prints. We looked at them 
Over the wine and fruit. I had to 
scheme . 
To get him from the fire. Nothing but 
saying 


His own set wants the proof-mark, 
roused him up 
To hunt them out. 
Seb. ’Faith, he is not alive 
To fondle you before my face. 

Ottt. Do you 
Fondle me then! Who means to take 
your life 
For that, my Sebald? 

Seb. 

One thing to guard against. 
make much 

One of the other—that is, not make 
more 

Parade of warmth, 
coil, 

Than yesterday: as if, sweet, I supposed 

Proof upon proof were needed now, now 
first, 

To show I love you—yes, still love you— 
love you 

In spite of Luca and what’s come to him 

—Sure sign we had him ever in our 
thoughts, 

White snreLIRS old reproachful face and 
all! 


We'll not 


childish officious 


Hark you, Ottima ! 


We ’ll even quarrel, love, at times, as if 
We still could lose each other, were not 
tied 
By this: 
Otti. Love ! 
Seb. Not tied so sure ! 
Because though I was wrought upon, 
have struck 
His insolence back into hin—am I 
So surely yours ?—therefore forever 
yours? 
Otti. Love, to be wise, (one counsel 
pays another, ) 
Should we have—months ago, when first 
we loved, 
For instance that May morning we two 
stole 
Under the green ascent of sycamores— 
If we had come upon a thing like that 


conceive you ? 


Suddenly . 
SED ates ‘thing’ ’—there aoe a 
’ thing!” 
Ottt. Then, Venus’ body, had we 


come upon 
My husband Luca Gaddi’s murdered 


corpse 
Within there, at his couch-foot, covered 
close— 
Would you have pored upon it? Why 
persist 


In poring now uponit? For ’t is here 

As much as there in the deserted house : 

You cannot rid your eyes of it. Forme, 

Now he is dead I hate him worse: I 
hate ... 

Dare you stay here? I would go back 
and hold 

His two dead hands, and say, ‘‘I hate 
you worse, 

Luca, than ” : 

Seb. Off, off—take . your hands off 


mine, 
’'T is the hot evening—off ! oh, morning 
is it? 
Otti?. There’s one thing must be done ; 
you know what thing. 
Come in and help to carry. We may 
sleep [night. 


Anywhere in the whole wide house to- 
Seb. What would come, think you, if 
we'let him lie 
Just as he is? Let him lie there until 
Theangels take him! He is turned by 
this 
Off from his face beside, as you will see. 
Otti. This dusty pane might serve for 
looking-glass. 
Three, four—four gray hairs! 
you said 


Is itso 


ROBERT BROWNING 


A plait of hair should wave across my 
neck ? 
No—this way. 
Seb. Ottima, I would give your neck 
Each splendid shoulder, both those 
breasts of yours, 
That this were undone! Kill 
the world, 
So Luca lives again !—ay, lives tosputter 
His fulsome dotage on you—yes, and 
feign 
Surprise that I return at eve to sup, 
When all the morning I was loitering 
here— 
Bid me dispatch my business and begone. 
ew 
Ottt. See ! 
Seb. No, Tl] finish. Do you think 
I fear at speak the bare truth once for 
1 


Killing ! 


All we have talked of, is, at bottom, fine 

To suffer ; there’s a recompense in guilt ; 

One must be venturous and fortunate: 

What is one young for, else? In age 
we ‘ll sigh 

O’er the wild reckless wicked days flown 


over ; 

Still, we have lived: the vice was in its 
place. 

But to have eaten Luca’s bread, have 
worn 

His clothes, have felt his money swell 
my purse— 


Do lovers in romances sin that way ? 

Why, I was starving when I used to call 

And teach you music, starving while 
you plucked me 

These flowers to smell! 

Otti. My poor lost friend ! 
Seb. He gave me 

Life, nothing less: what if he did re- 
proach 

My perfidy, and threaten, and do more— 

Had he noright? What was to wonder 
at ? 

He sat by us at table quietly : 

Why must you lean across till our cheeks 
touched ? 

Could he do less than make pretence to 
strike ? 

"Tis not the crime’s sake—I’d commit 
ten crimes 

Greater, to have this crime wiped out, 


undone ! 

And you—O how feel you? Feel you 
for me! 

Otti. Well then, I love you better 


now than ever, [you)-— 
And best (look at me while I speak to 


575 


Best for the crime ; nor dol grieve, in 
truth, 

This mask, this simulated ignorance, 

This affectation of simplicity, 

Falls off our crime; this naked crime of 
ours 

May not now be looked over: look it 
down ! 

Great ? let it be great ; but the joys it 
brought, 

Pay they or no its price ? 
or it ! 

Speak not! The past, would you give 
up the past 

Such as it is, pleasure and crime to- 


Come ; they 


gether ? 
Give up that noon I owned my love for 
ou? 
The garden’s silence: even the single 
bee 


Persisting in his toil, suddenly stopped, 
And where he hid you only could sur- 
mise 
By some campanula chalice set a-swing. 
Who stammered—‘‘ Yes, I love you ? ” 
Seb. And I drew 
Back ; put far back your face with both 
my hands 
Lest you should grow too full of me— 
your face 
So seemed athirst for my whole soul and 
body ! 
Otti. And when I ventured to receive 
you here, 
Made you steal hither in the mornings—- 


Seb. When 
I used to look up ’neath the shrub-house 
here, 
Till the red fire on its glazed windows 
spread 


To a yellow haze? 
Otti. Ah—my sign was, the sun 
Inflamed the sere side of yon chestnut- 
tree 
Nipped by the first frost. 
Seb. You would always laugh 
At my wet boots: [had to stride through 
grass 
Over my ankles. 
Otti. Then our crowning night ! 
Seb. The July night ? 
Otti. The day of it too, Sebald ! 
When heaven’s pillars seemed o’erbowed 
with heat, 
Its black-blue canopy suffered descend 
Close on us both, to weigh down each to 
each, 
And smother up all life except our life. 
So lay we till the storm came. 


576 BRITISH POETS 


Seb. How it came ! 
Otti. Buried in woods we lay, you 
recollect ; 
Swift ran the searching tempest over- 
head ; 
And ever and anon some bright white 
shaft 
Burned through the pine-tree roof, here 
burned and there, 
As if God’s messenger through the close 
wood screen 
Plunged and replunged his weapon at a 
venture, 
Feeling for guilty thee and me: then 
broke 
The thunder like a whole sea overhead— 
Seb. Yes! 
Otti.--While I stretched myself upon 
you, hands 
To hands, my mouth to your hot mouth, 
and shook 
All my locks loose, and covered you with 
them— 
You, Sebald, the same you! 


Seb. Slower, Ottima ! 
Otti. And as we lay— 
Seb. Less vehemently! Love me! 


Forgive me! Take 
words, to heart ! 

Your breath is worse than wine. Breathe 
slow, speak slow! 

Do not lean on me! 
Otti. Sebald, as we lay, 
Rising and falling only with our pants, 
Who said, ‘‘ Let death comenow! ’ Tis 
right to die! 

Right to be punished ! Naught completes 
such bliss 

But woe!” Who said that? 

Seb. How did we ever rise ? 
Was ’t that we slept? Why did it end? 

Ottt. I felt you 
Taper into a point the ruffled ends 
Of my loose locks ’twixt both 

humid lips, 
My hair is fallen now: knot it again ! 

Seb. I kiss you now, dear Ottima, 

now and now! 
This way? Will you forgive me—be 
; once more 
My great queen? 

Otti. Bind it thrice about my brow; 

Crown me your queen, your spirit’s 
arbitress, 
Magnificent in sin. Say that ! 

Seb. I crown you 
My great white queen, my spirit’s arbi- 

tress, 
Magnificent... 


not words, mere 


‘your 


[from without is heard the voice of Pippa 
singing— 


The year’s at the spring 
And day’s at the morn ; 
Morning’s at seven ; 

The hillside’s dew-pearled ; 
The lark’s on the wing ; 
The snail’s on the thorn: 
God’s in his heaven— 

All's right-:with the world ! 


[PIPPA passes, 


Seb. God’s in his heaven ! 
that? Who spoke? 
You, you spoke ! 
Ottt. Oh—that little ragged girl! 
She must have rested on the step: we 
give them 
But this one holiday the whole year 


Do you hear 


round 

Did you ever see our silk-mills—their 
inside? a 

There are ten silk-mills now belong to 
you. 


She stoops to pick my double hearts- 
ease... Sh! 
She does not hear : call you out louder ! 
Seb. Leave me! 
Go, get your clothes ya those 
shoulders ! 


Otti ‘Sebald ? 
Seb. Wipe off that paint! Ihate you. 
Otti. Miserable ! 
Seb. My God, and she is emptied of it 


now ! 
Outright now !—how miraculously gone 
Allof the grace—had she not strange 
grace once ? 
Why, the blank cheek hangs listless 
as it likes, 
No purpose holds the foauates up to- 
gether, 
Only the cloven brow and aoKeree chin. 
Stay in their places: and the very hair, 
That seemed to have a sort of life in it, 
Drops, a dead web ! 
Otti. Speak to me—not of me! 
Seb.—That round great full-orbed face, 
where not an angle 
Broke the delicious 
broken ! 
Otti. To me—notofme! Ungrateful, 
perjured cheat ! 
A coward too: but ingrate’s worse than 


indolence—all 


all! 
Beggar—my slave--a fawning, cringing 
lie! 
Leave me! Betrayme! I can see your 
drift! 


ROBERT BROWNING 


A lie that walks and eats and drinks! 
Seb. My God! 
Those morbid olive faultless shoulder- 
blades— 
I should have known there was no blood 
beneath ! 


Ottt. Youhate me then? You hate 
me then ? 
Seb. To think 


She would succeed in her absurd attempt, 
And fascinate by sinning, show herself 
Superior—guilt from its excess superior 
Toinnocence ! That little peasant’s voice 
Has righted allagain. Though I be lost, 
I know which is the better, never fear, 
Of vice or virtue, purity or lust, 

Nature or trick! Isee what I have done, 
Entirely now! Oh Iam proud to feel 
Such torments—let the world take credit 


thence— 

I, having done my deed, pay too its 
price ! 

I hate, hate—curse you! God's in his 
heaven ! 

Ottt. —Me! 

Me! no, no, Sebald, not yourself—kill 
me! 

Mine is the whole crime. Do but kill 
me—then 


Yourself—-then—presently—first hear 
me speak ! 

I always meant to kill myself—wait, 
you! 

Lean on my breast—-not asa_ breast; 
don’t love me 

The more because you lean on me, my 
own 

Heart’s Sebald! There, 
deaths presently ! 

Seb. My brain is drowned now—quite 

drowned : all I feel 

Is... is, at swift-recurring intervals, 

A hurry-down within me, as of waters 
Loosened to smother up some ghastly 
pit: 
There they go 

fiery sea ! 
Ottt. Not me —to him, O God, be 
merciful ! 


there, both 


whirls from a black 





Talk by the way, while Pippa is passing from the 
hillside to Orcana. Foreign Students of paint- 
ing and sculpture, from Venice, assembled 
opposite the house of JuLes,a young French 
statuary, at Passagno. 


Ist Student. Attention ! My own post is 
beneath this window, but the pomegranate 
- clump yonder will hide three or four of you 
with a little squeezing, and Schramm and 
his pipe must lie flat in the balcony. Four, 


ar 


Sir 


five— who’s a defaulter ? We want every- 
body, for Jules must not be suffered to 
hurt his bride when the jest’s found out. 

2d Stud. All here! Only our poet’s 
away—never having much meant to be 
present, moonstrike him! The airs of that 
fellow, that Giovacchino ! He was in vio- 
lent love with himself, and had a fair pros- 
pect of thriving in his suit, so unmolested 
was it,—when suddenly a woman falls in 
love with him, too; and out of pure jeal- 
ousy he takes himself off to Trieste, im- 
mortal poem and all: whereto is this 
prophetical epitaph appended already, as 
Bluphocks assures me,—‘! Here a mam- 
moth-poem lies, Fouled to death by but- 
terflies.”. His own fault, the simpleton ! 
Instead of cramp couplets, each like a knife 
in your entrails, he should write, says 
Bluphocks, both classically and intelligibly. 
—Aisculapius, an Epic. Catalogue of the 
drugs: Hebe’s Plaister—One strip Cools 
your lip. Phacbus’ emulsion—One bottle 
Clears your throttle. Mereury’s bolus— 
One box Cures... 

3d Stud. Subside, my fine fellow ! If the 
marriage was over by ten o’clock, Jules will 
certainly be here ina minute with his bride. 

2d Stud. Good !—only, so should the 
poet’s muse have been universally accept- 
able, says Bluphocks, et canibus nostris 
... and Delia not better known to our 
literary dogs than the boy Giovacchino ! 

1st Stud. To the point, now. Where’s 
Gottlieb, the new-comer ? Oh,—listen, Gott- 
lieb, to what has called down this piece of 
friendly vengeance on Jules, of which we 
now assemble to witness the winding-up. 
We are all agreed, all in a tale, observe, 
when Jules shall burst out on us ina fury 
by and by; I am spokesman—the verses 
that are to undeceive Jules bear my name 
of Lutwyche—but each professes himself 
alike insulted by this strutting stone- 
squarer, who came along from Paris to 
Munich, and thence with a crowd of us to 
Venice and Possagno here, but proceeds in 
a day or two alone again—oh, alone indu- 
bitably ! to Rome and Florence. He, for- 
sooth, take up his portion with these disso- 
lute, brutalized, heartless bunglers!—so he 
was heard to call us all. Now, is Schramm 
brutalized, I should like to know? Am I 
heartless ? 

Gottlieb. Why, somewhat heartless; for, 
suppose Jules a coxcomb as much as you 
choose, still, for this mere coxcombry, you 
will have brushed off—what do folks style 
it?—the bloom of his life. Itis too late to 
alter? These love-letters, now, you call 
his—I can’t laugh at them. 

4th Stud. Because you never read the 
sham letters of our inditing which drew 
forth these. 

Gott. His discovery of the truth will be 
frightful. 


578 


4th Stud. That’s the joke. But you 
should have joined us at the beginning: 
there’s no doubt he loves the girl—loves a 
model he might hire by the hour! 

Gott. See here! ‘‘He has been accus- 
tomed,” he writes, ‘‘to have Canova’s 
women about him, in stone, and the world’s 
women beside him, in flesh; these being as 
much below, as those above, his soul’s as- 
piration: but now he is to have the reality.” 
There you laugh again! I say, you wipe off 
the very dew of his youth. 

1st Stud. Schramm! (Take the pipe out 
of his mouth, somebody!) Will Jules lose 
the bloom of his youth ? 

Schramm. Nothing worth keeping is 
ever lost in this world: look at a blossom— 
it drops presently, having done its service 
and lasted its time; but fruits succeed, and 
where would be the blossom’s place could it 
continue? As well affirm that your eye is 
no longer in your body, because its earliest 
favorite, Whatever it may have first loved 
to look on, is dead and done with—as that 
any affection is lost to the soul when its 
first object, whatever happened first to sat- 
isfy it, is superseded in due course. Keep 
but ever looking, whether with the body’s 
eye or the mind’s, and you will soon find 
something to look on! Has a man done 
wondering at women ?—there follow men, 
dead and alive, to wonder at. Has he done 
wondering at men ?—there’s God to wonder 
at: and the faculty of wonder may be, at 
the same time, old and tired enough with 
respect to its first object, and yet young 
and fresh sufficiently, so far as concerns its 
novel one! Thus o 

ist Stud. Put Schramm’s pipe into his 
mouth again! There, yousee! Well, this 
Jules a wretched fribble—oh, I 
watched his disportings at Possagno, the 
other day ! Canova’s gallery—you know; 
There he marches first resolvedly past 
great works by the dozen without vouch- 
safing an eye: all at once he stops full at 
the Psiche-fanciulla—cannot pass that oid 
acquaintance without a nod of encourage- 
ment—‘“ In your new place, beauty ? Then 
behave yourself as well here as at Munich 
—I see you!” Next he posts himself delib- 
erately before the unfinished Pieta for half 
an hour without moving, till up he starts 
of a sudden, and thrusts his very nose into 
—I say, into—the group; by which gesture 
you are informed that precisely the sole 
point he had not fully mastered in Canova’s 
practice was a certain method of using the 


drill in the articulation of the knee-joint—’ 


and that, likewise, has he mastered at 
length! Good-by, therefore, to poor Canova 
—whose gallery no longer needs detain his 
successor Jules, the predestinated novel 
thinker in marble! 

dth Stud. Tell him about the women: go 
on to the women ! 





BRITISH POETS 


1st Stud. Why, on that matter he could 
never be supercilious enough. How should 
we be other (he said) than the poor devils, 
you see, with those debasing habits we 
cherish! He was not to wallow in that 
mire, at least; he would wait, and love 
only at the proper time, and meanwhile put 
up with the Psiche-fanciulla. Now, I hap- 
pened to hear of a young Greek—real 
Greek girl at Malamocco: a true Islander, 
do you see, with Alciphron’s ‘‘ hair like sea- 
moss ’”’— Schramm knows !— white and 
quiet as an apparition, and fourteen years 
old at farthest,—a daughter of Natalia, so 
she swears—that hag Natalia, who helps us 
to models at three lire an hour. We se- 
lected this girl for the heroine of our jest. 
So, first, Jules received a scented letter— 
somebody had seen his Tydeus at the Acad- 
emy, and my picture was nothing to it: a 
profound admirer bade him persevere— 
would make herself known to him ere long. 
(Paolina, my little friend of the Fenice, 
transcribes divinely.) And in due time, the 
mysterious correspondent gave certain 
hints of her peculiar charms—the pale 
cheeks, the black hair—whatever, in short, 
had struck us in our Malamocco model; we 
retained her name, too—Phene, which is, 
by interpretation, sea-eagle. Now, think of 
Jules finding himself distinguished from 
the herd of us by such a creature! In his 
very first answer he proposed marrying his 
monitress: and fancy us over these letters, 
two, three times a day, to receive and dis- 
patch! I concocted the main of it: relations 
were in the way—secrecy must be observed 
in fine, would he wed her on trust, and only 
speak to her when they were indissolubly 
united ? St—st—Here they come ! 

6th Stud. Both of them! Heaven’s love, 
speak softly, speak within yourselves! 

5th Stud. Look at the bridgroom! Half 
his hair in storm and half in calm,—patted 
down over the left temple,—like a frothy 
cup one blows on to cool it: and the same 
old blouse that he murders the marble in. 

2d Stud. Not a rich vest like yours, Han- 
nibal Scratchy !—rich, that your face may 
the better set it off. 

6th Stud. And the bride! Yes, sure 
enough, our Phene! Should you have 
known her in her clothes? How magnifi- 
cently pale. 

Gott. She does.not also take it for ear- 
nest, I hope ? 

1st Stud. Oh, Natalia’s concern, that is. 
We settle with Natalia. 

6th Stud. She does not speak—has evi- 
dently let out no word. The only thing is, 
will she equally remember the rest of her 
lesson, and repeat correctly all those verses 
which are to break the secret to Jules ? 

Gott. How he gazes on her! Pity—pity! 

1st Stud. They go in; now, silence! 
You three,—not nearer the window, mind, 





ROBERT BROWNING 


579 





than ‘that pomegranate; just where the 
little girl, who a few minutes ago passed us 
singing, is seated. 


II. NOON 


Over Orcana. The house of JuLES, who crosses 
its threshold with PHENE: she is silent, on 
which JuLEes begins— 


Do not die, Phene! I am yours now, 
you 

Are mine now; let fate reach me how 
she likes, 

If you ‘ll not die: so, never die! Sit 
here— 

My work-room’s single seat. 
lean 

This length of hair and lustrous front ; 
they turn 


I over- 


Like an entire flower upward: eyes,’ 


lips, last 
Your chin—no, last your throat turns: 
t is. their scent 


Pulls down my face upon you. Nay, 
look ever 

This one way till I change, grow you— 
I could 


Change into you, beloved ! 
You by me, * 
And I by you; thisis your handin mine, 
And side by side we sit: all ’s true. 
Thank God! 
I have spoken: speak you! 
O my life to come! 


My Tydeus must be carved that ’s there 
in clay ; 

Yet how be carved, with you about the 
room ? 

Where must I place you? WhenI think 
that once 

This room-full of rough block-work 
seemed my heaven . 

Without you! Shall I ever work again, 

Get fairly into my old ways again, 

Bid each conception stand while, trait 
by trait, 

My hand transfers 
stone ? 

Will my mere fancies live near you, 
their truth— 

The live truth, passing and repassing 


its lineaments to 


me, 

Sitting beside me? 
Now speak ! 
Only first, 

See, all vour letters! Was ’t not well 

contrived ? 
Their hiding-place is Psyche’s robe; she 

keeps 





Your letters next her skin: which drops 
out foremost ? 

Ah,—this that swam down like a first 
moonbeam 

Into my world! 

Again those eyes complete 

Their melancholy survey, sweet and 
slow, 

Of all my room holds; to return and 
rest 

On me, with pity, yet some wonder too: 

As if God bade some spirit plague a 
world, [ prise 

And this were the one moment of sur- 

And sorrow while she took her station, 
pausing 

O’er what she sees, finds good, and must 
destroy ! 

What gaze you at? Those? 
told you of; 

Let your first word to me rejoice them, 
too: 

This minion, a Coluthus, writ in red, 

Bistre and azure by Bessarion’s scribe— 

Read this line . . . no shame—Homer’s 
be the Greek 

First breathed me from the lips of my 
Greek girl! 


Books, I 


This Odyssey in coarse black vivid type 


With faded yellow blossoms ‘twixt page 
and page, 

To mark great places with due gratitude ; 

‘* He said, and on Antinous directed 

A bitter shaft” ...a flower blots out 


the rest ! 

Again upon your search? My statues, 
then ! 

—Ah, do not mind that—better that will 
look 


When cast in bronze—an Almaign Kai- 
ser, that, 

Swart-green and gold, with truncheon 
based on hip. 

This, rather, turn to! 
nized ? 

I thought you would have seen that here 
you sit 

As I imagined you,—Hippolyta, 

Naked upon her bright Numidian horse. 

Recall you this then? ‘‘ Carve in bold 
relief ”— 

So you commanded—‘‘ carve, against I 
come, 

A Greek, in Athens, as our fashion was, 

Feasting, bay-filleted and thunder-free, 

Who rises ‘neath. the lifted myrtle- 
branch. 

‘Praise those who slew Hipparchus !’ 
cry the guests, 


What, unrecog- 


BRUTISHVPORLS 





580 

‘While o'er thy head the singer’s myrtle 
waves 

As erst above ourchampion: stand up, 
alia 3 

See, I have labored to express your 
thought. 


Quite round, a cluster of mere hands 
and arms 

(Thrust in all senses, all ways, from all 
sides, 

Only consenting at the branch’s end 

They strain toward) serves for frame to 
a sole face, 

The Praiser’s, in the centre: who with 
eyes 

Sightless, so bend they back to light in- 
side 

His brain where visionary forms throng 
up, 

Sings, minding not that palpitating arch 

Of hands and arms, nor the quick drip 
of wine 

From the drenched leaves o’erhead, nor 
crowns cast off, 

Violet and parsley crowns to trample 
on— 

Sings, pausing as the patron-ghosts ap- 
prove, 

Devoutly their unconquerable hymn, 

But you must say a ‘** well” to that—say 
“well!” 

Because you gaze — am 
sweet ? 

Gaze like my very life’s-stuff, marble—- 
marbly 

Even tothe silence ! Why, before I found 

The real flesh Phene, I inured myself 


I fantastic, 


To see, throughout ali nature varied 
stuff 

For better nature’s birth by means of 
art: 

With me, each substance tended to one 
form 


Of beauty—to the human archetype. 

On every side occurredsuggestive germs 

Of that—-the tree, the flower—or take 
the fruit,— 

Some rosy shape, continuing the peach, 

Curved beewise o’er its bough ; as rosy 
limbs, 

Depending, nestled in the leaves; and 
just 

From a cleft rose- peach the whole Dryad 
sprang. 

But of the stuffs one can be master of, 

How I divined their capabilities ! 

From the soft-rinded smoothening facile 
chalk [brace, 

That yields your outline to the air’s em- 





Halt-softened by a halo’s pearly gloom ; 

Down to the crisp imperious steel, so 
sure 

To cut its one confided thought clean out 

Of all the world. But marble !—neath 
my tools 

More pliable than jelly—as it were- 

Some clear primordia] creature dug from 
depths 

In the earth’s heart, where itself breeds 
itself, 

And whence all baser substance may be 
worked ; 

Refine it off to air, you may,—condense 


it 

Down to the diamond ;—is not metal 
there, 

When o’er the sudden speck my chisel 
trips? 

—Not flesh, as flake off flake I scale, ap- 
proach, 

Lay bare those bluish veins of blood 
asleep! 


Lurks flame in no strange windings 
where, surprised 

By the swift implement sent home at 
once, 

Flushes and glowings radiate and hover 

About its track? 

Phene? what—-why is this? 

That whitening cheek, those still dilat- 
ing eyes! 

Ah, you will die—I knew that you would 
die ! 


PHENE begins, on his having long remained 
silent. 


Phene. Now the end’s coming; to be 
sure, it must 

Have ended sometime ! Tush, why need 
I speak 

Their foolish speech ? 
mind 

One half of it, beside; and do not care 

For old Natalia now, nor any of them. 

Oh, you—what are you ?—if I do not try 

To say the words Natalia made me 
learn, [self 

To please your friends,—it is to keep my- 

Where your voice lifted me, by letting 
that 

Proceed: but can it? 
haps, 

Cannot take up, now you have once let 
fall, 

The music’s life, and me along with 
that— 

No, or you would ; 
as we are: 


I cannot bring to 


Even you, per- 


We ‘ll stay, then, 


ROBERT BROWNING 


Above the world. 
You creature with the eyes! 

If I could look forever up to them, 

As now vou let me,—TI believe, all sin, 

All memory of wrong done, suffering 
borne, 

Would drop down, low and lower, to the 
earth 

Whence all that’s low comes, and there 
touch and stay 

—Never to overtake the rest of me, 

All that, unspotted, reaches up to you, 

Drawn by those eyes! What rises is 
myself, 

Not me the shame and suffering; but 
they sink, 

Are left, I rise above them. Keep me 
So, 

Above the world ! 

But you sink, for your eyes 

Are altering—altered! Stay—‘‘I love 
you, love’”’.... 

I could prevent it if I understood : 

More of your words to me: was ’t in the 
tone 

Or the words, your power ? 

‘2 Or stay—I will repeat 

Their speech, if that contents you ! 
Ouly change 

No more, and [ shall find it presently 

Far back here, in the brain yourself 
filled up. 

Natalia threatened me that harm should 
follow 

Unless I spoke their lesson to the end, 

But harm to me, I thought she meant, 
not you. 

Your friends,—Natalia said they were 

your friends 

meant you 

doubted it, 

Observing (what was very strange to 
see) 

On every face, so different in all else, 

The same smile girls like me are used to 
bear, 

But never men, men cannot stoop so low; 

Yet your friends, speaking of you, used 
that smile, 

That hateful smirk of boundless self- 
conceit 

Which seems to take possession of the 
world 

And make of God a tame confederate, 

Purveyor to their appetites........you 
know ! 

But still Natalia said they were your 
friends, [the more, 

And they assented though they smiled 


And well, — because, I 





581 


And all came round me,—that thin Eng- 


lishman 

With light lank hair seemed leader of 
the rest ; 

He held a paper—‘‘ What we want,” 
said he, 


Knding some explanation to his friends— 

‘‘Is something slow, involved and mys- 
tical, 

To hold Jules long in doubt, yet take his 
taste 

And lure him on until, at innermost 

Where he seeks sweetness’ soul, he may 
find—this! 

—As in the apple’s core, the noisome fly: 

For insects on the rind are seen at once, 

And brushed aside as soon, but this is 
found 

Only when on the lips or loathing 
tongue.” 

Andso he read what I have got by heart: 


I ‘ll speak it,—‘*‘ Do not die, love! Iam 
FOUTS TS tas 

No—is not that, or like that, part of 
words 

Yourself began by speaking? Strange to 
lose 

What cost such pains to learn! Is this 


more right ? 


Tam a painter who cannot paint ; 

In my life, a devil rather than saint ; 

In my brain, as poor a creature too: 

No end toall I cannot do! 

Yet do one thing at least IT can— 

Love a man or hate a man 

Supremely: thus my love began. 

Through the Valley of Love I went, 

In the lovingest spot to abide. 

And just on the verge where I pitched my 
tent, 

I found Hate dwelling beside. 

(Let the Bridegroom ask what the painter 


meant, 
Of his Bride, of the peerless Bride !) 
And further, I traversed Hate’s grove, 


In the hatefullest nook to dwell ; 

But lo, where I flung myself prone, 
couched Love 

Where the shadow threefold fell. 

(The meaning—those black bride’s-eyes 
above, 

Not a painter's lip should tell !) 


‘‘ And here,” said he, ‘‘ Jules probably 
will ask, 

‘ You have black eyes, Love,—you are, 
sure enough, {deed 

My peerless bride,—then do you tell in- 


582 


BRITISH “POETS 





What needs some explanation! What 
means this ?’” 


—And I am to go on, without a word— 


So, I grew wise in Love and Hate, 
From simple that I was of late. 


Once, when I loved, I would enlace ri 
Breast, eyelids, hands, feet, form and 
ace 


Of her I loved, in one embrace— 


As if by mere love I could love immense- 


ly ! 

Once, when I hated, I would plunge 

My sword, and wipe with the first lunge 

My foe’s whole life out like a sponge— 

As if by mere hate I could hate intensely ! 

But now I am wiser, know better the 

fashion 

How passion seeks aid from its opposite 

passion: 

And if I see cause to love more, hate 
more 

Than ever man loved, ever hated before— 

And seek in the Valley of Love 

The nest, or the nook in Hate’s Grove 

Where my soul may surely reach 

The essence, naught less, of each, 

The Hate of all Hates, the Love 

Of all Loves, in the Valley or Grove,— 

I find them the very warders 

Each of the other’s borders. 

When I love most, Love is disguised 

In Hate; and when Hate is surprised 

In Love, then I hate most: ask 

How Love smiles through Hate’s iron 
casque, 

Hate grins through Love’s rose-braided 
mask,— 

And how, having hated thee, 

TI sought long and painfully 

To reach thy heart, nor prick 

The skin but pierce to the quick— 

Ask this, my Jules, and be answered 
straight 

By thy bride—how the painter Lutwyche 
can hate ! 


JULES interposes. 


Lutwyche! Who else? But all of 
them, no doubt, 
Hated me: they at Venice—presently 


Their turn, however! You I shall not 


meet : 
If I dreamed, saying this would wake 
me, 
Keep 
What’s here, the gold—we cannot meet 
again, 


Consider. and the money was but meant 

For two years’ travel, which is over now. 

All chance or hope or care or need of it, 

This—and what comes from selling these, 
my casts 

And books and medals, except... let 
them go 

Together, so the produce keeps you safe 

Out of Natalia’s clutches! If by chance 

(For all’s chance here) I should survive 
the gang 

At Venice, root out all fifteen of them, 

We might meet somewhere, since the. 
world is wide. 


From without is heard the voice of Pippa, sing- 
ing-- 


Give her but a least excuse to love me! 

When—where— 

How—can this arm establish her above 
me, 

If fortune fixed her as my lady there, 

There already, to eternally reprove me ? 

(‘* Hist !”—said Kate the Queen ; 

But * Oh!” cried the maiden, binding 
her tresses, 

“°T is only a page that carols unseen. 

Crumbling your hounds their messes !”) 


Is she wronged ?—To the rescue of her 
honor, 

My heart ! 

1s she poor ?—What costs it to be styled 
a donor ? : 

Merely an earth to cleave, a sea to part. 

But that fortune should have thrust 
all this upon her ! 

(‘* Nay, list !”—bade Kate the Queen ; 

And still cried the maiden, binding her 
tresses, 

“°T is only a page that carols unseen, 

Fitting your hawks their jesses !”’) 

PIPPA passes. 


JULES resumes, 


What name was that the little girl sang 
forth ? © 

Kate? The Cornaro, doubtless, who re- 
nounced . 

The crown of Cyprus to be lady here 

At Asolo, where still her memory stays. 

And peasants sing how once a certain 
page 

Pined for the grace of her so far above 

His power of doing good to, ‘‘ Kate the 
Queen— 

She never could be wronged, be poor,” 
he sighed, 

‘‘Need him to help her !” 


ROBERT BROWNING 


Yes, a bitter thing 
To see our lady above all rfeed of us ; 
Yet so we look ere we will love; not I, 
But the world looks so. If whoever 
loves 
Must be, insome sort, god or worship- 
per, 
The blessing or the blest one, queen or 


page, ; 

Why should we always choose the page’s 
part ? 

Here is a woman with utter need of 
me,— 

I find myself queen here, it seems ! 

How strange ! 

Look at the woman here with the new 
soul, 

Like my own Psyche,—fresh upon her 
lips 

Alit. the visionary butterfly. 

Waiting my word to enter and make 
bright, 

Or flutter off and leave all blank as first. 

This body had no soul before, but slept 

Or stirred, was beauteous or ungainly, 
free 

From taint or foul with stain, as outward 
things 

Fastened their image on its passiveness : 

Now it will wake, feel, live-—or die again! 

Shall to produce form out of unshaped 
stuff 

Be Art—and further, to evoke a soul 

From form be nothing ? This new soul is 
mine ! 


Now, tokill Lutwyche, what would that 
do ?—save 
A wretched dauber, men will hoot to 
‘death 
Without me, from their hooting. Oh, 
to hear 
God’s voice plain as I heard it first, be- 
fore 
They broke in with their laughter! I 
heard them 
Henceforth, not God. 
To Ancona—Greece—some isle! 
I wanted silence only ; there is clay 
Everywhere. One may do whate’er one 
likes 
In Art: the only thing is, to make sure 
That one does like it—which takes pains 
to know. 
Scatter all this, my Phene—this mad 
dream ! 
Who, what is Lutwyche, what Natalia’s 
friends, [my own, 
What the whole world except our love— 





583 


Own Phene? But I told you, did I not, 

Ere night we travel for your land—some 
isle 

With the sea’s silence on it ? Stand aside— 

I do but break these paltry models up 

To begin Art afresh. Meet Lutwyche, 
I— {him ? 

And save him from my statue meeting 

Some unsuspected isle in the far seas ! 

Like a god going through his world, 
there stands 

One mountain fora moment in the dusk, 

Whole brotherhoods of cedars on its 
brow : 

And you are ever by me while I gaze 

—Are in my arms as now—as now—as 
now ! » 

Some unsuspected isle in the far seas ! 

Some unsuspected isle in far-off: seas ! 


Talk by the way, while Pippa is passing from Or- 
cana to the Turret. Two or three of the Aus- 
trian Police loitering with BLuPHOcKS, ai 
English vagabond, just in view of the Turret. 


Bluphocks. So, that is your Pippa, the 
little girl who passed us singing ? Well, 
your Bishop’s Intendant’s money shall be 
honestly earned :—now, don’t make me 
that sour face because I bring the Bishop’s 
name into the business; we know he can 
have nothing to do with such horrors: we 
know that heis asaint andall that a bishop 
should be, who is a great man beside. Oh 
aere but every worm a maggot, Every fly 
a grig, Every bough a Christmas fagot, 
Every tune a jig! In fact, Ihave abjured 
all religions ; but the last I inclined to was 
the Armenian : for I have travelled, do you 
see, and at Koenigsberg, Prussia Improper 
(so styled because there’s asort of bleak 
hungry sun there), you might remark, over 
a venerable house-porch, a certain Chaldee 
inscription ; and brief as it is, a mere 
glance at it used absolutely to change the 
mood of every bearded passenger. In they 
turned, one and all; the young and light- 
some, with no irreverent pause, the aged 
and decrepit, with a sensible alacrity: 
*’twas the Grand Rabbi’s abode, in short. 
Struck with curiosity, I lost no time in 
learning Syriac—(these are vowels, you dogs 
—follow my stick’s end in the mud—Celar- 
ent, Darii, Ferio!) and one morning pre- 
sented myself, spelling-book in hand, a, b, 
c,—I picked it out letter by letter, and what 
was the purport of this miraculous posy ? 
Some cherished legend of the past, you’ll 
say—‘' How Moses hocuspocussed Egypt's 
land with fly and locust,”—or ‘* How to 
Jonah sounded harshish, Get thee up and 
go to Tarshish,’--or ‘‘ How the angel 
meeting Balaam, Straight his ass returned 
a salaam.” In no wise ! “ Shackabrack— 
Boach—-somebody or other—Isaach, e- 


584 


BRITISH POETS 





' ceiver, Pur-cha-ser and Ea-chan-ger of-- 
Stolen Goods!” So talk to me of the re- 
ligion of a bishop! I have renounced all 
bishops s save Bishop Beveridge !|—mean to 
live so--and die--As some Greek dog-sage 
dead and merry, Hellward bound in 
Charon’s wherry, With food for both 
worlds, under and upper, Lupine-seed and 
Hecate’s supper, And never an obolus. . .« 
(though thanks to you, or this Intendant— 
through you, or this Bishop through his In- 
tendant—-I possess a burning pocket-full of 
zwanzigers) . ..Topay the Stygian Ferry! 

Ist Policeman. There is the girl, then ; 
goand deserve them the moment you have 
pointed out to us Signor Luigi and his 
mother. [To the rest.| Ihave ‘been notic- 
ing a house yonder, this long while: nota 
shutter unclosed since morning ! 

2d Pol. Old Luca Gaddi’s, that owns the 
silk-mills here : he dozes by the hour, wakes 
up, sighs deeply, says he should like to be 
Prince Metternich, and then dozes again, 
after having bidden young Sebald, the 
foreigner, set his wife to playing draughts. 
Never molest such a household, they mean 
well. 

Blup. Only, cannot you tell me some- 
thing of this little Pippa, I must have to do 


with ? One could make something of that 
name. Pippa—that is, short for Felippa— 


rhyming to Panurge consults Hertrip- 
pa—Believest thou king Agrippa? Some- 
thing might be done with that name. 

2d Pol. Put into rhyme that your head 
and a ripe muskmelon would not be dear 
at half a zwanziger! Leave this fooling, 
and look out ; the afternoon’s over or nearly 


SO. 

3d Pol. Where inthis passport of Signor 
Luigi does our Principal instruct you to 
watch him so narrowly? There? What’s 
there beside a simple signature? (That 
English fool’s busy watching. ) 

2d Pol. Flourish all round—‘‘ Put all 
possible obstacles in his way ;” oblong dot 
at the end—“ Detain him till further advices 
reach you ;” scratch at bottom—‘‘ Send him 
back on pretence of some informality in the 
above ;” ink-spirt on right hand side (which 
is the case here)—‘‘ Arrest him at once.” 
Why and wherefore, I don’t concern myself, 
but my instructions amount to this: if 
Signor Luigi leaves home to-night for 
Vienna—well and good, the passport de- 
posed with us for our visa is really for his 
own use, they have misinformed the Office, 
and he means well ; but let him stay over 
to-night—there has been the pretence we 
suspect, the accounts of his corresponding 
and holding intelligence with the Carbonari 
are correct, we arrest him at once, to-mor- 
row comes Venice, and presently Spielberg. 
Bluphocks makes the signal, sure enough ! 
That is he, entering the turret with his 
mother, no doubt, 


Ill. EVENING 


Inside the Turret on the Hill above Asolo. 
and his MOTHER entering. 


Mother. If there blew wind, you’d 
hear a long sigh, easing 
The utmost heaviness of music’s heart. 
Luigi. Here in the archway? 
Mother. Oh no, no—in farther, 
Where the echo is made, on the ridge. 
Lwigt. Here surely, then. 
How plain the tap of my heel as I leaped 
up! 

Hark—‘‘ Lucius Junius!” 
ghost of a voice 
Whose body is caught and kept by... 

what are those ? 
Mere withered wallflowers, waving over- 
head ? 
They seem an elvish group with thin 
bleached hair 
That lean out of their topmost fortress— 
look 
And listen, mountain men, to what we 
say, 
Hand under chin of each grave earthy 
face. 
Up and show faces all of you !— 
you! ” 
That ’s the king dwarf with the scarlet 
comb; old Franz, 
Come down and meet your fate? Hark— 
‘‘ Meet your fate!” 
Mother. Let him not meet it, my 
Luigi—do not 
Go to his City! Putting crime aside, 
Half of these ills of Italy are feigned: 
Your Pellicos and writers for effect, 
Write for effect. 
Luigi. Hush! Say A writes, and B. 
Mother. These A’s and B’s write for 
effect. I say. . 
Then, evil is in its nature loud, while 
good 
Is silent ; you hear each petty injury, 
None of his virtues ; he is old beside, 
Quiet and kind, and densely stupid. 
Why 
Do A and B kill not him themselves ? 
Luigi. They teach 
Others to kill him—me—and, if I fail, 
Others to succeed ; now, if A tried and 
failed, 
I could not teach that : mine ’s the lesser 
task. 
Mother, they visit night by night . 
Mother. —You, Luigi ? 
Ah, will you let me tell you what you 
are ? 


LviG1 


The very 


‘* All of 


ROBERT BROWNING 





585 





Luigi. Why not? Oh, the one thing 
you fear to hint, 
You may assure yourself I say and say 
Ever to myself! At times—nay, even 


as now 
We sit—I think my mind is touch’d, 
suspect 
All is not sound: but is not knowing 
that, 


What constitutes one sane or otherwise ? 

I know I am thus—so, all is right again. 

I laugh at myself as through the town I 
walk, 

And see men metry as if no Italy 

Were suffering : then I ponder—‘‘ Iam 
rich, 

Young, healthy ; why should this fact 
trouble me, 

More than it troubles these?” 
does trouble. 

No, trouble ’s a bad word: for as I walk 

There’s springing and melody and giddi- 


But it 


ness, 

And old quaint turns and passages of 
my youth, 

Dreams long forgotten, little in them- 
selves, 





Return to me—whatever may amuse me: 
And earth seems ina truce with me, and 
heaven 
Accords with me, all things suspend 
their strife, 
The very cicala laughs ‘‘ There goes he, 
and there! 
Feast him, the time is short; he is on 
his way 
For the world’s sake : feast him this once, 
our friend!” 
And in return for all this, I can trip 
Cheerfully up the scaffold-steps. I go 
This evening, mother ! 
Mother. But mistrust yourself— 
Mistrust the judgment you pronounce 
on him ! 
Luigi. Oh, there I feel—am sure that 
Tam right! 
Mother. Mistrust your judgment then, 
of the mere means 
To this wild enterprise: say, you are 


right ,— 

How should one in your state e’er bring 
to pass 

What would require a cool head, a cool 
heart, 

And a calm hand? You never will es- 
cape. 

Iuigi. Escape? To even wish that, 


would spoil all. 


The dying is best part of it. Too much 


Have I enjoyed these fifteen years of 
mine, 
To leave myself excuse for longer life : 
Was not life pressed down, running o’er 
with joy, 
That I might finish with it ere my 
fellows 
Who, sparelier feasted, make a longer 
stay? 
I was put at the board-head, helped to 
all 
At first ; I rise up happy and content. 
Ged must be glad one loves his world so 
much, 
I can give news of earth to all the dead 
Who ask me:—last year’s sunsets, and 
great stars 
Which had a right to come first and see 
ebb 
The crimson wave that drifts the sun 
away— 
Those crescent moons with notched and 
burning rims 
That strengthened into sharp fire, and 
there stood, 
Impatient of the azure—and that day 
In March, a double rainbow stopped the 
storm— 
May’s warm slow yellow moonlit summer 
nights— 
Gone are they, but I have them in my 
soul! 
Mother. (He will not go!) 
Luigi. You smile at me? ’T is true,— 
Voluptuousness, grotesqueness, ghastli- 
ness, 
Environ my devotedness as quaintly 
As round about some antique altar 
wreathe 
The rose festoons, goats’ horns, and 
oxen’s skulls. 
Mother. See now: you reach the city, 
you must cross 
His threshold—how ? 
Luigi. Oh, that’s if we conspired ! 
Then would come pains in plenty, as 
you guess— 
But guess not how the qualities most fit 
For such an office, qualities I have, 
Would little stead me, otherwise em- 
_ ployed, 
Yet prove of rarest merit only here. 
Every one knows for what his excellence 
Will serve, but no one ever will consider 
For what his worst defect might serve : 
and yet 
Have you not seen me range our coppice 
yonder 
In search of a distorted ash ?—I find 


586 


The wry spoilt branch a natural perfect 
bow. 

Fancy the thrice-sage, 
tioned man 

Arriving at the palace on my errand ! 

No, no! I have a handsome dress packed 


thrice-precau- 


p 
White satin here, to set off my black 
air ; 
In I shall march—for you may watch 
your life out 
Behind thick walls, make friends there 
to betray you; 
More than one man spoils everything. 
March straight— 
Only, no clumsy knife to fumble for, 
Take the great gate, and walk (not 
saunter) on 
Through guards and guards—I have re- 
hearsed it all 
Inside the turret here a hundred times. 
Don’t ask the way of whom you meet, 
observe ! 
But where they cluster thickliest is the 


door 

Of doors; they’ll let you pass—they’ll 
never blab 

Each to the other, 
favorite, 

Whence he is bound and what’s his 
business now. 

Walk in—straight up to him; you have 
no knife: 

Be prompt, how should he scream? Then 
out with you! 

Italy, Italy, my Italy ! 

Youre free, youre free! 
could dream 

They got about me—Andrea from his 
exile, 

Pier from his dungeon, 
his grave ! 

Mother. Well, youshall go. Yet seems 

this patriotism 

The easiest virtue for a selfish man 

To acquire : he loves himself—and next, 
the world— 

If he must love beyond,—but naught 
between : [way 

As a short-sighted man sees naught mid- 

His body and the sun above. But you 

Are my adored Luigi, ever obedient 

To my least wish, and running o’er with 
love: 

I could not call you cruel or unkind. 

Once more, your ground for killing him ! 
eer go! 

Luigi. Now do youtry me, or make 

sport of me? 


he knows not the 


Oh mother, I 


Gualtier from 


BRITISH POETS 


How first the Austrians got these proy- 
inces . . 

(If that is all, 7 1] satisfy you soon) 

—Never by conquest but Ne cunning, for 

That treaty whereby . 
Mother. Well! 
Luigi. (Sure, he’s arr ea) 
The tell-tale cuckoo: spring’s his confi- 
dant, 

And he lets out her April purposes !) 

Or... better go at once to modern 
time. 

He has ... they have .. 
derstand 

But can’t restate the matter : that’s my, 
boast : 

Others could reason it out to you, and 
prove 

Things they have made me feel. 
Mother. Why go to-night ? 
Morn’s for adventure. Jupiter is now 
A morning-star. I cannot hear you, 
Luigi! 

Luigi. ** 1am the bright and morning- 

star,” saith God—- 

And ‘* to such an one I give the morning- 
star.” 

The gift of the morning-star! Have I 
God’s gift 

Of the Moni Sie ! 

Mother. Chiara will love to see 
That Jupiter an evening-star next June. 

Luigi. True, mother. Well for those 

who live through June! 
Great noontides, thunder-storms, all 
glaring pomps 


. in fact, I un- 


‘That triumph at the heels of June the 


Zo 
Leading his revel through our leafy 


world. 
Yes, Chiara will be here. ‘ 
Mother. In June: remember. 


Yourself appointed that month for her 
coming. 
Inigi. Was that low noise the echo? 
Mother. The night wind. 
She must be grown—with her blue eyes 
upturned 
As if life were one long and sweet sur- 
prise : 
In June she comes. 
Twigi. We were to see together 
The Titian at Treviso. There, again! 
[From without is heard the voice of PIPPA 
singing— 


A king lived long ago, 
In the morning of the world, 
When earth was nigher heaven than now ; 


ROBERT BROWNING 


And the king’s locks curled, 

Disparting o'er a forehead full 

As the milk-white space ’twixt horn and 
horn 

Of some sacrificial bull— 

Only calm as a babe new-born : 

For he was got to a sleepy mood, 

So safe from all decrepitude, 

Age with its bane, so sure gone by, 

(The gods so loved him while he dreamed) 

That, having lived thus long, there seemed 

No need the king should ever die. 


Luigi. No need that sort of king should 
ever die! 


Among the rocks his city was : 

Before his palace, in the sun, 

He sat to see his people pass, 

And judge them every one 

From its threshold of smooth stone. 

They haled him many a valley-thief 

Caught in the sheep-pens, robber-chief 

Swarthy and shameless, beggar-cheat, 

Spy-prowler, or rough pirate found 

On the sea-sand left aground ; 

And sometimes clung about his feet, 

With bleeding lip and burning cheek, 

A woman, bitterest wrong to speak 

Of one with sullen thickset brows : 

And sometimes from the prison-house 

The angry priests a pale wretch 
brought, 

Who through some chink had pushed 
and pressed 

On knees and elbows, belly and breast, 

Worm-like into the temple,— caught 

He was by the very god, 

Who ever in the darkness strode 

Backward and forward, keeping watch 

Over his brazen bowls, such rogues to 
catch ! 

These, all and every one, 

The king judged, sitting in the sun. 


Luigi. That king should still judge, 
sitting in the sun! 


His councillors, on left and right, 

Looked anxious up,—but no surprise 

Disturbed the king's old smiling eyes 

Where the very blue had turned to 
white. 

*T is said, a Python scared one day 

The breathless city, till he came, 

With forky tongue and eyes on flame, 

Where the old king sat to judge alway ; 

But when he saw the sweepy hair 

Girt with a crown of berries rare 

Which the god will hardly give to wear 





537 


To the maiden who singeth, dancing 
bare 
In the altar-smoke by the pine-torch 
lights, 
At his wondrous forest rites,— 
Seeing this he did not dare 
Approach that threshold in the sun, 
Assault the old king snviling there. 
Such qarace had kings when the world 
began ! 
PIPPA passes. 
Luigi. And such grace have they, 
now that the world ends! 
The Python at the city, on the throne, 
And brave men, God would crown for 
slaying him, 


Lurk in by-corners lest they fall his 


prey. 

Are crowns yet to be won in this late 
time 

Which weakness makes me hesitate to 
reach ? 


'T is God’s voice calls : how could I stay ? 
Farewell ! 


Talk by the way, while Pippa is passing from the 
Turret to the Bishop’s Brother’s House, close 
to the Duomo S. Maria. Poor GIRLS sitting on 
the steps. 


ist Girl. There goes a swallow to 
Venice—the stout seafarer ! 
Seeing those birds fly, makes one wish 
for wings. 
Let us all wish ; you, wish first ! 


2d Girl. I? This sunset 
To finish. 
3d Girl. That old — somebody I 
know, 


Grayer and older than my grandfather, 
To give me the same treat he gave last 


week— 

Feeding me on his knee with fig- 
peckers, 

Lampreys and red Breganze-wine, and 
mumbling 

The while some folly about how well I 
fare, 


Let sit and eat my supper quietly : 
Since had he not himself been late this 


morning : 
Detained at—never mind where,—had 
he not... 
‘‘ Eh, baggage, had I not! ”— 
2d Girl. How she can lie! 
3d Girl. Look there—by the nails! 
2d Girl. What makes your fingers 
red? 
3d Girl. Dipping them into wine to 


write bad words with 


588 





BRITISH POETS 





On the bright table: how he laughed ! 
lst Girl. My turn. 
Spring ’s come and summer ’s coming. 
I would wear 
A long loose gown, down to the feet and 
hands, 
With plaits here, close about the throat, 
all day ; 
And all night lie, the cool long nights 
in bed; 
And have new milk to drink, apples to 
eat, 
Deuzans and junetings, leather “coats hays 
ah, I should say, 
This is away in the fields—miles ! 
dd Girl. Say at once 
You ’d be at home: she ’d always be at 
home! 
Now comes the story of the farm among 
The cherry orchards, and how April 
snowed 
White blossoms on her 
Why, fool, 
They ’ve rubbed the chalk-mark out, 
how tall you were, 
Twisted your starling’s neck, broken 
his cage, 
Made a dung-hill of your garden ! 
1st Girl. They destroy 


as she ran. 


My garden since I left them? well— 
perhaps 
I would have done so: so I hope they 
have ! 
A fig-tree curled out of our cottage 
wall ; 
They called it mine, I have forgotten 
why. 
It must have been there long ere I was 
born: 
Cric—cric—I think I hear the wasps 
o’erhead 
Pricking the papers strung to flutter 
there 


And keep off birds in fruit-time—coarse 
long papers, 

And the wasps eat them, prick them 
through and through. 

3d Girl.How her mouth twitches! 

Where was I ?—before 

She broke in with her wishes and long 
gowns 

And wasps—would I be such a fool !— 
Oh, here! 

This is my way: I answer every one 

Who asks me why I make so much of 
him— 

(if you say ‘‘ you love him ”— straight 
‘‘ he “ll not be gulled !”’) 

“He that seduced me when I was a girl 





Thus high—had eyes like yours, or hair 
like yours, 
Brown, red, white,”—as the case may 
be : that pleases. 
See how that beetle burnishes in the 
path ! 
There sparkles he along the dust : and 
there— 
Your journey to that maize tuft spoiled 
at least ! 
lst Girl. When I was young, they 
said if you killed one 
Of those sunshiny beetles, that his friend 
Up there, would shine no more that day 
nor next. 
2d Girl. When you were young? nor 
are you young, that ’s true. 
How your plump arms, that were, have 
dropped away ! 
Why, I can span them. Cecco beats 
you still? 
No matter, so you keep your curious 
hair. {hair 
I wish they ’d find a way to dye our 
Your color— any lighter tint, indeed 
Than black: the men say they are sick 
of black, 
Black eyes, black hair! 
4th Girl. Sick of yours, like enough. 
Do you pretend you ever tasted lam- 
reys 
And ortolans? Giovita, of the palace, 
Engaged (but there’s no trusting him) 
to slice me 
Polenta with a knife that had cut up 
An ortolan. 


2d Girl. Why, there! Is not that 
Pippa 
We are to talk to, under the window,— 
uick !— 


Where the lights are ? 
1st Girl. Thatshe? No, orshe would 
sing, 
For the Intendant said .. . 
3d Girl. Oh, you sing first ! 
Then, if she listensand comesclose.. . 
I’ll tell you,— 
Sing that song the young English noble 
made, 
Who took you for the purest of the pure, 
And meant to leave the world for you— 
what fun! 
2d Girl. [Sings.] 


Youll love me yet !—and I can tarry 
Your love’s protracted growing : 
June reared that bunch of flowers you 
Carry, 
From seeds of April’s sowing. 








ROBERT BROWNING 


589 





~~ 


I plant a heartfull now : some seed 
At least is sure to strike, 

And yield—what you'll not pluck indeed, 
Not love, but, may be, like. 


You ll look at least on love’s remains, 
A grave’s one violet : 

Your look ?—that pays a thousand pains. 
What’s death 2? Youll love me yet! 


3d Girl. [To PIPPA who approaches. | 
Oh, you may come closer—we shall not eat 
you ! Why, you seem the very person that 
the great rich handsome Englishman has 


fallen so violently in love with. [ll tell 
you all about it. 
IV. NIGHT 
Inside the Palace by the Duomo. MOoNSIGNoR, 
dismissing his Attendants. 

Monsignor. Thanks, friends, many 
thanks! I chiefly desire life now, that I 
may recompense every one of you. Most I 


know something of already. What, a re- 
past prepared ? Benedicto benedicatur... 
ugh, ugh! Where wasI? Oh, as you were 
remarking, Ugo, the weather is mild, very 
unlike winter-weather : but lama Sicilian, 
you know, and shiver in your Julys here. 
To be sure, when ’t was full summer at 
Messina, as we priests used to cross in pro- 
cession the great square on Assumption 
Day, you might see our thickest yellow 
tapers twist suddenly in two, each like a 
falling star, or sink down on themselves in 
a gore of wax. But go, my friends, but go ! 
[To the Intendant.] Not you, Ugo! [The 
others leave the apartment.] I have long 
wanted to converse with you, Ugo. 

Intendant. Ugucecio— 

Mon. ... ’guccio Stefani, man ! of As- 
coli, Fermo and Fossombruno ;—what I do 
need instructing about, are these accounts 
of your administration of my poor brother’s 
affairs. Ugh! Ishallnever get through a 
third part of your accounts; take some of 
these dainties before we attempt it, how- 
ever. Are you bashful to that degree? 
For me, a crust and water suffice. 

Inten. Do you choose this especial night 
to question me ? 

Mon. This night, Ugo. ‘You have man- 
aged my late brother’s affairs since the 
death of our elder brother : fourteen years 
and a month, all but three days. On the 
Third of December, | find him... 

Inten. If you have so intimate an ac- 
quaintance with your brother’s affairs, you 
will be tender of turning so far back : they 
will hardly bear looking into, so far back. 

Mon. Ay, ay, ugh, ugh,—nothing but 
disappointments here below! I remarked 
a considerable payment made to yourself 


on this Third of December. Talk of disap- 
pointments ! There was a young fellow 
here, Jules, a foreign sculptor I did my ut- 
most to advance, that the Church might be 
a gainer by us both: he was going on hope- 
fully enough, and of a sudden he notifies to 
me some marvellous change that has hap- 
pened in his notions of Art. Here’s his 
letter,—‘‘ He never had a clearly conceived 
Ideal within his brain till to-day. Yet 
since his hand could manage a chisel, he has 
practised expressing other men’s Ideals ; 
and, in the very perfection he has attained 
to, he foresees an ultimate failure : his un- 
conscious hand will pursue its prescribed 
course of old years, and will reproduce with 
a fatal expertness the ancient types, let the 
novel one appear never so palpably to his 
spirit. There is but one method of escape : 
confiding the virgin type to as chaste a © 
hand, he will turn painter instead of sculp- 
tor, and paint, not carve, its characteris- 
tics,”—strike out, I dare say, a school like 
Correggio : how think you, Ugo ? 

Inten. Is Correggio a painter ? 

Mon. Foolish Jules! and yet, after all, 
why foolish ? He may—probably will—fail 
egregiously ; but if there should arise a 
new painter, will it not be in some such 
way, by a poet now, or a musician (spirits 
who have conceived and perfected an Ideal 
through some other channel), transferring 
it to this, and escaping our conventional 
roads by pure ignorance of them ; eh, Ugo ? 
If you have no appetite, talk at least, Ugo ? 

Inten. Sir, I can submit no longer to 
this course of yours. First, you select the 
group of which I formed one,—next you 
thin it gradually,—always retaining me 
With your smile,—and so do you proceed 
till you have fairly got me alone with you 
between four stone walls. And now then ? 
Let this farce, this chatter end now: what 
is it you want with me ? 

Mon. Ugo! 

Inten. From the instant you arrived, I 
felt your smile on me as you questioned me 
about this and the other article in those 
papers—why your brother should have 
given me this villa, that podere,—and your 
nod at the end meant,—what ? 


Mon. Possibly that I wished for no loud 
talk here. If once you set me coughing, 
Ugo !|— 

Inten. I have your brother’s hand and 


seal to all I possess : now ask me what for ! 
what service I did him—ask me ! 

Mon. I would better not: I should rip 
up old disgraces, let out my poor brother’s 
weaknesses. By the way, Maffeo of Forli, 
(which, I forgot to observe, is your true 
name, ) was the interdict ever taken off you 
for robbing that church at Cesena ? 

Inten. No, nor needs be: for when I 
murdered your brother’s friend, Pasquale, 
for him . 


599 


BRITISH ‘POETS 





Mon. Ah, he employed you in that busi- 
ness, did he? Well, I must let you keep, 
as you say, this villa and that podere, for 
fear the world should find out my relations 
were of so indifferent a stamp? Maffeo, 
my family is the oldest in Messina, and 
century after century have my progenitors 
gone on polluting themselves with every 
wickedness under heaven: my own father 
... rest his soul!—I have, I know, a chapel 
to support that it may rest: my dear two 
dead brothers were,—what you know toler- 
ably well; I, the youngest, might have 
rivalled them in vice, if not in wealth: but 
from my boyhood I came out from among 
them, and so am not partaker of their 
plagues. My glory springs from another 
source; or if from this, by contrast only,— 
for [, the bishop, am the brother of your 
‘employers, Ugo. I hope to repair some of 
their wrong, however; so far as my brother’s 
ill-gotten treasure reverts to me, I can stop 
the consequences of his crime: and not one 
soldo shall escape me. Maffeo, the sword 
we quiet men spurn away, you shrewd 
knaves pick up and commit murders With; 
what opportunities the virtuous forego, 
the villanous seize. Because, to pleasure 
myself apart from other considerations, my 
food would be miilet-cake, my dress sack- 
cloth, and my couch straw,—am I there- 
fore to let you, the off-scouring of the earth, 
seduce the poor and ignorant by appro- 
priating a pomp these will be sure to think 
lessens the abominations so unaccountably 
and exclusively associated with it?) Must I 
let villas and poderi go to you, a murderer 
and thief, that you may beget by means of 
them other murderers and thieves? No-- 
if my cough would but allow me to speak ! 

Inten. What am Ito expect? You are 
going to punish me ? 

Mon. Must punish you, Maffeo. I can- 
not afford to cast away a chance. I have 
whole centuries of sin to redeem, and only 
a month or two of life to do it in. How 
should I dare to say... 

Inten. ‘‘ Forgive us our trespasses” ? 

Mon. My friend, it is because I avow 
myself a very worm, sinful beyond mea- 
sure, that I reject a line of conduct you 
would applaud perhaps. Shall I proceed, 
as it were, a-pardoning ?—I ?—who have no 
symptom of reason to assume that aught 
less than my strenuousest efforts will keep 
myself out of mortal sin, much less keep 
others out. No: Ido trespass, but will not 
double that by allowing you to trespass. 

Inten. And suppose the villas are not 
your brother’s to give, nor yours to take ? 
Oh, you are hasty enough just now ! 

Mon. 1, 2—No 3 !—ay, can you read the 
substance of a letter, No 3, I have received 
from Rome? It is precisely on the ground 
there mentioned, of the suspicion. I have 
that a certain child of my late elder brother, 





who would have succeeded to his estates, 
was murdered in infancy by you, Maffeo, 
at the instigation of my late younger 
brother—that the Pontiff enjoins onme not 
merely the bringing that Maffeo to condign 
punishment, but the taking all pains, as 
guardian of the infant’s heritage for the 
Church, to recover it parcel by parcel, how- 
soever, Whensoever, and wWwheresoever. 
While you are now gnawing those fingers, 
the police are engaged in sealing up your 
papers, Maffeo, and the mere raising my 
voice brings my people from the next room 
to dispose of yourself. But I want you to 
confess quietly, and save me raising my 
voice. Why, man, do I not know the old 
story? The heir between the succeeding 
heir, and this heir’s ruffianly instrument, 
and their complot’s effect, and the life of 
fear and bribes and ominous smiling si- 
lence ? Did you throttle or stab my brother’s 
infant ? Come now ! 

Inten. So old a story, and tell it no bet- 
ter? When did such an instrument ever 
produce such an effect? Either the child 
smiles in his face ; or, most likely, he is not 
fool enough to put himseif in the employer’s 
power so thoroughly : the child is always 
ready to produce—as you say—howsoever, 
wheresover, and whensoever. 

Mon. Liar ! 

Inten. Strikeme? Ah, so mighta father 
chastise !- I shall sleep sounddy to-night at 
least, though the gallows await me to-mor- 
row ; for what a life did I lead! Carlo of 
Cesena reminds me of his connivance, 
every time I pay his annuity ; which hap- 
pens commonly thrice a year. If I remon- 
strate, he will confess all to the good bishop 
—you ! 

Mon. Isee through the trick, caitiff ! I 
would you spoke truth for once. All shall 
be sifted, however—seven times sifted. 

Inten. And how my absurd riches en- 
cumbered me! I dared not lay claim to 
above half of my possessions. Let me but 
once unbosom myself, glorify Heaven, and 


‘die ! 


Sir, you are no brutal dastardly idiot like 
your brother I frightened to death : let us 
understand one another. Sir, I will make 
away with her for you—the girl—here close 
at hand; not the stupid obvious kind of 
killing ; do not speak—know nothing of her 
nor of me! Isee her every day—saw her 
this morning: of course there is to be no 
killing ; but at Rome the courtesans perish 
off every three years, and I can entice her 
thither—have indeed begun operations al- 
ready. There is a.certain lusty blue-eyed 
florid-complexioned English knave, I and 
the Police employ occasionally. You as- 
sent, I perceive—no, that’s not it—assent 
I do not say—but you will let me convert 
my present havings and holdings into cash, 
and give me time tocross the Alps? ’T is 


- en ——— 


ROBERT BROWNING 


but a little black-eyed pretty singing Fe- 
lippa, gay silk-winding girl. I have kept 
her out of harm’s way up to this present ; 
for I always intended to make your life a 
plague to you with her. ’Tisas well settled 
once and forever. Some women I have 
procured will pass Bluphocks, my hand- 
some scoundrel, off for somebody; and 
once Pippa entangled !—you conceive? 
Through her singing? Is ita bargain ? 
[From without is heard the voice of PIPPA 
singing— 
Overhead the tree-tops meet, 
Flowers and grass spring ’neath one’s 
feet; 
There was naught above me, naught 
below. 
My childhood had not learned to know : 
For, what are the voices of birds 


—Ah, and of beasts, but words, our | 


words, 

Only so much more sweet ? 

The knowledge of that with my life be- 
gun. 

But I had so near made out the sun, 

And counted your stars, the seven and 
one, 

Like the fingers of my hand: 

Nay, I could all but understand 

Wherefore through heaven the white 
moon ranges ; 

And just when out of her soft fifty 
changes 

No unfamiliar face might over-look 


me— 
Suddenly God took me. 


[PIPPA passes. 


Mon. [Springing up.] My people---one 
and all—within there! Gag this villain-- 
tie him hand and foot! He dares... I 
know not half he dares—but remove him— 
quick! Miserere mei, Domine! Quick, 
I say ! 


Prppa’s Chamber again. She enters it. 


The bee with his comb, 

The mouse at her dray, 

The grub in his tomb, 

While winter away ; 

But the fire-fly and hedge-shrew and 
lob-worm, I pray, 

How fare they? 

Ha, ha, thanks for your counsel, my 
Zanze ! 

“ Feast upon lampreys, 
ganze ”— 

The summer of life so easy to spend, 

And care for to-morrow so soon put 
away ! 


quaff Bre- 





59 


But winter hastens at summer’s end, 

And _ fire-fly, hedge-shrew, lob-worm, 
I pray, 

How fare they? 

No bidding me then to.. 
Zanze say ? 

‘*Pare your nails pearlwise, get your 
small feet shoes 

Morelike” . (what said she? )—‘‘and 
less like canoes!” 

How pert that girl was!—would I be 
those pert 

Impudent staring women! 
me, 

However, surely no such mighty hurt 

To learn his name who passed that jest 
upon me: 

No foreigner, that I can recollect, 

Came, as she says, a month since, to in- 
spect 

Our silk-mills—none with blue eyes and 
thick rings 

Of raw-silk-colored hair, at all events. 

Well, if old Luca keep his good intents, 

We shall do better, see what next year 
brings ! 

I may buy shoes, my Zanze, not appear 

More destitute than you perhaps next 
year ! 

Bluph . . . something ! 
the uncouth name 

But for Monsignor’s people’s sudden 
clatter 

Above us—bound to spoil such idle 
chatter 

As ours : it were indeed a serious matter 

If silly talk like ours should put to shame 

The pious man, the man devoid of blame, 

The... ah but—ah but, all the same, 

No mere mortal has a right 

To carry that exalted air ; 

Best people are not angels quite : 

or st of people’s doings 
scare [spare ! 

The devil; so there’s that proud look to 

Which is mere counsel to myself, 

mind! for 

I have just been the holy Monsignor : 

And I was you, too, Luigi’s gentle 
mother, 

And you too, Luigi!—how that Luigi 
started 

Out of the turret—doubtlessly departed 

On some good errand or another, 

For he passed just now in. a traveller’s 
trim, 

And the sullen company that prowled 

About his path, I noticed, scowled 

As if they had lost a prey in him. 


. what did 


It had done 


T had caught 





so 


BRITISH POETS 








And I was Jules the sculptor’s bride, 
And I was Ottima beside, 
And now what am I ?—tired of fooling. 
Day for folly, night for schooling! 
New year’s day is over and spent, 
Ill or well, I must be content. 

Even my lily’s asleep, I vow: 
Wake up—here’s a friend I’ve plucked 

you! 
Call this flower a heart’s-ease now ! 
Something rare, let me instruct you, 
Is this, with petals triply swollen, 
Three times spotted, thrice the pollen ; 
While the leaves and parts that witness 
Old proportions and their fitness, 
Here remain unchanged, unmoved now ; 
Call this pampered thing improved now ! 
Suppose there’s a king of the flowers 
And a girl-show held in his bowers— 
** Look ye, buds, this growth of ours,” 
Says he, ‘‘ Zanze from the Brenta, 
I have made her gorge polenta 
Till both cheeks are near as bouncing 
Asher... name there’s no pronounc- 
ing! 

See this heightened color too, 
For she swilled Breganze wine 
Till her nose turned deep carmine ; 
°T was but white when wild she grew. 
And only by this Zanze’s eyes 
Of which we could not change the size, 
The magnitude of all achieved 
Otherwise, may be perceived.” 


Oh what a drear dark close to my poor 
day ! 

How could that red sun drop in that 
black cloud ? 

Ah Pippa, morning’s rule is moved away, 

Dispensed with, inever more to be al- 
lowed ! 

Day’s turn is over, now arrives the 
night’s. 

Oh lark, be day’s apostle 

To mavis, merle and throstle, 

Bid them their betters jostle 

From day and its delights ! 

But at night, brother owlet, over the 
woods, 

Toll the world to thy chantry ; 

Sing to the bats’ sleek sisterhoods 

Full complines with gallantry : 

Then, owls and bats, 

Cowls and twats, 

Monks and nuns, in a cloister’s moods, 

Adjourn to the oak-stump pantry ! 

[After she has begun to undress herself. 

Now, one thing Ishould like to really 

know : 


How near I ever might approach all 
these 
I only fancied being, this long day : 
—Approach, I mean, so as to touch them, 
SO 
As to...insome way... move them— 
if you please, 
Do good or evilto them some slight way. 
For instance, if I wind 
Silk to morrow, my silk may bind 
[Sitting on the bedside 
And border Ottima’s cloak’s hem. 
Ah me, and my important part with 
them, 
This morning’s hymn 
when I rose! 
True in some sense or other, I suppose.’ 
[As she lies down. 
I can pray no more to- 


half promised 


God bless me! 
night. 
No doubt, some way or other, hymns say 


right. 


Allservice ranks the same with God— 
With God, whose puppets, best and worst, 
Are we ; there is no last nor first. 
[She sleeps. 
1841, 


CAVALIER TUNES 
I. MARCHING ALONG 


KENTISH Sir Byng stood for his King, 

Bidding the crop-headed Parliament 
swing: 

And, pressing a troop unable to stoop 

And see the rogues flourish and honest 
folk droop, 

Marched them along, fifty-score strong, 

Great-hearted gentlemen, singing this 
song. 


God for King Charles! 
carles 
To the Devil that prompts ’em their 
treasonous parles ! 
Cavaliers, up! Lips from the cup, 
Hands from the pasty, nor bite take nor 
sup 
Till you ’re— 
CHorRus.—Marching along, fifty-score 
strong, 
Great-hearted gentlemen, 
singing this song. 


Pym and such 


Hampden to hell, and his obsequies’ 
knell. 

Serve Hazelrig, Fiennes, 
Harry as well! 


and young 


ROBERT BROWNING 


England, good cheer! Rupert is near! 
Kentish and loyalists, keep we not here, 
CuHorus.—Marching along, fifty-score 
strong, 
Great-hearted gentlemen, sing- 
ing this song? 


Then, God for King Charles ! 
his snarls 
To the Devil that pricks on such pestilent 


Pym and 


carles ! 
' Hold by the right, you double your 
might ; 
So, onward to Nottingham, fresh for 
the fight, 
CHORUS.--March we along, fifty-score 
strong, 


Great-hearted gentlemen, sing- 
ing this song! 


II. GIVE A ROUSE 


King Charles, and who ’ll do him right 


now ? : 
King Charles, and who’s ripe for fight 
now? . 
Give a rouse: here ’s, in hell’s despite 
now, 


King Charles! 
Who gave me the goods that went since ? 
Who raised me the house that sank once ? 
Who helped me to gold I spent since ? 
Who found me in wine you drank once? 
CHORUS.—King Charles, and who’ll do 
him right now ? 
King Charles, and who’s ripe 
for fight now ? 
Give a rouse: here’s, 
despite now, 
King Charles ! 


in hell’s 


To whom used my boy George quaff else, 
By the old fool’s side that begot him ? 
For whom did he cheer and laugh else, 
While Noll’s damned troopers shot him ? 
CHorus.—King Charles, and who'll do 
him right now ? 
King Charles, and who’s ripe 
for fight now ? 
Give a rouse: here’s, in hell’s 
despite now, 
' King Charles ! 


Ill. BOOT AND SADDLE 


Boot, saddle, to horse and away ! 

Rescue my castle before the hot day 

Brightens to blue from its silvery gray. 
CHorRuUS.—Boot, saddle, to horse and 


away ! 
38 


293 


Ride past the suburbs, asleep as you’d 
Say ; 
Many ’s the friend there, will listen and 


pray 
‘*God’s luck to gallants that strike up 
the lay— 
Cuorvus.—Boot, saddle, to horse, and 
away!” 


Forty miles off, like a roebuck at bay, 

Flouts Castle Brancepeth the Round- 
heads’ array : 

Who laughs, ‘‘ Good fellows ere this, by 


my fay, 
CHORUS.—Boot, saddle, to horse, and 
away!” 
Who? My wife Gertrude; that, honest 
and gay, 
Laughs meen you talk of surrendering, 
66 Nay 
I’ve better Berea what counsel 
they ? 
CHo.—Boot, saddle, to horse, and 


away!” 1842. 


THROUGH THE METIDJA TO ABD- 
EL-KADR 


AS IJ ride, asI ride, 

With a full heart for my guide, 
So its tide rocks my side, 

As I ride, as I ride, 

That, as I were double-eyed, 
He, in whom our Tribes confide, 
Is descried, ways untried, 

As I ride, as I ride. 


As I ride, as I ride 

To our Chief and his Allied, 

Who dares chide my heart’s pride 
As I ride, as I ride? 

Or are witnesses denied— 

Through the desert waste and wide 
Do I glide unespied 

As I ride, as I ride? 


As I ride, as I ride, 

When an inner voice has cried, 
The sands slide, nor abide 

(As I ride, as I ride) 

O’er each visioned homicide 

That came vaunting (has he lied ?) 
To reside—where he died, 

As I ride, as I ride. 


As I ride, as I ride, 
Ne’er has spur my swift horse plied, 
Yet his hide, streaked and pied, 


594 


As I ride, as I ride, 

Shows where sweat has sprung and dried, 
—Zebra-footed, ostrich-thighed— 

How has vied stride with stride 

As I ride, as I ride! 


As I ride, as I ride, 

Could I loose what Fate has tied, 
Ere I pried, she should hide 

(As I ride, as I ride) 

All that’s meant me—satisfied 
When the Prophet and the Bride 
Stop veins I’d have subside 

As I ride, as I ride! 1842. 


CRISTINA 


SHE should never have looked at me 
If she meant I should not love her! 
There are plenty . . . menyoucall such, 
I suppose . . . she may discover 
All her soul to, if she pleases, 
And yet leave much as she found 
them : 
But I’m not so, and she knew it 
When she fixed me, glancing round 
them. 


What? To fix me thus meant nothing? 
But I can’t tell (there ’s my weakness) 
What her look said !—no vile cant, sure, 
About ‘‘ need to strew the bleakness 
Of some lone shore with its pearl-seed, 
That the sea feels” —no ‘‘ strange 
yearning 
That such souls have, most to lavish 
Where there’s chance of least return- 
ing.” 


Oh, we’re sunk enough here, God knows! 
But not quite so sunk that moments, 
Sure though seldom, are denied us, 
When the spirit’s true endowments 
Stand out plainly from its false ones, 
And apprise it if pursuing 
Or the right way or the wrong way, 
To its triumph or undoing. 


There are flashes struck from midnights, 
There are fire-flames noondays kindle, 
Whereby piled-up honors perish, 
Whereby swollen ambitions dwindle, 
While just this or that poor impulse, 
Which for once had play unstifled, 
Seems the sole work of a lifetime, 
That away the rest have trifled. 


Doubt you if, in some such moment, 
As she fixed me, she felt clearly, 
Ages past the soul existed, 


BRITISH POETS 


Here an age ’t is resting merely, 
And hence fleets again for ages, 

While the true end, sole and single, 
It stops here for is, this love- -way, 

With some other soul to mingle? 


Else it loses what it lived for, 
And eternally must lose it ; 
Better ends may be in prospect, 
Deeper blisses (if you choose it), 
But this life’s end and this love-bliss 
Have been lost here. Doubt you 
whether 
This she felt as, looking at me, 
Mine and her souls rushed together ? 


Oh, observe! Of course, next moment, 
The world’s honors in derision, 
Trampled out the light forever : 
Never fear but there’s provision 
Of the devil’s to quench knowledge 
Lest we walk the earth in rapture! 
—Making those who catch God’s secret 
Just so much more prize their capture ! 


Such am I; the secret ’s mine now ! 
She has lost me, I have gained her ; 
Her soul’s mine: and thus, grown per- 

fect, 
I shall pass my life’s remainder, 
Life will just hold out the proving 
Both our powers, alone and blended : 
And then come the next life quickly ! 
This world’s use will have been ended. 
1842. 


INCIDENT OF THE FRENCH CAMP 


You know, we French stormed Ratis- 
bon : 

A mile or so away, 

On a little mound, Napoleon 
Stood on our storming-day ; 

With neck out-thrust, you fancy how, 
Legs wide, arms locked behind, 

As if to balance the prone brow 
Oppressive with its mind. 


Just. as perhaps he mused ‘* My plans 
- That soar, to earth may fall, 
Let once my army-leader Lannes 
Waver at yonder wall,”— 
Out “twixt the battery- -smokes there 
flew 
A rider, bound on bound 
Full-galloping ; nor bridle drew 
Until he reached the mound. 


Then off there flung in smiling joy, 
And held himself erect 


ROBERT BROWNING 


By just his horse’s mane, a boy : 
You hardly could suspect— 

(So tight he kept his lips compressed, 
Scarce any blood came through) 

You looked twice ere you saw his breast 
Was all but shot in two. 


“‘ Well,” cried he, ‘‘ Emperor, by God's 
grace 
We ’ve got you Ratisbon ! 
The Marshal ’s in the market-place, 
And you ’ll be there anon 
To see your flag-bird flap his vans 
Where I, to heart’s desire, 
Perched him!” The chief’s eye flashed ; 
his plans 
Soared up again like fire. 


The chief’s eye flashed ; but presently 
Softened itself, as sheathes 
A film the mother-eagle’s eye 
When her bruised eaglet breathes ; 
* * You ’re wounded!” ‘‘ Nay,” the sol- 
dier’s pride 
Touched to the quick, he said: 
**T ’m killed, Sire!” And his chief be- 
side 


Smiling the boy fell dead. —_—1842, 


MY LAST DUCHESS 
FERRARA 


THAT'S my last Duchess painted on the 
wall, 

Looking as if she were alive. 

That piece a wonder, now: 
dolf’s hands 

Worked busily a day, and there she 


T call 
Fra Pan- 


stands. 

Will ’t please you sit and look at her? I 
said 

‘Fra Pandolf” by design, for never 
read 

Strangers like you that pictured coun- 
tenance, 

The depth and passion of its earnest 
glance, 

But to myself they turned (since none 

: puts by 


The curtain I have drawn for you, but I) 

And seemed as they would ask me, if 
they durst, 

How such a glance came there ; so, not 
the first 

Are you to turn and ask thus. 
was not 

Her husband’s presence only, called that 
spot 


Sir, ’t 





599 


Of joy into the Duchess’ cheek: perhaps 


Fra Pandolf chanced to say, ‘‘ Her man- 
tle laps 

Over my lady’s wrist too much,” or 
‘* Paint 


Must never hope to reproduce the faint 

Half-flush that dies along her throat:” 
such stuff 

Was courtesy, she thought, and cause 
enough 

For calling up that spot of joy. She had 

A heart—how shall I say ?—too soon 
made glad. 

Too easily impressed : she liked whate’er 

She looked on, and her looks went every- 


where. 
Sir, *t was all one! My favor at her 
breast, 
The dropping of the daylight in the 
est, 
The bough of cherries some officious 
fool 
Broke in the orchard for her, the white 
mule 
She rode with round the terrace—all and 
each 


Would draw from her alike the approv- 
ing speech, 

Or blush, at least. She thanked men,— 
good! but thanked 

Somehow—I know’ not how—as if she 


ranked 

My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old 
name 

With anybody’s gift. Who ’d stoop to 
blame 


This sort of trifling? Even had youskill 

In speech—(which I have not)—to make 
your will 

Quite clear to such an one, and say, 
** Just this 

Or that in you disgusts me; here you 
miss, 

Or there exceed the mark ”—and if she 
let 

Herself be lessoned so, nor plainly set 

Her wits to yours, forsooth, and made 
excuse, 

—K’en then would be some stooping ; 
and I choose 

Never to stoop. Oh sir, she smiled, no 


doubt, 

Whene’er I passed her ; but who passed 
without 

Much the same smile? This grew ; I 


gave commands ; 
Then all smiles stopped together. There 
she stands [ll meet 
Asifalive. Will’t please you rise? We 


590 


BRITISH: POETS 





The company below, then. I repeat, 

The Count your master’s known munifi- 
cence 

Is ample warrant that no just pretence 

Of mine for dowry will be disallowed ; 

Though his fair daughter’s self, as I 
avowed 

At starting, is my object. 

Together down, sir. 
though, 

Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity, 

Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze 
forme! 1842. 


Nay, we’ll go 
Notice Neptune, 


IN A GONDOLA 
He sings 


I SEND my heart up to thee, all my heart 
In this my singing. 
For the stars help me, and the sea bears 
part ; 
The very night is clinging 
Closer to Venice’ streets to leave one 
space 
Above me, whence thy face 
May light my joyous heart to thee its 
dwelling place. 


She speaks 


Say after me, and try to say 

My very words, as if each word 

Came from you of your own accord, 

In your own voice, in your own way: 

‘This woman’s heart and souland brain 

Are mine as much as this gold chain 

She bids me wear; which” (say again) 

‘*T choose to make by cherishing 

A precious thing, or choose to fling 

Over the boat-side, ring by ring.” 

And yet once more say... no word 
more ! 

Since words are only words. Give o’er! 

Unless you call me, all the same, 

Familiarly by my pet name, 

Which if the Three should hear you call, 

And me reply to, would proclaim 

At once our secret to them all. 

Ask of me, too, command me, blame,— 

Do, break down the partition-wall 

°T wixt us, the daylight world beholds 

Curtained in dusk and splendid folds ! 

What’s left but—all of me to take? 

Iam the Three’s: prevent them, slake 

Your thirst! ’T is said, the Arab sage, 

In practising with gems. can loose 

Their subtle spirit in his cruce , 

And leave but ashes: so, sweet mage, 





Leave them my ashes when thy use 
Sucks out my soul, thy heritage! 


He sings 


Past we glide, and past, and past ! 
What’s that poor Agnese doing 
Where they make the shutters fast ? 
Gray Zanobi ’s just a-wooing 
To his couch the purchased bride: 

Past we glide! 


Past we glide, and past. and past! 
Why’s the Pucci Palace flaring 
Like a beacon to the blast ? 
Guests by hundreds, not one caring 
If the dear host’s neck were wried : 
Past we glide! 


She sings 


The moth’s kiss, first ! 

Kiss me as if you made believe 

You were not sure, this eve, 

How my face, your flower, had pursed 


Its petals up; so, here and there 


You brush it, till Il grow aware 
Who wants me, and wide ope I burst. 


The bee’s kiss, now ! 

Kiss me as if you entered gay 
My heart at some noonday, 

A bud that dares not disallow 
The claim, so all is rendered up, 
And passively its shattered cup 
Over your head to sleep I bow. 


Fe sings 


What are we two? 

lama Jew, 

And carry thee, farther than friends 
can pursue, 

To a feast of our tribe ; 

Where they need thee to bribe 

The devil that blasts them unless he 
imbibe 

Thy ... Scatter the vision forever! 
And now, 

As of old, Iam I, thou art thou! 


Say again, what we are? 

The sprite of a star, 

I lure thee above where the destinies bar 

My plumes their full play 

Till a ruddier ray 

Than my pale one announce there is 
withering away * 

Some... Scatter the vision forever ! 
And now, 

As of old, Iam J, thou art thou! 





ROBERT BROWNING 


He muses 


Oh, which were best, to roam or rest ? 

The land’s lap or the water’s breast? 

To sleep on yellow millet-sheaves, 

Or swim in lucid shallows just 

Eluding water-lily leaves, 

An inch from Death’s black fingers, 
thrust 

To lock you, whom release he must ; 

Which life were best on Summer eves? 


He speaks, musing 


Lie back; could thought of mine im- 
prove you? 

From this shoulder let there spring 

A wing; from this, another wing ; 

Wings, not legs and feet, shall move 
you! 

Snow- white must they spring, to blend 

With your flesh, but I intend 

‘They shall deepen to the end, 

Broader, into burning gold, 

Till both wings crescent-wise enfold 

Your perfect self, from ’neath your feet 

To o’er your head, where, lo, they meet 

As if a million sword-blades hurled 

Defiance from you to the world! 


Rescue me thou, the only real! 

And scare away this mad ideal 

That came, nor motions to depart ! 
Thanks! Now, stay ever as thou art! 


Still he muses 


What if the Three should catch at last 
Thy serenader? While there ’s cast 
Paul’s cloak about my head, and fast 
Gian pinions me, Himself has past 
His stylet through my back ; I reel ; 
And... .is it thou I feel? 


They trail me, these three godless knaves, 
Past every chur ch that saints and saves, 
Nor stop till, where the cold sea raves 
By Lido’s wet accursed graves, 

They scoop mine, roll me to its brink, 
And...on thy breast I sink! 


She replies, musing. 


Dip your arm o’er the boat-side, elbow- 
deep, 

As I do: thus: were death so unlike 
sleep, 

Caught this way? Death ’s to fear from 
flame or steel, 

Or poison doubtless ; but from water— 
feel ! 


597 

Go find the bottom! Would you stay 

me? There! [grass 

Now pluck a great blade of that ribbon- 

To plait in where the foolish jewel was, 

I flung away: since you have praised 
my hair, 

’T is proper to be choice in what I wear. 


He speaks 


Row home? must we row home? Too 
surely 

Know I where its front ’s demurely 

Over the Giudecca piled ; 

Window just with window mating, 

Door on door exactly waiting 

All’s the set face of a child: 

But behind it, where ’s a trace 

Of the staidness and reserve 

And formal lines without a curve, 

In the same child’s playing-face? 

No two windows look one way 

O’er the small sea-water thread 

Below them. Ah, the autumn day 

I, passing, saw you overhead ! 

First, out a cloud of curtain blew, 

Then a sweet cry, and last came you— 

To catch your lory that must needs 

Escape just then, of all times then, 

To peck a tall plant’s fleecy seeds, 

And make me happiest of men. 

I scarce could breathe to see you reach 

So far back o’er the balcony 

To catch him ere he climbed too high 

Above you in the Smyrna peach, 

That quick the round smooth cord of 
gold, 

This coiled hair on your head, unrolled, 

Fell down you like a gorgeous snake 

The Roman girls were wont, of old, 

When Rome there was, for coolness’ sake 

To let lie curling o’er their bosoms. 

Dear lory, may his beak retain 

Ever its delicate rose stain 

As if the wounded lotus-blossoms 

Had marked their thief to know again! 


Stay longer yet, for others’ sake 

Than mine! What should your cham- 
ber do? 

—With all its rarities that ache 

In silence while day lasts, but wake 

At night-time and their life renew, 

Suspended just to pleasure you 

Who brought against their will together 

These objects, and, while day lasts, 
weave 

Around them such a magic tether 

That dumb they look: your harp, be- 
lieve, 


598 


With all the sensitive tight strings 
Which dare not speak, now to itself 
Breathes slumberously, as if some elf 


Went in and out the chords, his wings 

Make murmur wheresoe’er they graze, 

As an angel may, between the maze 

Of midnight palace-pillars, on 

And on, to sow God’s plagues, have gone 

Through guilty glorious Babylon. 

And while such murmurs flow, the 
nymph 

Bends o’er the harp-top from her shell 

As the dry limpet for the lymph 

Come with a tune he knows so well. 

And how your statues’ hearts must 
swell! 

And how your pictures must descend 

To see each other, friend with friend ! 

Oh, could you take them by surprise, 

You'd find Schidone’s eager Duke 

Doing the quaintest courtesies 

To that prim saint by Haste-thee-Luke ! 

And, deeper into her rock den, 

Bold Castelfranco’s Magdalen 

You'd find retreated from the ken 

Of that robed counsel-keeping Ser— 

As if the Tizian thinks of her, 

And is not, rather, gravely bent 

On seeing for himself what toys 

Are these, his progeny invent, 

What litter now the board employs 

Whereon he signed a document 

That got him murdered! Each enjoys 

Its night so well, you cannot break 

The sport up, so, indeed must make 

More stay with me, for others’ sake. 


She speaks 


To-morrow, if a harp-string, say, 

Is used to tie the jasmine back 

That overfloods my room with sweets, 
Contrive your Zorzi somehow meets 
My Zanze! If the ribbon’s black, 
The Three are watching: keep away ! 


Your gondola—let Zorzi wreathe 

A mesh of water-weeds about 

Its prow, as if he unaware 

Had struck some quay or bridge-foot 
stair ! 

That I may throw a paper out 

As you and he go underneath. 


There’s Zanze’s vigilant taper ; safe are 

we. [me ? 
Only one minute more to-night with 
Resume your past self of a month ago! 
Be you the bashful gallant, I will be 


BRITISHAPOERTS 





The lady with the colder breast than 
snow. 
Now fee you, as becomes, nor touch 
hand 
More thea? I touch yours when I step to 
land, 
And say, “All thanks, Siora! }?_ 
Heart to heart 
And lips to lips! Yet once more, ere 
we part, 
Clasp me and make me thine, as mine 
thou art! 
[He is surprised, and stabbed. 
It was ordained to be so, sweet !—and 
best 
Comes now, beneath thine eyes, upon 
thy br ‘east. 
Still eam me! Carenot forthe cowards ! 
are 
Only to put aside thy beauteous hair 
My blood will hurt! The chee Ido 
not scorn 


To death, because they never lived : but I 


Have lived indeed, and so—(yet one 
more kiss)—can die! 1842. 


THE PIED PIPER OF HAMELIN 


A CHILD'S STORY 


(Written for, and inscribed to, W. M. 
the Younger.) 4 


I 


HAMELIN Town ’s in Brunswick, 
By famous Hanover city ; 

The river Weser, deep and wide, 

Washes its wall on the southern side ; 

A pleasanter spot you never spied ; 
But, when begins my ditty, 

Almost five hundred years ago, 

To see the townsfolk suffer so 

From vermin, was a pity. 


II 
Rats ! 
They fought the dogs and killed the cats, 
And bit the babies in the cradles, 
And ate the cheeses out of the vats, 
And licked the soup from the cooks’ 
; own ladles, 
Split open the kegs of salted sprats, 
Made nests inside men’s Sunday hats, 
And even spoiled the women’s chats 
By drowning their speaking 
With shrieking and squeaking 
In fifty different sharps and flats. 


1 The son of William Macready, the famous 
actor. 





ROBERT BROWNING 





III 


At last the people in a body 
To the Town Hall came flocking : 
‘* °T is clear,” cried they, ‘‘our Mayor ’s 
a noddy ; 
And as for our Corporation—shocking 
To think we buy gowns lined with 
ermine 
For dolts that can’t or won’t determine 
What ’s best to rid us of our vermin ! 
You hope, because you ’re old and obese, 
To find in the furry civic robe ease ? 
Rouse up, sirs! Give your brains a rack- 


ing 
To find the remedy we ’re lacking, 
‘Or, sure as fate, we ‘ll send you pack- 
ing!” 
At this the Mayor and Corporation 
Quaked with a mighty consternation. 


IV 


An hour they sat in council ; 
At length the Mayor broke silence : 

‘* For a guilder I ’d my ermine gown 

sell, 
I wish I were a mile hence ! 

It ’s easy to bid one rack one’s brain— 

I’m sure my poor head aches again, 

I’ve scratched it so, and all in vain. 

Oh for a trap, a trap, a trap!” 

Just as he said this, what should hap 

At the chamber-door but a gentle tap ? 

‘* Bless us,” cried the Mayor, ‘‘ what ’s 
that?” 

(With the Corporation as he sat, 

Looking little though wondrous fat ; 

Nor brighter was his eye, nor moister 

Than a too-long-opened oyster, 

Save when at noon his paunch grew 
mutinous 

For a plate of turtle green and glutinous) 

‘Only a scraping of shoes on the mat ? 

Anything like the sound of a rat 

Makes my heart go pit-a-pat !” 


Vv 


“ Come in! ”—the Mayor cried, looking 
bigger : 
And in did come the strangest figure ! 
His queer long coat from heel to head 
Was half of yellow and half of red, 
And he himself was tall and thin, 
With sharp blue eyes, each like a pin, 
And light loose hair, yet swarthy skin, 
No tuft on cheek nor beard on chin, 
But lips where smiles went out and in ; 
There was no guessing his kithand kin: 
And nobody could enough admire 





599 


The tall man and his quaint attire. 

Quoth one: “It ’s as my great-grand- 
sire, 

Starting up at the Trump of Doom’s 
tone, 

Had walked this way from his painted 
tombstone ! ” 


VER 


He advanced to the council-table : 

And, ‘‘ Please your honors,” said he, 
**T ’m able, 

By means of a secret charm, to draw 

All creatures living beneath the sun, 

That creep or swim or fly or run, 

After me so as you never saw ! 

And I chiefly use my charm 

On creatures that do people harm, 

The mole and toad and newt and viper ; 

And people call me the Pied Piper.” 

(And here they noticed round his neck 

A scarf of red and yellow stripe, 

To match with his coat of the self-same 
check ; 

And at the scarf’s end hung a pipe; 

And his fingers, they noticed, were ever 
straying 

As if impatient to be playing 

Upon this pipe, as low it dangled 

Over his vesture so old-fangled. ) 

‘* Yet,” said he, ‘‘ poor piper as I am, 

In Tartary I freed the Cham, 

Last June, from his huge swarms of 
gnats ; 

I eased in Asia the Nizam 

Of a monstrous brood of vampire-bats: 

And as for what your brain bewilders, 

If I can rid your town of rats 

Will you give meathousand guilders ? ” 

“One? fifty thousand!”’—was the ex- 
clamation 

Of the astonished Mayor and Corpora- 
tion, 

Vil 


Into the street the Piper stepped, 
Smiling first a little smile, 
As if he knew what magic slept 
In his quiet pipe the while ; 
Then, like a musical adept, 
To blow the pipe his lips he wrinkled, 
And green and blue his sharp eyes 
twinkled, 
a candle-flame 
sprinkled ; 
And ere three shrill notes the pipe 
uttered, 
You heard as if an army muttered ; 
And the muttering grew toa grumbling ; 


Like where salt is 


600 


And the grumbling grew to a mighty 
rumbling ; 

And out of the houses the rats came 
tumbling. 

Great rats, small rats, lean rats, brawny 
rats, 

Brown rats, black rats, gray rats, tawny 
rats, 

Grave old plodders, gay young friskers, 

Fathers, mothers, uncles, cousins, 
Cocking tails and pricking whiskers, 
Families by tens and dozens, 

Brothers, sisters, husbands, wives— 

Followed the Piper for their lives. 

From street to street he piped advanc- 
ing, 

And step for step they followed dancing, 

Until they came to the river Weser, 

Wherein all plunged and perished ! 

Save one who, stout as Julius Cesar, 

Swam across and lived to carry 

(As he, the manuscript he cherished) 

To’ Rat-land home his commentary : 

Which was, ‘‘ At the first shrill notes of 
the pipe, 

I heard a sound as of scraping tripe, 

And putting apples, wondrous ripe, 

Into a cider-press’s gripe : 

Anda moving away of pickle-tub-boards, 

And a leaving ajar of conserve-cup- 





boards, 

And a drawing the corks of train-oil- 
flasks, 

And a breaking the boops of butter- 
casks : 


And it seemed as if a voice 
(Sweeter far than by harp or by psaltery 
Is breathed) called out, ‘Oh rats, re- 


joice ! 

The world is grown to one vast dry- 
saltery ! 

So munch on, crunch on, take your 
nuncheon, 


Breakfast, supper, dinner, luncheon! ’ 

And just as a bulky sugar puncheon, 

All ready staved, like a great sun shone 

Glorious scarce an inch before me, 

Just as methought it said, ‘Come, bore 
me !’ 

—I found the Weser rolling o’er me.” 


VIII 
You should have heard the Hamelin 
people 
Ringing the bells till they rocked the 
steeple. 
‘*Go,” cried the Mayor, ‘‘and get long 
poles, [holes ! 


Poke out the nests and block up the © 


BRITISH POETS 


Consult with carpenters and builders, 

And leave in our town not even a trace 

Of the rats!”—when suddenly, up the 
face 

Of the Piper perked in the market-place, 

With a, ‘* First, if you please, my thou- 
sand guilders!” 


IX 


A thousand guilders ! The Mayor looked 
lue ; 

So did the Corporation too. 

For council dinners made rare havoc 

With Claret, Moselle, Vin-de-Grave, 
Hock ; 

And half the money would replenish 

Their cellar’s biggest butt with Rhenish. 

To pay this sum to a wandering fellow 

With a gypsy coat of red and yellow ! 

‘* Beside,” quoth the Mayor with a 
knowing wink, 


| “Our business was done at: the river’s 


brink ; 
We saw with our eyes the vermin sink, 
And what ’s dead can’t come to life, I 
think. 
So, friend, we ’re not the folks to shrink 
From the duty of giving you something 
for drink, 
And a matter of money to put in your — 
oke ; 
But as for the guilders, what we spoke 
Of them, as you very well know, was in 
joke. 
Beside, our losses have made us thrifty. 
A thousand guilders! Come, take fifty !” 


x 


The Piper’s face fell, and he cried, 

‘‘No trifling! I can’t wait, beside! 

I’ve promised to visit by dinner time 

Bagdad, and accept the prime 

Of the Head-Cook’s pottage, all he’s 
rich in, 

For having left, in the Caliph’s kitchen, 

Of a nest of scorpions no survivor : 

With him I proved no bargain-driver, 

With you, don’t think I'll bate a stiver! 

And folks who put me in a passion 

May find me pipe after another fashion.” 


xell 


‘“‘How?” cried the Mayor, ‘‘ d’ye think 
I brook . 

Being worse treated than a Cook? 

Insulted by a lazy ribald 

With idle pipe and vesture piebald ? 

You threaten us, fellow ? Do your worst, 

Blow your pipe there till you burst !”” 


ROBERT BROWNING 


XII 


Once more he stepped into the street, 
And to his lips again 
Laid his long pipe of smooth straight 


cane ; 
And ere he blew three notes (such 
sweet 
Soft notes as yet musician’s cunning 
Never gave the enraptured air) 
There was a rustling that seemed like a 
bustling 
Of merry crowds justling at pitching 
and hustling ; 
Small feet were pattering, wooden shoes 
clattering, 
Little hands clapping and little tongues 
chattering, 
And, like fowls in a farm-yard when 
barley is scattering, 
Out came the children running. 
All the little boys and girls, 
With rosy cheeks and flaxen curls. 
And sparkling eyes and teeth like pearls, 
Tripping and skipping, ran merrily after 
The wonderful music with shouting and 


laughter. - 
xl 
The Mayor was dumb, and the Council 
stood 
As if they were changed into blocks of 
wood, 


Unable to move a step, or cry 

To the children merrily skipping by, 

—Could only follow with the eye 

That joyous crowd at the Piper’s back. 

But how the Mayor was on the rack, 

And the wretched Council’s bosoms beat, 

As the Piper turned from the High Street 

To where the Weser rolled its waters 

Right in the way of their sons and daugh- 
ters ! 

However, he turned from South to West, 

And to Koppelberg Hill his steps ad- 
dressed, 

And after him the children pressed ; 

Great was the joy in every breast. 

‘‘ He never can cross that mighty top! 

He’s forced to let the piping drop, 

And we shall see our children stop !” 

When, 4 as they reached the mountain- 
side, 

A wondrous portal opened wide. 

As if a cavern was suddenly hollowed ; 

And the Piper advanced and the children 
followed, 

And when all were in to the very last. 

The door in the mountain-side shut fast. 


601 


Did I say all? No! One was lame, 

And could not dance the whole of the 
way ; 

And in after years if you would blame 

His sadness, he was used to say,-— 

“It’s dull in our town since my play- 
mates left ! 

I can’t forget that I’m bereft 

Of all the pleasant sights they see, 

Which the Piper also promised me. 

For he led us, he said, to a joyous land, 

Joining the town and just at hand, 

Where waters gushed and fruit-trees 
grew 

And flowers put forth a fairer hue, 

And everything was strange and new ; 

The sparrows were brighter than pea- 
cocks here, 

And their dogs outran our fallow deer, 

And honey-bees had lost their stings, 

And horses were born with eagles’ 
wings; 

And just as I became assured 

My lame foot would be speedily cured, 

The music stopped and I stood still, 

And found myself outside the hill, 

Left alone against my will, 

To go now limping as before, 

And never hear of that country more!” 


XIV 


Alas, alas for Hamelin ! 
There came into many a burgher’s pate 
A text which says that heaven’s gate 
Opes to the rich at as easy rate 

As the needle’s eye takes a camel in ! 

The Mayor sent East, West, North and 

South, 

To offer the Piper, by word of mouth, 
Wherever it was men’s lot to find him, 

Silver and gold to his heart’s content, 

If he’d only return the way he went, 
And bring the children behind him. 
But when they saw ’t was a lost en- 

deavor, 
And Piper and dancers were gone for- 
ever, 
They made a decree that lawyers never 
Should think their records dated duly 
If, after the day of the month and year, 
These words did not as well appear, 
«And so long after what happened here 
On the Twenty-second of July, 
Thirteen hundred and seventy-six :” 
And the better in memory to fix 
The place of the children’s last retreat, 
They.called it, the Pied Piper’s Street— 
Where any one playing on pipe or tabor 
Was sure for the future to lose his labor. 


602 


Nor suffered they hostelry or tavern 
To shock with mirth a street so 
solemn ; 
But opposite the place of the cavern 
They wrote the story on a column. 
And on the great church-window painted 
The same, to make the-world acquainted 
How their children were stolen away, 
And there it stands to this very day. 
And I must not omit to say 
That in Transylvania there ’s a tribe 
Of alien people who ascribe 
The outlandish ways and dress 
On which their neighbors lay such stress, 
To their fathers and mothers having 
risen 
Out of some subterraneous prison 
Into which they were trepanned 
Long time ago in a mighty band 
Out of Hamelin town in Brunswick land, 
But how or why, they don’t understand. 


XV 


So, Willy, let me and you be wipers 

Of scores out with all men—especially 
pipers ! 

And, whether they pipe us free from rats 
or from mice, 

If we've promised them aught, let us 
keep our promise ! 1842. 


RUDEL TO THE LADY OF TRIPOLI 


TI KNOW a Mount, the gracious Sun per- 
ceives 

First, when he visits, last, too, when he 
leaves 

The world ; and, vainly favored, it repays 

The day-long glory of his steadfast gaze 

By no change of its large calm front of 
snow. 

And underneath the Mount, a Flower I 
know, 

He cannot have perceived, that changes 
ever 

At his approach; and, in the lost en- 
deavor 

To live his life, has parted, one by one, 

With all a flower’s true graces, for the 
grace 

Of being but a foolish mimic sun, 

With ray-like florets round a disk-like 
face. 

Men nobly call by many a name the 
Mount 

As over many a land of theirs its large 

Calm front of snow like a triumphal 
targe 





BRITISH POETS 


Is reared, and still with old names, fresh 
names vie, 
Each to its proper praise and own 


account: 
| Men call the Flower the Sunflower, 
sportively. 
II 


Oh, Angel of the East, one, one gold look 
Across the waters to this twilight nook, 
—The far sad waters, Angel, to this 


nook ! 

; III 
Dear Pilgrim, art thou for the East in- 

deed ? 


Go !—saying ever as thou dost proceed, 

That I, French Rudel, choose for my 
device 

A sunflower outspread like a sacrifice 

Before its idol. See! These inexpert 

And hurried fingers could not fail to 
hart 

The woven picture ; *t is a woman’s skill 

Indeed ; but nothing baffled me, so, ill 

Or well, the work is finished. Say, men 
feed 

On songs I sing, and therefore bask the 
bees 

On my flower’s breast as on a platform 
broad : 

But as the flower’s concern is not for 
these 

But solely for the sun, so men applaud 

In vain this Rudel, he not looking here 

But to the East--the East! Go, say this, 
Pilgrim dear ! 1842 


THERE’S A WOMAN LIKE A DEW- 
DROP 


[FROM A BLOT IN THE SCUTCHEON] 


THERE ’S a woman like a dewdrop, she’s 
so purer than the purest ; 

And her noble heart ’s the noblest, yes, 
and her sure faith’s the surest: 

And her eyes are dark and humid, like 
the depth on depth of lustre 

Hid i’ the harebell, while her tresses, sun- 
nier than the wild-grape cluster, 

Gush in golden-tinted plenty down her 
neck’s rose-misted marble: 

Then her voice’s music . .. call it the 
well’s bubbling, the bird’s warble! 

And this woman says, ‘‘ My days were 
sunless and my nights were moon- 
less, 


ROBERT BROWNING 


Parched the pleasant April herbage, and 
the lark’s heart’s outbreak tune- 
less, 

If you loved me not!” And I who—(ah, 
for words of flame!) adore her, 

Who am mad to lay my spirit prostrate 
palpably before her— 

I may enter at her portal soon, as now 
her lattice takes me, 

And by noontide as by midnight make 
her mine, as hers she makes 
me ! 1843. 


THE LOST LEADER'! 


Just for a handful of silver he left us, 
Just for a riband to stick in his coat— 
Found the one gift of which fortune be- 
reft us, 
Lost all the others she lets us devote ; 
They, with the gold to give, doled him 
out silver, 
So much was theirs who so little al- 
lowed : 
How all our copper had gone for his 
service ! 
Rags—were they purple, his heart had 
been proud! 


1 Browning admitted that in writing this poem 
he had Wordsworth in mind, but insisted that he 
did not mean it as an exact portrait of Words- 
worth. Browning’s mature judgment on the 
matter is best expressed in his own words: ‘I 
did in my hasty youth presume to use the great 
and venerated personality of Wordsworth as a 
sort of painter’s model; one from which this or 
the other particular feature may be selected 
and turned to account; had I intended more, 
above all, such a boldness as portraying the en- 
tire man, I should not have talked about ‘hand- 
fuls of silver and bits of ribbon.’ These never 
influenced the change of politics in the great 
poet, whose defection, nevertheless, accom- 
panied as it was by a regular face-about of his 
special party, was to my juvenile apprehension, 
and even mature consideration, an event to de- 
plore.”? See also Mrs. Orr’s Browning (Life and 
Letters), I, 191. Compare Shelley’s early Sonnet 


TO WORDSWORTH 


Port of Nature, thou hast wept to know 
That things depart which never may return : 
Childhood and youth, friendship and love’s first 


glow, 
Have fled like sweet dreams, leaving thee to 
mourn. 
These common woesI feel. One loss is mine 
Which thou too feel’st, yet I alone deplore. 
Thou wert as a lone star, whose light did shine 
On some frail bark in winter’s midnight roar : 
Thou hast like to a rock-built refuge stood 
Above the blind and battling multitude : 
In honored poverty thy voice did weave 
Songs consecrate to truth and liberty,-- 
Deserting these, thou leavest me to grieve, 
Thus having been, that thou shouldst cease to 
be. 1815. 1816. 


603 


We that had loved him so, followed him, 
honored him, 
Lived in his mild and magnificent 
eye, 
Learned his great language, caught his 
clear accents, 
Made him our pattern to live and to 
die ! 
Shakespeare was of us, Milton was for 
us, 
Burns, Shelley, were with us,—they 
watch from their graves ! 
He alone breaks from the van and the 
freemen, 
—He alone sinks to the rear and the 
slaves ! 
shall march prospering,— not 
through his presence ; 
Songs may inspirit us,—not from his 
re; 
Deeds will be done,—while he boasts his 
quiescence, 
Still bidding crouch whom the rest 
bade aspire: — 
Blot out his name, then, record one lost 
soul more, 
One task more declined, one more 
footpath untrod, 
One more devils’-triumph and sorrow for 
angels, 
One wrong more to man, one more in- 
sult to God ! 
Life’s night begins: let him never come 
back to us! 
There would be doubt, hesitation and 
pain, 
Forced praise on our part—the glimmer 
of twilight, 
Never glad confident morning again ! 
Best fight on well, for we taught him— 
strike gallantly, 
Menace our heart ere we master his 
own; 
Then let him receive the new knowledge 
and wait us, 
Pardoned in heaven, the first by the 
throne ! 1845. 


We 


HOW THEY BROUGHT THE GOOD 
NEWS FROM GHENT TO AIX 1 


I SPRANG to the stirrup, and Joris, and 
he ; 
I galloped, Dirck galloped, we galloped 
all three ; 
1 This galloping ballad, which has no historical 


foundation, was written at sea, off Cape St. 
Vincent. See Mrs. Orr’s Browning, I, 144-45. 


604 


‘*Good speed !” cried the watch, as the 
gatebolts undrew ; 

‘*Speed!” echoed the wall to us gallop- 
ing through ; 

Behind shut the postern, the lights sank 
to rest, 

And into the midnight we galloped 
abreast. 


Not a word to each other ; we kept the 
great pace 

Neck by neck, stride by stride, never 
changing our place ; 

I turned in my saddle and made its 
girths tight, 

Then shortened each stirrup, and set the 
pique right, 

Rebuckled the cheek-strap, 
slacker the bit, 

Nor galloped less steadily Roland a whit. 


chained 


"T was moonset at starting ; but while 
we drew near 

Lokeren, the cocks crew and twilight 
dawned clear ; 

At Boom, a great yellow star came out 
to see ; 

At Diffeld, *t was morning as plain as 
could be: 

And from Mecheln church-steeple we 
heard the half-chime, 

So Joris broke silence with, ‘‘ Yet there 
is time !” 


At Aershot, up leaped of a sudden the 
sun, 

And against him the cattle stood black 
every one, [ing past, 

To stare through the mist at us gallop- 

And I saw my stout galloper Roland at 


last, 

With resolute shoulders, each butting 
away 

The haze, as some bluff river headland 
its spray : 


And his low head and crest, just one 
sharp ear bent back 

For my voice, and the other pricked out 
on his track ; 

And one eye’s black intelligence,—ever 
that glance 

O’er its white edge at me, his own 
master, askance ! 

And the thick heavy spume-flakes which 

aye and anon [ing on. 

His fierce lips shook upwards in gallop- 


By Hasselt, Dirck groaned; and cried 
Joris, ‘* Stay spur! 





BRITISH POETS 


Your Roos galloped bravely, the fault ’s 
not in her. 

We ’ll remember at Aix ”’—for one heard 
the quick wheeze 

Of her chest, saw the stretched neck and 
staggering knees, 

And sunk tail, and horrible heave of the 
flank, 

As down on her haunches she shuddered 
and sank. 


So, we were left galloping, Joris and I, 

Past Looz and past Tongres, no cloud in 
the sky ; [laugh, 

The broad sun above laughed a pitiless 

"Neath our feet broke the brittle bright 
stubble like chaff ; 

Till over by Dalhem a dome-spire sprang 
white, 

And “Gallop,” gasped Joris, ‘‘ for Aix is 
in sight!” 


‘ How they ‘ll greet us !”—and all ina 
moment his roan 

Rolled neck and croup over, lay dead as 
a stone ; 

And there was my Roland to bear the 
whole weight 

Of the news which alone could save Aix 
from her fate, 

With his nostrils hike pits fullof blood to 
the brim, 

And with circles of red for his eye- 
sockets’ rim. 


Then I cast loose my buffcoat, each hol- 
ster let fall, 

Shook off both my jack-boots, let go belt 
and all, [his ear, 

Stood up in the stirrup, leaned, patted 

Called my Roland his pet-name, my horse 
without peer ; 

Clapped my hands, laughed and sang, 
any noise, bad or good, 

Till at length into Aix Roland galloped 
and stood. 


And all I remember is—friends flocking 
round 

As I sat with his head *twixt my knees 
on the ground ; 

And no voice but was praising this Rol- 
and of mine, 

As I poured down his throat our last 
measure of wine, 

Which (the burgesses voted by common 
consent) 

Was no more than his due who brought 
good news from Ghent. 

1838. 1845. 


ROBERT BROWNING 


605 





EARTH’S IMMORTALITIES 


FAME 
SEE, as the prettiest graves will do in 
time, 
Our poet’s wants the freshness of its 
prime ; 
Spite of the sexton’s browsing horse, the 
sods 


Have struggled through its binding osier 


rods ; 

Headstone and half-sunk footstone lean 
awry, 

Wanting the brick-work promised by- 

and-by ; 

How the minute gray lichens, plate o’er 
plate, 

Have softened down the crisp-cut name 
and date ! 


LOVE 


So, the year ’s done with ! 
(Love me forever !) 

All March begun with, 
April’s endeavor ; 

May-wreaths that bound me 
June needs must sever ; 

Now snows fall round me, 
Quenching June’s fever— 
(Love me forever ! ) 1845. 

MEETING AT NIGHT 


THE gray sea and the long black land: 
And the yellow half-moon large and low 
And the startled little waves that ce: 
In fiery ringlets from their sleep, 

As I gain the cove with pushing prow, 
And quench its speed i’ the slushy sand. 


Then a mile of warm sea-scented beach ; 
Three fields to cross till a farm appears ; 
A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch 
And blue spurt of a lighted match, 

And a voice less loud, through its joys 

and fears, 
Than the two hearts beating each to each! 
1845. 


PARTING AT MORNING 


RounD the cape of a sudden came the sea, 
And the sun looked over the mountain’s 
rim: 
And straight was a path of gold for him, 
And the need of a world of men for me. 
1845. 





SONG 


Nay but you, who do not love her, 
Is she not pure gold, my mistress ? 
Holds earth aught—speak truth—above 
her ? 
Aught like this tress, see, and this tress, 
And this last fairest tress of all, 
So fair, see, ere I let it fall? 


Because you spend your lives in praising ; 
To praise, you search the wide world 
Over : 
Then why not witness, calmly gazing, 
If earth holds aught—speak truth— 
above her ? 
Above this tress. and this, I touch 
But cannot praise, I love so much ! 
1845. 


HOME-THOUGHTS, 


OH, to be in England 

Now that April’s there, 

And whoever wakes in England 

Sees, some morning, unaware, 

That the lowest boughs and the brush- 
wood sheaf 

Round the elm-tree bole are in tiny leaf, 

While the chaffinch sings on the orchard 
bough 

In England—now ! 


And after April, when May follows, 

And the whitethroat builds, and all the 
swallows! 

Hark, where my blossomed pear-tree in 
the hedge 

Leans to the field and scatters on the 
clover 

Blossoms and dewdrops—at the bent 
spray’s edge— 

That ’s the wise thrush ; 
song twice over, 

Lest you should think he never could re- 
capture 

The first fine careless rapture ! 

And though the fields look rough with 
hoary dew, 

All will be gay when noontide wakes 


FROM ABROAD 


he sings each 


anew 

The buttercups, the little children’s 
dower 

—Far brighter than this gaudy melon- 
flower ! 1845. 


HOME-THOUGHTS, FROM THE SEA 


NOBLY, nobly Cape Saint Vincent to the 
Northwest died away ; 


606 


Sunset ran, one glorious blood-red, reek- 
ing into Cadiz Bay ; 

Bluish ’mid the burning water, full in 
face Trafalgar lay ; 

In the dimmest Northeast distance 
dawned Gibraltar grand and gray ; 

‘¢ Here and here did England help me: 
how can I help England ?”’—say, 


Whoso turns as I, this evening, turn to 
God to praise and pray, 

While Jove’s planet rises yonder, silent 
over Africa. 1838, 1845. 


TIME’S REVENGES 


I ’vE a Friend, over the sea; 

I like him, but he loves me. 

It all grew out of the books I write ; 

They find such favor in his sight 

That he slaughters you with savage looks 

Because you don’t admire my books. 

He does himself though,—and if some 
vein 

Were to snap to-night in this heavy 
brain, 

To-morrow month, if I lived to try, 

Round should I just turn quietly, 

Or out of the bedclothes stretch my hand 

Till I found him, come from his foreign 
land 

To be my nurse in this poor place, 

And make my broth and wash my face 

And light my fire and, all the while, 

Bear with his old good-humored smile 

That I told him ‘‘ Better have kept away 

Than come and kill me, nightand day, 

With, worse than fever throbs and 
shoots, 

The creaking of his clumsy boots.” 

Tam as sure that this he would do, 

As that Saint Paul’s is striking two. 

And I think I rather . . woe is me! 


—-Yes, rather should see him than not 
see, 

If lifting a hand could seat him there 

Before me in the empty chair 

To-night, when my head aches indeed, 

And I can neither think nor read, 

Nor make these purple fingers hold 

The pen ; this garret’s freezing cold! 


And I’ve a Lady—there he wakes, 

The laughing fiend and prince of snakes 
Within me, at her name, to pray 

Fate send some creature in the way 

Of my love for her, to be down-torn, 
Upthrust and outward-borne, 


BRITISH POETS 


So I might prove myself that sea 

Of passion which I needs must be! 

Call my thoughts false and my fancies 
quaint 

And my style infirm and its figures faint, 

All the critics say, and more blame yet, 

And not one angry word you get. 

But, please you, wonder I would put 

My cheek beneath that lady’sfeot ~ 

Rather than trample under mine 

The laurels of the Florentine, 

And you shall see how the devil spends 

A fire God gave for other ends ! 

I tell you, I ride up and down 

This garret, crowned with love’s best 
crown, 

And feasted with love’s perfect feast, 

To think I kill for her, at least, 

Body and soul and peace and fame, 

Alike youth’s end and manhood's aim, 

—So is my spirit, as flesh with sin, 

Filled full, eaten out and in 

With the face of her, the eyes of her, 

The lips, the little chin, the stir 

Of shadow round her mouth; and she 

—I’ll tell you—calmly would decree 

That I should roast at a slow fire, 

If that would compass her desire 

And make her one whom they invite 

To the famous ball to-morrow night. 


There may be heaven; there must be 
hell ; 

Meantime, there is our earth here— 
well! 1845. 

THE ITALIAN IN ENGLAND 

THAT second time they hunted me 

From hill to plain, from shore to sea, 

And Austria, hounding far and wide 

Her blood-hounds through the country- 
side, 

Breathed hot and instant on my trace,— 

I made six days a hiding-place 

Of that dry green old aqueduct 

Where I and Charles, when boys, have 
plucked 

The fire-flies from the roof above, 

Bright creeping through the moss they 
love: 

—How long it seems since Charles wa 
Jost ! . 

Six days the soldiers crossed and crossed 

The country in my very sight ; 

And when that peril ceased at night, 

The sky broke out in red dismay 

With signal fires ; well, there I lay 

Close covered o’er in my recess, 


“7 


ROBERT BROWNING 607, 


Up to the neck in ferns and cress, 

Thinking on Metternich our friend, 

And Charles’s miserable end, 

And much beside, two days; the third, 

Hunger o’ercame me when I heard 

The peasants from the village go 

To work among the maize; you know, 

With us in Lombardy, they bring 

Provisions packed on mules, a string 

With little bells that cheer their task, 

And casks, and boughs on every cask 

To keep the sun’s heat from the wine ; 

These I let pass in jingling line, 

And, close on them, dear noisy crew, 

The peasants from the village, too ; 

For at the very rear would troop 

Their wives and sisters in a group 

To help, I knew. When these had 
passed, A 

I threw my glove to strike the last, 

Taking the chance: she did not start, 

Much less cry out, but stooped apart, 

One instant rapidly glanced round, 

And saw me beckon from the ground ; 

A wild bush grows and hides my crypt: 

She picked my glove up while she 
stripped 

A branch off, then rejoined the rest 

With that; my glove lay in her breast. 

-Then I drew breath: they disappeared : 

It was for Italy I feared. 


An hour, and she returned alone 
Exactly where my glove was thrown. 
Meanwhile came many thoughts ; on me 
Rested the hopes of Italy ; 

I had devised a certain tale 

Which, when ’t was told her, could not 
fail 

Persuade a peasant of its truth ; 

I meant to call a.freak of youth 

This hiding, and give hopes of pay, 

And no temptation to betray. 

But when I saw that woman’s face, 

Its calm simplicity of grace, 

Our Italy’s own attitude 

In which she walked thus far, and stood, 

Planting each naked foot so firm, 

To crush the snake and spare the worm— 

At first sight of her eyes, I said, 

‘*Tam that man upon whose head 

They fix the price, because I hate 

The Austrians over us: the State 

Will give you gold—oh, gold so much !— 

If you betray me to their clutch, 

And be your death, for aught I know, 

If once they find you saved their foe. 

Now, you must bring me food and drink, 

And also paper, pen and ink, 





es. 





And carry safe what I shall write 

To Padua, which you’ll reach at night 

Before the duomo shuts ; go in, 

And wait till Tenebrae begin ; 

Walk to the third confessional, 

Between the pillar and the wall, 

And kneeling whisper, Whence comes 
peace ? 

Say it a second time, then cease ; 

And if the voice inside returns, 

From Christ and Freedom ; what concerns 

The cause of Peace ?—for answer, slip 

My letter where you placed your lip ; 

Then come back happy we have done 

Our mother service—lI. the son, 

As you the daughter of our land !” 


Three mornings more, she took her, 
stand 

In the same place, with the same eyes: 
I was no surer of sunrise 
Than of her coming. We conferred 
Of her own prospects, and I heard 
She had a lover—stout and tall, 
She said—then let her eyelids fall, 
‘‘ He could do much”—as if some doubt 
Entered her heart,—then, passing out, 
‘*She could not speak for others, who 
Had other thoughts ; herself she knew :” 
And so she brought me drink and food. 
After four days, the scouts pursued 
Another path ; at last arrived 
The help my Paduan friends contrived 
To furnish me: she brought the news. 
For the first time I could not choose 
But kiss her hand, and lay my own 
Upon her head—‘‘ This faith was shown 
To Italy, our mother ; she 
Uses my hand and blesses thee.” 
She followed down to the sea-shore ; 
I left and never saw her more. 


How very long since I have thought 

Concerning—much less wished for— 
aught 

Beside the good of Italy, 

For which I live and mean to die! 

I never was in love; and since 

Charles proved false, what shall now 
convince 

My inmost heart I have a friend? 

However, if I pleased to spend 

Real wishes on myself—say, three— 

I know at least what one should be. 

I would grasp Metternich until 

I felt his red wet throat distil 

In blood through these two hands. And 
next 

—Nor much for that am I perplexed— 


-_ 


608 


BRITISH POETS 





Charles, perjured traitor, for his part, 

Should die slow of a broken heart 

Under his new employers. Last 

—Ah, there, what should I wish ? 
fast 

Do I grow old and out of strength. 

If I resolved to seek at length 

My father’s house again, how scared 

They all would look, and unprepared ! 

My brothers live in Austria’s pay 

—Disowned me long ago, men say ; 

And all my early mates who used 

To praise me so—perhaps induced 

More than one early step of mine— 

Are turning wise: while some opine 

‘‘ Freedom grows licence,” some suspect 

‘* Haste breeds delay,” and recollect 

‘They always said, such premature 

Beginnings never could endure ! 

So, with a sullen ‘‘ All’s for best,” 

The land seems settling to its rest. 

I think then, I should wish to stand 

This evening in that dear, lost land, 

Over the sea the thousand miles, 

And know if yet that woman smiles 

With the calm smile ; some little farm 

She lives in there, no doubt: what harm 

If Isat on the door-side bench, 

And, while her spindle made a trench 

Fantastically in the dust, 

Inquired of all her fortunes—just 

Her children’s ages and their names, 

And what may be the husband’s aims 

For each of them. I'd talk this out, 

And sit there, for an hour about, 

Then kiss her hand once more, and lay 

Mine on her head, and go my way. 


For 


So much for idle wishing—how 
It steals the time! To business now. 
1845. 


PICTOR IGNOTUS 
FLORENCE, 15— 


I COULD have painted pictures like that 


youth’s 
Ye praise so. How my soul springs 
up! No bar 


Stayed me—ah, thought which saddens 
while it soothes ! 
—Never did fate forbid me, star by 
star, 
To outburst on your night with all my 
gift 
Of fires from God : nor would my flesh 
have shrunk 
From seconding my soul, with eyes up- 
lift 


And wide to heaven, or, straight like 
thunder, sunk 
To the centre, of an instant ; or around 
Turned calmly and inquisitive, to scan 
The license and the limit, space and 
bound, 
Allowed to truth made visible in man. 
And, like that youth ye praise so, all I 
saw, ; 
Over the canvas could my hand have 


flung, 
Each face obedient to its passion’s law, 
Each passion clear proclaimed with- 
out a tongue ; 
Whether Hope rose at once in all the 
blood, 
A-tiptoe for the blessing of embrace, 
Or Rapture drooped the eyes, as when 
her brood 
Pull down the nesting dove’s heart to 
its place ; 
Or Confidence lit swift the forehead up, 
And locked the mouth fast, like a 
castle braved,— 
O human faces, hath it spilt, my cup? 
What did ye give me that I have not — 
saved ? 
Nor will I say I have not dreamed (how 
well!) 
Of going—I, in each new picture,— - 
forth, 
As, making new hearts beat and bosoms 
swell, 
To Pope or Kaiser, East, West, South, 
or North, 
Bound for the calmly satisfied great 
State, 
Or glad aspiring little burgh, it went, 
Flowers cast upon the car which bore 
the freight, 
Through old streets named afresh from 
the event, 
Till it reached home, where learned age 
should greet 
My face, and youth, the star not yet 
distinct 
Above his hair, lie learning at my feet !— 
Oh, thus to live, I and my picture, 
linked 
With love about, and praise, till life 
should end, 
And then not go to heaven, but linger 
here, 
Here on my earth, earth’s every man 
my friend,— 
The thought grew frightful,’t was so 
wildly dear ! 
But a voice changed it. 
such sights 


Glimpses of 





ROBERT BROWNING 


Have scared me, like the _ revels 
through a door 
Of some strange house of idois at its 
rites ! 
This world seemed not the world it 
was before : 
Mixed with my loving trusting ones, 
there trooped 
... Who summoned those cold faces 
that begun 
To press on me and judge me? Though 
I stooped 
Shrinking, as from the soldiery a 
nun, 
They drew me forth, and spite of me... 
enough ! 
These buy and sell our pictures, take 
and give, 
Count them for garniture and household- 
stuff, . 
And where they live needs must our 
pictures live 
And see their faces, 
prate, 
Partakers of their daily pettiness, 
Discussed of,—‘‘ This I love, or this I 


listen to their 


hate, 
This likes me more, and this affects 
me less!” 
Wherefore I chose my portion. If at 
whiles 


My. heart sinks, as monotonous I paint 

These endless cloisters and eternal aisles 

With the same series, Virgin, Babe 
and Saint, 

With the same cold calm beautiful 


regard ,— 
At least no merchant traffics in my 
heart ; 
The sanctuary’s gloom at least shall 
ward 


Vain tongues from where my pictures 
stand apart : 
Only prayer breaks the silence of the 
shrine 
While, blackening in the daily candle- 
smoke, 
They moulder on 
travertine, 
’Mid echoes the light footstep never 
woke. 
So, die my pictures! surely, gently 
die ! 
O youth, men praise so,—holds their 
praise its worth ? 
Blown harshly, keeps the trump its 
golden cry? 
Tastes sweet the water with such 
specks of earth ? 1845, 


39 


the damp wall’s 


609 


THE BISHOP ORDERS HIS TOMB 
AT SAINT PRAXED’S CHURCH. 


ROME, 15— 


VANITY, saith the preacher, vanity! 

Draw round my bed: is Anselm keep- 
ing back? 

Nephews—sons mine... ah 
know not? Well— 

She, men would have to be your mother’ 
once, 

Old Gandolf envied me, so fair she was! 

What ’s done is done, and she is dead 
beside, 

Dead long ago, and I am Bishop since, 

And as she died so must we die our- 
selves, 

And thence ye may perceive the world 
’s a dream. 

Life, how and what is it? As here I lie 

In this state-chamber, dying by degrees, 

Hours and long hours in the dead night, 


God, I 


ask 

‘Do I live, am I dead?” 
seems all. 

Saint Praxed’s ever was the church for 
peace ; 

And so, about this tomb of mine. I 
fought 

With tooth and nail to save my niche, 
ye know : 

—Old Gandolf cozened me, despite my 
care ; 

Shrewd was that snatch from out the 
corner South 

He graced his carrion with, God curse 
the same! 

Yet still my niche is not so cramped but 
thence 

One sees the pulpit o’ the epistle-side, 

And somewhat of the choir, those silent 
seats, 

And up into the very dome where live 

The angels, and a sunbeam ’s sure to 
lurk : 

And I shall fill my slab of basalt there, 

And ’neath my tabernacle take my rest, 

With those nine columns round me, 
two and two, 

The odd one at my feet where Anselm 


Peace, peace 


stands : 

Peach-blossom marble all, the rare, the 
ripe 

As fresh poured red wine of a mighty 
pulse 

--Old Gandolf with his paltry onion- 
stone, [peach, 


Put me where I may look at him! True 


610 


Rosy and flawless: how I earned the 
prize ! . 

Draw close: that conflagration of my 
church 

—Wat then? So much was saved if 
aught were missed ! 

My sons, ye would not be my death? 
Go dig 

The white-grape vineyard where the oil- 
press stood, 

Drop water gently till the surface sink, 

And if ye find... Ah God, I know 
NOt bese 

Bedded in store of rotten fig-leaves soft, 

And corded up in a tight olive-frail, 

Some lump, ah God, of lapis lazuli, 

Big as a Jew’s head cut off at the nape, 

Blue as a vein o’er the Madonna’s breast 

Sons, all have I bequeathed you, villas, 
all, 

That brave Frascati villa with its bath, 

So, let the blue lump poise between my 
knees, 

Like God the Father’s globe on both his 
hands 

Ye worship in the Jesu Church so gay, 

For Gandolf shall not choose but see and 


burst ! 

Swift as a weaver’s shuttle fleet our 
years : 

Man goeth to the grave, and where is 
he? 

Did I say basalt for my slab, sons ? 
Black— 

"T was ever antique-black I meant ! How 
else 

Shall ye contrast my frieze to come 
beneath ? 


The bas-relief in bronze ye promised me. 

Those Pans and Nymphs ye wot of, and 
perchance 

Some tripod, thyrsus, with a vase or so, 

The Saviour at his sermon on the mount, 

Saint Praxed in a glory, and one Pan 

Ready to twitch the Nymph’s last gar- 


ment off, 

And Moses with the tables... butl 
know 

Ye mark me not! What do they whisper 
thee, 

Child of my bowels, Anselm? Ah, ye 
hope 


To revel down my villas while I gasp 

Bricked o’er with beggar’s mouldy tra- 
vertine 

Which Gandolf from his 
chuckles at ! 

Nay, boys, ye love me—all of jasper, 
then ! 


tomb-top 


BRITISH POETS 


"Tis jasper ye stand pledged to, lest I 


grieve 

My bath must needs be left behind, 
alas ! 

One block, pure green as a_ pistachio- 
nut, 

There ’s plenty jasper somewhere in the 
world—- 

And have I not Saint Praxed’s ear to 
pray 

Horses for ye, and brown Greek manu- 
scripts, 

And mistresses with great smooth mar- 
bly limbs ? 


—That ’s if ye carve my epitaph aright. 

Choice Latin, picked phrase, Tully’s 
every word, 

No gaudy ware like Gandolf’s second 


line-—- 

Tully, my masters? Ulpian serves his 
need ! 

And then how I shall he through cen- 
turies, 


And hear the blessed mutter of the mass, 

And see God made and eaten all day 
long, 

And feel the steady candle-flame, and 
taste 

Good strong thick stupefying incense- 
smoke ! 

For as [lie here, hours of the dead night, 

Dying in state and by such slow degrees, 

I fold my arms as if they clasped a 
crook, 

And stretch my feet forth straight as 
stone can point, 

And let the bedclothes, for a mortcloth, 
drop 

Into great laps and folds of sculptor’s- 
work : 

And as yon tapers dwindle, and strange 
thougbts 

Grow, with a certain humming in my 
ears, 

About the life before I lived this life, 

And this life too, popes, cardinals and 
priests, 

Saint Praxed at his sermon on the mount, 

Your tall pale mother with her talking 


eyes, 
And new-found agate urns as fresh as 
day, | 
And marble’s language, Latin pure, dis- 
creet, 


—Aha, ELUCESCEBAT quoth our friend? 
No Tully, said I, Ulpian at the best ! 
Evil and brief hath been my pilgrimage. 
Alllapis, all,sons! Else I give the Pope 
My villas! Will ye ever eat my heart ? 





ROBERT BROWNING 


Ever your eyes were as a lizard’s quick, 
They glitter like your mother’s for my 


soul, 
Or ye would heighten my impoverished 
frieze, [ vase 


Piece out its starved design, and fill my 

With grapes, andadd a visor and a Term, 

And to the tripod ye would tie a lynx 

That in his struggle throws the thyrsus 
down, 

To comfort me on my entablature 

Whereon I am to lie till IT must ask 

**Do I live,am I dead?” There, leave 
me, there! 

For ye have stabbed me with ingratitude 

To death—ye wish it-—-God, ye wish it! 
Stone— 

Gritstone, a-crumble! Clammy squares 
which sweat [through— 

Asif the corpse they keep were oozing 

And no more lapis to delight the world ! 

Well, go!I bless ye. Fewer tapers there, 

Butinarow:and, going, turn your backs 

—Ay, like departing altar-ministrants, 

And leave me in my church, the church 
for peace, 

That I may watch at leisure if he leers— 

Olid Gandolf—at me, from his onion- 


stone, 
As still he envied me, so fair she was !1 
1845. 
SAUL 
I 


Saip Abner, ‘‘ At last thou art come! 
Kre I tell, ere thou speak, 

Kiss my cheek, wish me well!” Then I 
wished it, and did kiss his cheek. 

And he: ‘Since the King, O my friend, 
for thy countenance sent, 

Neither drunken nor eaten have we; 
nor until from his tent 


1‘“*T know no other piece of modern English, 
prose or poetry, in which there is so much told, 
as in these lines, of the Renaissance spirit,--its 
worldliness, inconsistency, pride, hypocrisy, ig- 
norance of itself, love of art, of luxury, and of 
good Latin. It is nearly all that Isaid of the 
central Renaissance in thirty pages of the Stones 
of Venice, put into as many lines, Browning’s 
being also the antecedent work. The worst of 
it is that this kind of concentrated writing needs 
so much solution before the reader can fairly 
get the good of it, that people’s patience fails 
them, and they give the thing up as insoluble; 
though, truly, it ought to be to the current of 
common thought like Saladin’s talisman, dipped 
in clear water, not soluble altogether, but mak- 
ing the element medicinal.” (Ruskin.) Other 
aspects of the Renaissance spirit, finer but 
equally true, are expressed, with similar concen- 
tration, in Old Pictures in Florence, Pictor Igno- 
tus, Andrea del Sarto, The Grammarian’s Fune- 
ral, ete. ete, 


Ga 


Thou return with the joyful assurance 
the King liveth yet, 

Shall our lip with the honey be bright, 
with the water be wet. 

For out of the black mid-tent’s silence, 
a space of three days, 

Not a sound hath escaped to thy ser- 
vants, of prayer nor of praise, 

To betoken that Saul and the Spirit have 
ended their strife, 

And that, faint in his triumph, the mon- 
arch sinks back upon life. 


II 


‘Yet now my heart leaps, O beloved! 
God’s child with his dew 

On thy gracious gold hair, and those 
lilies still iiving and blue 

Just broken to twine round thy harp- 
strings, as if no wild heat 

Were now raging to torture the desert ! ” 


Ill 


Then I, as was meet, 

Knelt down to the God of my fathers, 
and rose on my feet, 

And ran o’er the sand burnt to powder. 
The tent was unlooped ; 

IT pulled up the spear that obstructed, 
and under I stooped ; 

Hands and knees on the slippery grass- 
patch, all withered and gone, 

That extends to the second enclosure, I 
groped my way on 

Till I felt where the foldskirts fly open. 
Then once more I prayed, 

And opened the foldskirts and entered, 
and was not afraid 

But spoke, ‘‘ Here is David, thy ser- 
vant!” And no voice replied. 

At the first I saw naught but the black- 
ness: but soon I descried 

A something more black than the black- 
ness—the vast, the upright 

Main prop which sustains the pavilion : 
and slow into sight 

Grew a figure against it, gigantic and 
blackest of all. 

Then asunbeam, that burst through the 
tent-roof, showed Saul. 


TV 


He stood as erect as that tent-prop, both 
arms stretched out wide 

On the great cross-support in the cen- 
tre, that goes to each side ; 

He relaxed not a muscle, but hung there 
as, caught in his pangs 


612 


BRITISH POETS 





And waiting his change, the king-ser- 
pent all heavily hangs, 

Far away from his kind, in the pine, 
till deliverance come 

With the spring-time,—so agonized Saul, 
drear and stark, blind and dumb. 


Vv 


Then I tuned my harp,—took off the 
lilies we twine round its chords 

Lest they snap ’neath the stress of the 
noontide—those sunbeams like swords! 

And I first played the tune all our sheep 
know, as, one after one, 

So docile they come to the pen-door till 
folding be done. 

They are white and untorn by the 
bushes, for lo, they have fed 

Where the long grasses stifle the water 
within the stream’s bed ; 

And now one after one seeks its lodging, 
as star follows star 

Into eve and the blue far above us,—so 
blue and so far! 


Vi 


—Then the tune for which quails on the 
cornland will each leave his mate 

To fly after the player; then, what 
makes the crickets elate 

Till for boldness they fight one another ; 
and then, what has weight 

To set the quick jerboa a-musing out- 
side his sand house— 

There are none such as he for a wonder, 
half bird and half mouse ! 

God made all the creatures and gave 
them our love and our fear, 

To give sign, we and they are his chil- 
dren, one family here. 


VII 


Then I played the help-tune of our reap- 
ers, their wine-song, when hand 
Grasps at hand, eye lights eye in good 
friendship, and great hearts expand 
And grow one in thesense of this world’s 
life.—And then, the last song 
When the dead man is praised on his 
journey—‘ Bear, bear him along, 
With his few faults shut up like dead 
flowerets! Are balm seeds not here 
To console us? The land has none left 
such as he on the bier. : 
Oh, would we might keep thee, my 
brother !”’—And then, the glad chant 
Of the marriage,—first go the young 
maidens, next, she whom we vaunt 


| As the beauty, the pride of our dwell- 


ing.—And then, the great march 
Wherein man runs to man to assist him 
and buttress an arch 
Naught can break ; who shall harm them, 
our friends? Then, the chorus intoned 
As the Levites go up to the altar in glory 
enthroned. 
But I stopped here : for here in the dark- 
ness Saul groaned. 


Vill 


And I paused, held my breath in such 
silence, and listened apart ; 

And the tent shook, for mighty Saul 
shuddered : and sparkles ’gan dart 

From the jewels that woke in his tur- 
ban, at once, with a start, 

All its lordly male-sapphires, and rubies 
courageous at heart. 

So the head: but the body still moved 
not, still hung there erect. 

And I bent once again to my playing, 
pursued it unchecked, 

As Isang :— 


1x 


‘Oh, our manhood’s prime vigor! 

No spirit feels waste, 

Not a muscle is stopped in its playing 
nor sinew unbraced. 

Oh, the wild joys of living ! the leaping 
from rock up to rock, 

The strong rending of boughs from the 
fire-tree, the cool silver shock 

Of the plunge in a pool’s living water, 
the hunt of the bear, 

And the sultriness showing the lion is 
couched in his lair. . 

And the meal, the rich dates yellowed 
over with gold dust divine, 

And the locust-flesh steeped in the 
pitcher, the full draught of wine, 

And the sleep in the dried river-channel 
where bulrushes tell 

That the water was wont to go war- 
bling so softly and well. 

How good is man’s life, the mere living ! 
how fit to employ 

All the heart and the souland the senses 
forever in joy! 

Hast thou loved the white locks of thy 
father, whose sword thou didst guard 

When he trusted thee forth with the 
armies, for glorious reward ? 

Didst thou see the thin hands of thy 
mother, held up as men sung 

The low song of the nearly-departed, and 
hear her faint tongue 





ROBERT BROWNING 


Joining in while it could to the witness, 
‘* Let one more attest, 

I have lived, seen God’s hand through a 
lifetime, and all was for best? ” 

Then they sung through their tears in 
strong triumph, not much, but the rest. 

And thy brothers, the help and the con- 
test, the working whence grew 

Such result as, from seething grape- 
bundles, the spirit strained true: 

And the friends of thy boyhood—that 
boyhood of wonder and hope, 

Present promise and wealth of the future 
beyond the eye’s scope,— 

Tilllo, thou art grown to a monarch; a 
people is thine ; 

And all gifts, which the world offers 
singly, on one head combine ! 

On one head, all the beauty and strength, 
love and rage (like the throe 

That, a-work in the rock, helps its labor 
and lets the gold go) 

High ambition and deeds which surpass 
it, fame crowning them,—all 

Brought to blaze on the head of-one 
creature—King Saul!” 


x 


And lo, with that leap of my spirit,— 
heart, hand, harp and voice, 

Each lifting Saul’s name out of sorrow, 
each bidding rejoice 

Saul’s fame in the light it was made for 
—as when, dare I say, 

The Lord’s army, in rapture of service, 
strains through its array, 

And upsoareth the cherubim-chariot— 
**Saul! ” cried I, and stopped, 

And waited the thing that should follow. 
Then Saul, who hung propped 

By the tent’s cross-supportin the centre. 
was struck by his name. 

Have ye seen when Spring’s arrowy 
summons goes right to the aim, 

And some mountain, the last to with- 
stand her, that held (he alone, 

While the vale laughed in freedom and 
flowers) on a broad bust of stone 

A year’s snow bound about for a breast- 
plate,—leaves grasp of the sheet ? 

Fold on fold all at once it crowds thun- 
derously down to his feet. 

And there fronts you, stark, black, but 
alive yet, your mountain of old, 

With his rents, the successive bequeath- 
ing of ages untold— 

Yea, each harm got in fighting your 
battles, each furrow and scar 


613 


Of his head thrust ’twixt you and the 
tempest—all hail, there they are! 

—Now again to be softened with ver- 
dure, again hold the nest 

Of the dove, tempt the goat and its 
young to the green on his crest 

For their food in the ardors of summer. 
One long shudder thrilled 

All the tent till the very air tingled, 
then sank and was stilled 

At the King’s self left standing before 
me, released and aware. 
What was gone, what remained? All 
to traverse ’twixt hope and despair, 
Death was past, life not come: so he 
waited. Awhile his right hand 

Held the brow, helped the eyes left too 
vacant forthwith to remand 

To their place what new objects should 
enter: *t was Saul as before. 

I looked up and dared gaze at those eyes, 
nor was hurt any more 

Than by slow pallid sunsets in autumn, 
ye watch from the shore, 

At their sad level gaze o’er the ocean— 
a sun’s slow decline 

Over hills which, resolved in stern 
silence, o’erlap and entwine 

Base with base to knit strength more 
intensely : so, arm folded arm 

O’er the chest whose slow heavings sub- 
sided. 

XI 


What spell or what charm, 
(For awhile there was trouble within 
me), what next should I urge 
To sustain him where song had restored 
him ?—Song filled to the verge 
His cup with the wine of this life, press- 
ing all that it yields 
Of mere fruitage, the strength and the 
beauty : beyond, on what fields, 
Glean a vintage more potent and perfect 
to brighten the eye 
And bring blood to the lip, and com- 
mend them the cup they put by ? 
He saith, ‘lt is good;” still he drinks 
not: he lets me praise life, 
Gives assent, yet would die for his own 
part. 
XII 
Then fancies grew rife 
Which had come long ago on the pas- 
ture, when round me the sheep 
Fed in silence—above, the one eagle 
wheeled slow as in sleep ; 
And Ilay in my hollow and mused on 
the world that might le 


614 


"Neath his ken, though I saw but the 
strip “twixt the hill and the sky: 

And I laughed—‘‘ Since my days are 
ordained to be passed with my flocks, 

Let me people at least, with my fancies, 
the plains and the rocks, 

Dream the life Iam never to mix with, 
and image the show 

Of mankind as they live in those fash- 
ions I hardly shall know! 

Schemes of life, its best rules and right 
uses, the courage that gains, 

And the prudence that keeps what men 
strive for.” And now these old trains 

Of vague thought came again ; I grew 
surer ; sO, once more the string 

Of my harp made response to my spirit, 
as thus— 

XIII 


‘*Yea, my King,” 

I began—‘ thou dost well in rejecting 
mere comforts that spring 

From the mere mortal life held in com- 
mon by man and by brute : 

In our flesh grows the branch of this 
life, in our soul it bears fruit. 

Thou hast marked the slow rise of the 
tree,—how its stem trembled first 

Till it passed the kid’s lip, the stag’s 
antler ; then safely outburst 

The fan-branches all round; and thou 
mindest when these too, in turn, 

Broke a-bloom and the palm-tree seemed 
perfect : yet more was to learn, 

K’en the good that comes in with the 
palm-fruit. Our dates shall we slight, 

When their juice brings a cure for all 
sorrow ? or care for the plight 

Of the palm’s self whose slow growth 
produced them? Not so! stem and 
branch 

Shall decay, nor be known intheir place, 
while the palm-wine shall stanch 

Every wound of man’s spirit in winter. 
IT pour thee such wine, 

Leave the flesh to the fate it was fit for! 
the spirit be thine! 

By thespirit, when age shall o’ercome 
thee, thou still shalt enjoy 

More indeed, than at first when incon- 
scious, the life of a boy. 

Crush that life, and behold its wine run- 
ning! Each deed thou hast done 

Dies, revives, goes to work in the world ! 
until e’en as the sun 

Looking down on the earth, though 
clouds spoil him, though tempests 

efface, 


BRITISH POETS 


Can find nothing his own deed produced 
not, must everywhere trace 

The results of his past summer-prime,— 
so, each ray of thy will, 

Every flash of thy passion and prowess, 
long over, shall thrill 

Thy whole people, the countless, with 
ardor, till they too give forth 

A like cheer to their sons, who in turn, 
fill the South and the North 

With the radiance thy deed was the 
germ of. Carouse in the past! 

But the license of age has its limit; thou 
diest at last : 

As the lion when age dims his eyeball, 
the rose at her height, 

So with man—-so his power and _ his 
beauty forever take flight. 

No! Again a long draught of my soul- 
wine! Look forth o’er the years! 

Thou hast done now with eyes for the 
actual; begin with the seer’s! 

Is Saul dead? In the depth of the vale 
make his tomb—bid arise 

A gray mountain of marble heaped four- 
square, till, built to the skies, 

Let it mark where the great First King 
slumbers : whose fame would ve know ? 

Up above see the rock’s naked face, 
where the record shall go 

In great characters cut by the scribe,— 
Such was Saul, so he did ; 

With the sages directing the work, by 
the populace chid,— 

For not half, theyll affirm, is comprised 
there! Which fault to amend, 

In the grove with his kind grows the 
cedar, whereon they shall spend 

(See, in tablets *t is level before them) 
their praise, and record 

With the gold of the graver, Saul’s story, 
—-the stateman’s great word 

Side by side with the poet’s sweet com- 
ment. The river ’s a-wave 

With smooth paper-reeds grazing each 
other when prophet-winds rave: 

So the pen gives unborn generations their 
due and their part _ 

In thy being! Then, first of the mighty, 
thank God that thou art !” 


XIV ; 


And behold while I sang... but O 
Thou who didst grant me that day, 
And before it not seldom hast granted 

thy help to essay, 
Carry on and complete an adventure,— 
my shield and my sword 





a ae ese 


ROBERT BROWNING 615, 





In that act where my soul was thy ser- 
vant, thy word was my word,—- 

Still be with me, who then at the summit 
of human endeavor 

And scaling the highest, man’s thought 
could, gazed hopeless as ever 

On the new stretch of heaven above me 
—till, mighty to save, 

Just one lift of thy hand cleared that 
distance—God’s throne from man’s 
grave! 

Let me tell out my tale to its ending— 
my voice to my heart 

Which can scare dare believe in what 
marvels last night I took part, 

As this morning | gather the fragments, 
alone with my sheep, 

And still fear lest the terrible glory 
evanish like sleep ! 

For I wake in the gray dewy covert, 
while Hebron upheaves 

The dawn struggling with night on his 
shoulder, and Kidron retrieves 

Slow the damage of yesterday’s sunshine. 


EXCV: 


I say then,—my song 

While Isang thus, assuring the monarch, 
and ever more strong 

Made a proffer of good to console him— 
he slowly resumed 

His old motions and habitudes ingly. 
The right hand replumed 

His black locks to their wonted compos- 
ure, adjusted the swathes 

Of his turban, and see—the huge sweat 
that his countenance bathes. 

He wipes off with the robe ; and he girds 
now his loins as of yore, 

And feels slow for the armlets of price, 
with the clasp set before. 

He is Saul, ye remember in glory,—-ere 
error had bent 

The broad brow from the daily com- 
munion; and still, though much spent 

Be the life and the bearing that front 
you, the same, God did choose, 

To receive what a man may waste, 
desecrate, never quite lose. 

So sank he along by the tent-prop till, 
stayed by the pile 

Of his armor and war-cloak and gar- 
ments, he leaned there awhile, 

And sat out my singing,——-one arm round 
the tent-prop, to raise 

His bent head, and the other hung slack 
—till I touched on the praise 

I foresaw from all men in all time, to the 
man patient there ; 


And thus ended, the harp falling for- 
ward. Then first I was ’ware 

That he sat, as I say, with my head just 
above his vast knees 

Which were thrust out on each side 
around me, like oak roots which please 

To encircle a lamb when it slumbers. 
I looked up to know 

If the best I could do had brought solace ; 
he spoke not, but slow 

Lifted up the hand slack at his side, till 
he laid it with care 

Soft and grave, but in mild settled will, 
on my brow: through my hair 

The large fingers were pushed, and he 
bent back my head, with kind power— 

All my face back, intent to peruse it, as 
men do a flower. 

Thus held he me there with his great 
eyes that scrutinized mine— 

And oh, all my heart how it loved him! 
but where was the sign ? 

I yearned—‘‘ Could I help thee, my 
father, inventing a bliss, 

I would add, to that life of the past, both 
the future and this ; 

I would give thee new life altogether, as 
good, ages hence, 

As this moment,—had love but the war- 
rant, love’s heart to dispense ! ” 


XVI 


Then the truthcame uponme. No harp 
more—no song more! outbroke— 


XVII 


‘‘T have gone the whole round of crea- 
tion: I saw and I spoke: 

I, a work of God’s hand for that purpose, 
received in my brain 

And pronounced on the rest of his hand- 
work—returned him again 

His creation’s approval or censure: I 
spoke as I saw: 

IT report, asa man may of God’s work— 
all’s love, yet all’s law. 

Now I lay down the judgeship he lent 
me. Each faculty tasked 

To perceive him, has gained an abyss, 
where a dewdrop was asked. 

Have I knowledge? confounded it 
shrivels at Wisdom laid bare. 

Have I forethought ? how purblind, how 
blank to the Infinite Care ! 

Do I task any faculty highest, to image 
success ? 

I but open my eyes,—and perfection, 
no more and no less, 


616 


BRITISH POE LS 





In the kind I imagined, full-fronts me, 
and God is seen God 

In the star, in the stone, in the flesh, in 
the soul and the clod. 

And thus looking within and around me, 
I ever renew 

(With that stoop of the soul which in 
bending upraises it too) 

The submission of man’s nothing-perfect 
to God’s all-complete, 

As by each new obeisance in spirit, I 
climb to his feet. 

Yet with all this abounding experience, 
this deity known, 

I shall dare to discover some province, 
some gift of my own. 

There’s a faculty pleasant to exercise, 
hard to hoodwink, 

Iam fain to keep still in abeyance, (I 
laugh as 1 think) 

Lest, ‘insisting to claim and parade in it, 
wot ye, I worst 

K’en the Giver in one gift.—Behold, I 
could love if I durst ! 

But I sink the pretension as fearing a 
man may Oo’ertake 

God’s own speed in the one way of love: 
I abstain for love’s sake. 

—What, my soul? see thus far and 
no farther? when doors great and 
small, 

Nine-and-ninety flew ope at our touch, 
should the hundredth appall ? 

In the least things have faith, yet dis- 
trust in the greatest of all? 

Do I find love so fullin my nature, God’s 
ultimate gift, 

That I doubt his own love can com- 
pete witb it? Here, the parts shift ? 
Here, the creature surpass the Creator ,-- 

the end, what Began? 

Would I fain in my impotent yearning 
do all for this man, 


And dare doubt he alone shall not help 


him, who yet alone can ? 

Would it ever have entered my mind, 
the bare will, much less power. 

To bestow on this Saul what I sang of, 
the marvellous dower 

Of the life he was gifted and filled with ? 
to make such a soul, 

Such a body, and then such an earth 
for insphering the whole? 

And doth it not enter my mind (as my 
warm tears attest) 

These good things being given, to go on, 
and give one more, the best ? 

Ay, to save and redeem and restore him, 
maintain at the height 


This perfection,—succeed with life’s 
day-spring, death’s minute of night ? 
Interpose at the difficult minute, snatch 
Saul the mistake, 

Saul the failure, the ruin he seems now, 
—and bid him awake 

From the dream, the probation, the pre- 
lude, to find himself set 

Clear and safe in new light and new life, 
—a new harmony yet 

To be run, and continued, and ended— 
who knows ?—or endure ! 

The man taught enough by life’s dream, 
of the rest to make sure ; 

By the pain-throb, triumphantly win- 
ning intensified bliss, 

And the next world’s reward and repose, 
by the struggles in this. 

' 


XVIII 


‘“*T believe it! "Tis thou, God, that 
givest, ’t is I who receive: 

In the first is the last, in thy will is my 
power to believe. 

All’s one gift: thou canst grant it more- 
over, as. prompt to my prayer 

As I breathe out this breath, as I open 
these arms to the air. 

From thy will stream the worlds, life 
and nature, thy dread Sabaoth : 

I will?—the mere atoms despise me! 
Why am I not loth 

To look that, even that in the face too? 
Why is it I dare 

Think but lightly of such impuissance ? 
What stops my despair ? 

This ;—’t is not what man Does which 
exalts him, but what man Would do! 

See the King—I would help him but can- 
not, the wishes fall through. 

Could I wrestle to raise him from sorrow, 
grow poor toenrich, — 

To fill up his life, starve my own out, I 
would—knowing which, 

I know that my service is perfect. Oh, 
speak through me now ! 

Would I suffer for him that I love? 
So wouldst thou—so wilt thou! 

So shall crown thee the topmost, ineffa- 
blest, uttermost crown— 

And thy love fill infinitude wholly, nor 
leave up nor down 

One spot for the creature tostand in! It 
is by no breath, 

Turn of eye, wave of hand, that salva- 
tion joins issue with death ! 

As thy Love is discovered almighty, 
almighty be proved 





ROBERT BROWNING 





Thy power, that exists with and for it, 
of being Beloved! 
He who did most, shall bear most; the 
strongest shall stand the most weak. 
*T is the weakness in strength, that I cry 
for! my flesh, that I seek 

In the Godhead ! I seek andI find it. O 
Saul, it shall be 

A Face like my face that receives thee ; 
a Man like to me, 

Thou shalt love and be loved by, for- 
ever: a Hand like this hand 

Shall throw open the gates of new life 
to thee! See the Christ stand !” 


XIX 


I know not too well how I found my way 
home in the night. 

There were witnesses, cohorts about me, 
to left and to right, 

Angels, powers, the unuttered, unseen, 
the alive, the aware: 

I repressed, I got through them as 
hardly, as strugglingly there, 

As a runner beset by the populace 
famished for news— 

Life or death. The whole earth was 
awakened, hell loosed with her crews ; 

And the stars of night beat with emo- 
tion, and tingled and shot 

Out in fire the strong pain of pent knowl- 
edge: but I fainted not, 

For the Hand still impelled me at once 
and supported, suppressed 

All the tumult, and quenched it with 
quiet, and holy behest, 

Till the rapture was shut in itself, and 
the earth sank to rest. 

Anon at the dawn, all that trouble had 
withered from earth— 

Not so much, but I saw it die out in the 
day’s tender birth ; 

In the gathered intensity brought to the 
gray of the hills ; 

In the shuddering forests’ held breath ; 
in the sudden -wind-thrills ; 

In the startled wild beasts that bore off, 
each with eye sidling still 

Though averted with wonder and dread ; 
in the birds stiff and chill 

That rose heavily, as [approached them, 
made stupid with awe: 

E’en the serpent that slid away silent,— 
he felt the new law. 

The same stared in the white humid 
faces upturned by the flowers ; 

The same worked in the heart of the 
cedar and moved the vine-bowers : 


And the little brooks witnessing mur- 

mured, persistent and low, 
With their obstinate. all but hushed 
voices—‘‘ E’en so, it is so!” 
1845, 1855.1 


A WOMAN’S LAST WORD 


LET’s contend no more, Love, 
Strive nor weep: 

All be as before, Love, 
—Only sleep ! 


What so wild as words are ? 
I and thou 

In debate, as birds are, 
Hawk on bough! 


See the creature stalking 
While we speak ! 

Hush and hide the talking, 
Cheek on cheek ! 


What so false as truth is, 
False to thee? 

W here the serpent’s tooth is 
Shun the tree— 


Where the apple reddens 
Never, pry— 

Lest we lose our Edens, 
Eve and I. 


Be a god and hold me 
With a charm ! 

Be a man and fold me 
With thine arm! 


Teach me, only teach, Love! 
As I ought 

I will speak thy speech, Love, 
Think thy thought— 


Meet, if thou require it, 
Both demands, 

Laying flesh and spirit 
In thy hands. 


That shall be to-morrow, 
Not to-night. 

I must bury sorrow 
Out of sight : 


—Must a little weep, Love, 
(Foolish me !) 

And so fall asleep, Love, 
Loved by thee. 1855. 


1 The first part of the poem, up to Section X, 
was published in Dramatic Romances and Lyrics, 
1845; the complete poem, in Men and Women, 
1855, 


618 


BRITISH POETS 





EVELYN HOPE 


BEAUTIFUL Evelyn Hope is dead ! 
Sit and watch by her side an hour, 
That is her book-shelf, this her bed ; 
She plucked that piece of geranium- 
flower, 

Beginning to die too, in the glass ; 
Little has yet been changed, I think : 
The shutters are shut, no light may 

pass 
Save two long rays through the hinge’s 
chink. 


Sixteen years old when she died ! 
Perhaps she had scarcely heard my 
name ; 
It was not her time to love ; beside, 
Her life had many a hope and aim, 
Duties enough and little cares, 
And now was quiet, now astir, 
Till God’s hand beckoned unawares,— 
And the sweet white brow is all of 
her. 


Is it too late then, Evelyn Hope? 
What, your soul was pure and true, 
The good stars met in your horoscope, 
Made you of spirit, fire and dew— 
And, just because I was thrice as old 
And our paths in the world diverged 


so wide, 

Each was naught to each, must I be 
told ? 

We were fellow mortals, naught be- 
side ? 


No, indeed! for God above 
Is great to grant, as mighty to make, 
And creates the love to reward the 
love: 
I claim you still, for my own love’s 
sake ! 
Delayed it may be for more lives yet, 
Through worlds I shall traverse, not a 
few : 
Much is to learn, much to forget 
Ere the time be come for taking you. 


But the time will come—at last it will, 
When, Evelyn Hope, what meant (I 
shall say) 
In the apes earth, in the years long 
still, 
That body and soul so pure and gay? 
Why your hair was amber,I shall di- 
vine, 
And your mouth of your own gera- 
nium’s red— 


And what you would do with me, in 
fine, 
In the new life come in the old life’s 
stead. 


I have lived (I shall say) so much since 
then, 
Given up myself so many times, 
Gained me the gains of various men, 
Ransacked the ages, spoiled the 
climes ; 
Yet one thing, one, in my soul’s full 
scope, 
Either | missed or itself missed me : 
And I want and find you, Evelyn Hope! 
What is the issue? Let us see! 


T loved you, Evelyn, all the while! 
My heart seemed full as it could hold; 
There was place and to spare for the 
frank young smile, 
And the red young mouth, and the 
hair’s voung gold. 
So, hush,—I will give you this leaf to 
keep: 
See, I shut it inside the sweet cold 
hand ! 
There, that is our secret: go to sleep! 
You will wake, and remember, and 
understand. 1855. 


LOVE AMONG THE RUINS 


WHERE the quiet-colored end of evening 
smiles 
Miles and miles 
On the solitary pastures where our sheep 
Half-asleep 
Tinkle homeward through the twilight, 
stray or stop 
As they crop— 
Was the site once of a city great and 
gay, 
(So they say) 
Of our country’s very capital, its prince 
Ages since 
Held his court in, gathered councils, 
wielding far 
Peace or war. 


Now,—the country does not even boast 
a tree, 
As you see, 
To distinguish slopes of verdure, certain 
rills 
From the hills 
Intersect and give a name to, (else they 
run 
Into one, ) 





ROBERT BROWNING 


Where the domed and daring palace 
shot its spires 
Up like fires 
O’er the hundred-gated circuit of a wall 
Bounding all, 
Made of marble, men might march on 
nor be pressed, 
Twelve abreast. 


And such plenty and perfection, see, of 
grass 
Never was ! 
Such a carpet as, this summer-time, o’er- 
spreads 
And embeds 
Every vestige of the city, guessed alone, 
Stock or stone— 
Where a multitude of men breathed joy 
and woe 
Long ago: 
Lust of glory pricked their hearts up, 
dread of shame 
Struck them tame ; 
And that glory and that shame alike, 
the gold 
Bought and sold. 


Now,—the single little turret that re- 
mains 
On the plains, 
By the caper overrooted, by the gourd 
Overscored, 
While the patching houseleek’s head of 
blossom winks 
Through the chinks— 
Marks the basement whence a tower in 
ancient time 
Sprang sublime, 
And a burning ring, 
chariots traced 
As they raced, 
And the monarch and his minions and 
his dames 
Viewed the games. 


all round, the 


And I know, while thus the quiet-col- 
ored eve 
Smiles to leave 
To their folding, all our many-tinkling 
fleece 
In such peace, 
And the slopes and rills in undistin- 
guished gray 
Melt away— 
That a girl with eager eyes and yellow 
hair 
Waits me there 
In the turret whence the charioteers 
caught soul 
For the goal, 


619 


When the king looked, where she looks 
now, breathless, dumb 
Till I come. 


But he looked upon the city, every side, 
Far and wide, 
All the mountains topped with temples, 
all the grades 
Colonnades, 
All the causeys, bridges, aqueducts,— 
and then, 
All the men! 
When I do come, she will speak not, she 
will stand, 
Kither hand 
On my shoulder, give her eyes the first 
embrace 
Of my face, 
Ere we rush, ere we extinguish sight and 
speech 
Each on each. 


In one year they sent a million fighters 
forth 
South and North, 
And they built their gods a brazen pillar 
high 
As the sky, 
Yet reserved a thousand chariots in full 
force— 
Gold, of course. 
Oh heart! oh blood that freezes, blood 
that burns ! 
Earth’s returns 
For whole centuries of folly, noise and 
sin! 
Shut them in, 
With their triumphsand their glories 
and the rest ! 
Love is best. 1855. 


UP AT A VILLA—DOWN 
CLL 


(AS DISTINGUISHED BY AN ITALIAN PERSON 
OF QUALITY) 


IN THE 


Hap I but plenty of money, 
enough and to spare, 

The house for me no doubt, were a 
house in the city-square ; 

Ah, such a life, such a life, as one leads 
at the window there ! 


money 


Something to see, by Bacchus, some- 
thing to hear, at least! 

There, the whole day long, one’s life is a 
perfect feast ; 

While up at a villa one lives, I maintain 
it, no more than a beast. 


620 


Well now, look at our villa! stuck like 
the horn of a bull 

Just on a mountain-edge as bare as the 
creature’s skull, 

Save a mere shag of a bush with hardly 
a leaf to pull! 

—I scratch my own, sometimes, to see 
if the hair’s turned wool. 


But the city, oh the city—the square 
with the houses! Why, 

They are stone-faced, white as a curd, 
there’s something to take the eye ! 


Houses in four straight lines, not a single 


front awry ; 

You watch who crosses and gossips, who 
saunters, who hurries by ; 

Green blinds, asa matter of course, to 
draw when the sun gets high ; 

And the shops with fanciful signs which 
are painted properly. 


What of a villa? Though winter be over 
in March by rights, 

°T is May perhaps ere the snow shall 
have withered well off the heights : 

You’ve the brown ploughed land before, 
where the oxen steam and wheeze, 

And the hills over-smoked behind by the 
faint gray olive-trees. 


Is it better in May, Iask you? You've 
summer all at once ; 

In aday he leaps complete with a few 
strong April suns. 

*Mid the sharp short emerald wheat, 
scarce risen three fingers well, 

The wild tulip, at end of its tube, blows 
out its great red bell 

Like a thin clear bubble of blood, for the 
children to pick and sell. 


Is it ever hot in the square? There ’s a 
fountain to spout and splash ! 

In the shade it sings and springs : in the 
shine such foambows flash 

On the horses with curling fish-tails, 
that prance and paddle and pash 

Round the lady atop in her conch—fifty 
gazers do not abash, 

Though all that she wears is some weeds 
round her waist in a sort of sash. 


All the year long at the villa, nothing to 
see though you linger, 

Except yon cypress that points like 
death's lean lifted forefinger. 

Some think fireflies pretty, when they 
mix i’ the corn and mingle, 


BRITISH POETS 


Or thrid the stinking hemp till the stalks 
of it seem a-tingle. 

Late August or early September, the 
stunning cicala is shrill, 

And the bees keep their tiresome whine 
round the resinous firs on the hill. 

Enough of the seasons,—I spare you the 
months of the fever and chill. 


Ere you open your eyes in the city, the 
blessed church-bells begin : 

No sooner the bells leave off than the 
diligence rattles in : 

You get the pick of the news, and it 
costs you never a pin. 
By and by there’s the travelling doctor 
gives pills, lets blood, draws teeth ; 
Or the Pulcinello-trumpet breaks up the 
market beneath. 

At the post-office such a scene-picture— 
the new play, piping hot! 

Anda notice how, only this morning, 
three liberal thieves were shot. 


Above it, behold the Archbishop’s most. 


fatherly of rebukes, 

And beneath, with his crown and his 
lion, some littl new law of the 
Duke’s! 

Or asonnet with flowery marge, to the 
Reverend Don So-and-so, 

Who is Dante, Boccaccio, Petrarca, Saint 
Jerome, and Cicero, : 

‘*And moreover,” (the sonnet goes 
rhyming,) ‘‘ the skirts of Saint Paul 
has reached, 

Having preached us those six Lent- 
lectures more unctuous than ever he 
preached.” 

Noon strikes,—here sweeps the proces- 
sion! our Lady borne smiling and 
smart 

With a pink gauze gown all spangles, 
and seven swords stuck in her heart ! 

Bang-whang-whang goes the drum, 
tootle-te-tootle the fife ; 

No keeping one’s haunches still : it’s the 
greatest pleasure in life. 


But bless you, it’s dear—it ’s dear! 
fowls, wine, at double the rate. 

They have clapped a new tax upon salt, 
and what oil pays passing the gate 

It’s a horror to think of. And so, the 
villa for me, not the city ! 


Beggars can scarcely be choosers : but 
still—ah, the pity, the pity! 

Look, twoand two go the priests, then 
the monks with cowls and sandals, 





ROBERT BROWNING 


621 





And the penitents dressed in white 
shirts, a-holding the yellow candles ; 
One, he carries a flag up straight, and 
another across with handles, 

And the Duke’s guard brings up the rear, 
for the better prevention of scandals : 

Bang-whang-whang goes the drum, tootle- 
te-tootle the fife. 

Oh, a day in the city-square, there is no 
such pleasure in life ! 1855. 


A TOCCATA OF GALUPPI’S 


Ox Galuppi, Baldassare, this is very sad 
to find! 

I can hardly misconceive you; it would 
prove me deaf and blind ; 

But although I take your meaning, ’tis 
with such a heavy mind ! 


Here you come with your old music, and 
here ’s all the good it brings. 


What, they lived once thus at Venice 


where the merchants were the kings, 
Where St. Mark’s is, where the Doges 
used to wed the sea with rings? 


Ay, because the sea ’s the street there; 
and ’t is arched by. . . what you call 

. . . Shylock’s bridge with houses on it, 
where they kept the carnival: 

I was never out of England—it ’s as if I 
saw it all. 


Did young people take their pleasure 
when the sea was warm in May? 

Balls and masks begun at midnight, 
burning ever to mid-day, 

When they made up fresh adventures 
for the morrow, do you say? 


Was a lady such a lady, cheeks so round 
and lips so red,— 

On her neck the small face buoyant, 
like a bell-flower on its bed, 

O’er the breast’s superb abundance where 
aman might base his head? 


Well, and it was graceful of them— 
they *d break talk off and afford 

—She, to bite her mask’s black velvet— 
he, to finger on his sword, 

While you sat and played Toccatas, 
stately at the clavichord ? 


What? Those lesser thirds so plaintive, 
sixths diminished, sigh on sigh, 

Told them something? Those suspen- 
sions, those solutions — ‘Must we 
die ? a2 


Those commiserating sevenths——‘‘ Life 
might last! we can but try!” 


‘* Were you happy ?”—‘ Yes.”——‘* And 
are you still as happy ?”--‘‘ Yes. And 
you?” 

—‘*Then, nrore kisses !”—‘‘ Did I stop 
them, when a million seemed _ so 
few?” 

Hark, the dominant’s persistence till it 
must be answered to! 


So, an octave struck the answer. 
they praised you, I dare say! 

‘* Brave Galuppi! that was music! good 
alike at grave and gay ! 

I can always leave off talking when I 
hear a master play ! ” 


Oh, 


hen they left you for their pleasure : 
till in due time, one by one, 
Some with lives that came to nothing, 
some with deeds as well undone, 
Death stepped tacitly and took them 
where they never see the sun. 


But when I sit down to reason, think to 
take my stand nor swerve, 

While I triumph o’er a secret wrung 
from nature’s close reserve, 

In you come with your cold music till I 
creep through every nerve. 


Yes, you, like a ghostly cricket, creak- 
ing where a house was burned: 

** Dust and ashes, dead and done with, 
Venice spent what Venice earned. 

The soul, doubtless, is immortal—-where 
a soul can be discerned. 


‘¢ Yours for instance : you know physics, 
something of geology, 

Mathematics aré your pastime; souls 
shall rise in their degree ; 

Butterflies may dread extinction,— 
you ‘ll not die, it cannot be! 


‘As for Venice and her people, merely 
born to bloom and drop, 

Here on earth they bore their fruitage, 
mirth and folly were the crop: 

What of soul was left, I wonder, when 
the kissing had to stop? 


‘*Dust and ashes!” So you creak it, 
and I want the heart to scold. 

Dear dead women, with such hair, too 
—what’s become of all the gold 

Used to hang and brush their bosoms? 
I feel chilly and grown old. 1855. 


622 


BRITISH POETS 








OLD PICTURES IN FLORENCE 
THE morn when first it thunders in 
March, 
The eel in the pond gives a leap, they 


say : 
As I leaned and looked over the aloed 
arch 
Of the villa-gate this warm March day, 
No flash snapped, no dumb thunder rolled 
In the valley beneath where, white 
and wide 
And washed by the morning water gold, 
Florence lay out on the mountain-side. 


River and bridge and street and square 
Lay mine, as much at my beck and call’ 
Through the live translucent bath of air 
As the sights in a magic crystal ball. 
And of all [ saw and of all I praised, 
The most to praise and the best to see, 
Was the startling bell-tower Giotto 
raised : 
But why did it more than startle me ? 


Giotto, how, with that soul of yours, 
Could you play me false who loved you 
so? 
Some slights if a certain heart endures 
Yet it feels, I would havey our fellows 
know! 
I’ faith, I perceive not why I should care 
To break a silence that suits them best, 
But the thing grows somewhat hard to 
bear 
When I find a Giotto join the rest. 


On the arch where olives overhead 
Print the blue sky with twig and leaf, 
(That sharp-curled leaf which they 
never shed) 
’ Twixt the aloes, I used to lean in chief, 
And mark through the winter after- 
noons, 
By a gift God grants me now and then, 
In the mild decline of those suns lke 
moons, 
Who walked in Florence, besides her 
men. 


They might chirp and chaffer, come and 
go 

For pleasure or profit, her men alive— 

My business was hardly with them, I 


trow, 
But with empty cells of the human 
hive ; 
—With the chapter-room, the cloister- 
porch, 


The church’s apsis, aisle or nave, 
Its crypt, one fingers along witha torch, 
Its face set full for the sun to shave. 


Wherever a fresco peels and drops, 
Wherever an outline weakens and 
wanes 
Till the latest life in the painting stops, 
Stands One whom each fainter pulse- 
tick pains : 
One, wishful each scrap should clutch 
the brick, 
Each tinge not wholly escape the 
plaster, 
—A lion who dies of an ass’s kick, 
The wronged great soul of an ancient 
Master. 


For oh, this world and the wrong it does! 
They are safe in heaven with their 
backs to it. 


.The Michaels and Rafaels, you hum and 


buzz 
Round the works of, you of the little 
wit ! 
Do their eyes contract to the earth’s old 
scope, 
Now that they see God face to face, 
And have all attained to be poets, I hope ? 
’T is their holiday now, in any case. 


Much they reck of your praise and you ! 
But the wronged great souls—can they 
be quit 
Of a world where their work is all to do, 
Where you style them, you of the little 
wit, 
Old Master This and Early the Other, 
Not dreaming that Old and New are 
fellows : 
A younger succeeds to an elder brother, 
Da Vincis derive in good time from 


Dellos. 
And here where your praise might yield 
returns, . 
And a handsome word or two give 
help, 


Here, after your kind, the mastiff girns 
And the puppy pack of poodles yelp. 
What, not a word for Stefano there, 
Of brow once prominent and starry, 
Called Nature’s Ape, and the world’s 
despair 
For his peerless painting? (See Vasari. ) 


There stands the Master. 
friends, 
What a man’s work comes to! 
plans it, 


Study, my 
So he 


ROBERT BROWNING 





Performs it, perfects it, makes amends 
For the toiling and moiling, and then, 
sie transit ! 
Happier the thrifty blind-folk labor, 
With upturned eye while the hand is 
busy, 
Not sidling a glance at the coin of their 
neighbor ! 
°T is looking downward that makes one 
dizzy. 


** If you knew their work you would deal 
your dole.” 
May I take upon me to instruct you? 
When Greek Art ran and reached the 


goal, 
Thus much had the world to boast in 
fructu— 

The Truth of Man, as by God first spoken, 
Which the actual generations garble, 
Was re-uttered, and Soul (which Limbs 

betoken) 
And Limbs (Soul informs) made new 
in marble. 


So you saw yourself as you wished you 
were, 
As you might have been, as you can- 
not be; 
Earth here, rebuked by Olympus there: 
And grew content in your poor degree 
With your little power, by those statues’ 
godhead, 
And your little scope, by their eyes’ 
full sway, 
And your little grace, by their grace 
embodied 
And your little date, by their forms 
that stay. 


You would fain be kinglier, say, than I 
am ? 
Even so, you will not sit like Theseus, 
You would prove a model? The Son of 
Priam, 
Has yet the advantage in arms’ and 
knees’ use. 
Youw’re wroth—can you slay your snake 
like Apollo? 
Youwre grieved—still Niobe ’s_ the 
grander ! 
You live—there’s the Racers’ frieze to 
follow : 
You die—there’s the dying Alexander. 
So, testing your weakness by their 
strength, 
Your meagre charms by their rounded 
beauty, 


623 
Measured by Art in your breadth and 
length, 
You learned—to submit is a mortal's 
duty. 
—When I say ‘‘ you” ’tis the common 
soul, 
The collective, I mean: the race of 
Man 
That receives life in parts to live in a 
whole, 


And grow here according to God’s 
clear plan. 


Growth came when, looking your last 
on them all, 
You turned your eyes inwardly one 
fine day 
And cried with a start—What if we so 
small 
Be greater and grander the while than 
they ? 
Are they perfect of lineament, perfect of 
stature ? 
In both, of such lower types are we 
Precisely because of our wider nature ; 
For time, theirs—ours, for eternity. 


To-day’s brief passion limits their range ; 
It seethes with the morrow for us and 
more. 
They are perfect—how else? they shall 
never change: 
We are faulty—why not? we have 
time in store. 
The Artificer’s hand is not arrested 
With us; we are rough-hewn, nowise 
polished : 
They stand for our copy, and once, in- 
vested 
With all they can teach, we shall see 
them abolished. 


’'T is a life-long toil till our lump be 
leaven—- 
The better! What’s come to perfec- 
tion perishes. 
Things learned on earth, we shall practise 
in heaven: 
Works done least rapidly, Art most 
cherishes. 
Thyself shalt afford the example, Giotto! 
Thy one work, not to decrease or dim- 
inish, 


Done at a stroke, was just (was it not ?) 


66 O ! 9 
Thy great Campanile is still to finish. 


Is it true that we are now, and shall be 
hereafter, 


624 


BRITISH POETS 





But what and where depend on life’s 
minute? 
Hails heavenly cheer or infernal laughter 
Our first step out of the gulf or in it ? 
Shall Man, such step within his endeavor, 
Man’s face, have no more play and 
action 
Than joy which is crystallized forever, 
Or grief, an eternal petrifaction ? 


On which I conclude, that the early 
painters, 
To cries of ‘‘ Greek Art and what more 
wish you ?”— 


Replied, ‘‘To become now = self-ac- 
quainters, 
And paint man, man, whatever the 
issue ! 


Make new hopes shine through the flesh 
they fray, 
New fears aggrandize the rags and 
tatters: - 
To bring the invisible fullinto play! 
Let the visible go to the dogs—what 
matters ?” 





Give these, I exhort you, their guerdon 
and glory 
For daring so much, before they well 
did it, 
The first of the new, in our race’s story, 
Beats the last of the old; ’t is no idle 
quiddit. 
The worthies began a revolution, 
Which if on earth you intend to ac- 
knowledge, 
Why, honor them now! (ends my allo- 
cution) 
Nor confer your degree when the folk 
leave college. 


There's a fancy some lean to and others 
hate— 
That, when this life is ended, begins 
New work for the soul in another state, 
Where it strives and gets weary, loses 
and wins: 
Where the strong and the weak, this 
world’s congeries, 
Repeat in large what they practised in 


small, 
Through life after life in unlimited 
series ; 
Only the scale’s to be changed, that’s 
all. 


Yet I hardly know. When a soul has 
seen 


By the means of Evil that Good is best, 





And, through earth and its noise, what 
is heaven’s serene,— 
When our faith in the same has stood 
the test— 
Why the child grown man, you burn the 
rod, 
The uses of labor are surely done ; 
There remaineth a rest for the people of 
God : 
And I have had troubles enough, for 
one. 


But at any rate I have loved the season 
Of Art’s spring-birth so dim and-dewy ; 

My sculptor is Nicolo the Pisan, 
My painter—who but Cimabue? 

Nor ever was man of them all indeed, 
From these to Ghiberti and Ghirlan- 


ajo, 

Could say that he missed my critic-meed. 

So, now to my special grievance— 
heigh-ho! 


Their ghosts still stand, as I said before, 
Watching each fresco flaked and 
rasped, 
Blocked up, knocked out, or white- 
washed o’er: 
—No getting again what the church 
has grasped ! 
The works on the wall must take their 
chance ; 
‘Works never conceded to England’s 
thick clime! ” 
(I hope they prefer their inheritance 
Of a bucketful of ltalian quick-lime. ) 


When they go at length, with such a 
shaking 
Of heads o’er the old delusion, sadly 
Each master his way through the black 
streets taking, 
Where many a lost work breathes 
though badly— 
Why don’t they bethink them of who has 
merited ? . 
Why not reveal, while their pictures 
dree 
Such doom, how a captive might be out- 
ferreted ? : 
Why is it they never remember me? 


Not that I expect the great Bigordi, 
Nor Sandro to hear me, chivalric, belli- 
cose ; 
Nor the wronged Lippino; and not a 
word I 
Say of a scrap of Fra Angelico’s: 


} But are you too fine, Taddeo Gaddi, 


ROBERT BROWNING 


To grant mea taste of your intonaco, 
Some Jerome that seeks the heaven with 
asad eye? 
Not a churlish saint, Lorenzo Monaco? 


Could not the ghost with the close red 


cap, 
My Pollajolo, the twice a craftsman, 
Save me a sample, give me the hap 
Of a muscular Christ that shows the 
draughtsman ? 
No Virgin by him the somewhat petty, 
Of finical touch and tempera crumbly— 
Could not Alesso Baldovinetti 
Contribute so much, I ask him 
humbly ? 


Margheritone of Arezzo, 
With the grave-clothes 
swaddling barret, 
(Why purse up mouth and beak in a pet 
So, 
You bald old saturnine poll-clawed 
parrot ?) 
Not a poor glimmering Crucifixion, 
Where in the foreground kneels the 
donor ? 
If such remain, as is my conviction, 
The hoarding it does you but little 
honor. 


garb and 


They pass; for them the panels may 
thrill, 
The tempera grow alive and tinglish ; 
Their ee are left to the mercies 
sti 
Of dealers and stealers, Jews and the 
English, 
Who, seeing mere money’s worth in their 
prize, 
‘Will sell it to somebody calm as Zeno 
At naked High Art, and in ecstasies 
Before some clay-cold vile Carlino! 


No matter for these! But Giotto, you, 

Have you allowed, as the town-tongues 
babble it,— 

Oh, never ! it shall not be counted true— 
That a certain precious little tablet 

Which Buonarrotti eyed like a lover— 
Was buried so long in oblivion’s womb 

And, left for another than I to discover, 
Turns up at last! and to whom ? — to 


whom ? 
I, that have haunted the dim San 
Spirito, 


(Or was it rather the Ognissanti ?) 
Patient on altar-step planting a weary 
toe! 


40 


625 


Nay, Ishall have it yet ! Detur amanti! 
My Koh-i-noor—or (if that ’s a plati- 
tude) 
Jewel of Giamschid, the Persian Sofi’s 
eye ; 
So, in anticipative gratitude, 
What if I take up my hope and pro- 
phesy ? 


When the hour grows ripe, and a certain 
dotard 
Is pitched, no parcel that needs invoic- 
ing, 
To the worse side of the Mont St. Gothard, 
We shall begin by way of rejoicing ; 
None of that shooting the sky (blank 


cartridge), 
Nor a civic guard, all plumes and 
lacquer, 


Hunting Radetzky’s soul likea partridge 
Over Morello with squib and cracker. 


This time we ‘Il shoot better game and 
bag ’em hot— 
No mere display at the stone of Dante 
But a kind of sober Witanagemot 
(Ex: ‘* Casa Guidi,” quod videas ante) 
Shall ponder, once Freedom restored to 
Florence, 
How Art may return that departed 
with her. 
Go, hated house, go each trace of the 
Loraine’s, 
And bring us the days of Orgagna 
hither ! 


How we shall prologuize, how we shall 
perorate, 
Utter fit things upon art and history, 
Feel truth at blood-heat and falsehood at 
zero rate, 
Make of the want of the age no 
mystery ; 
Contrast the fructuous and sterile eras, 
Show—monarchy ever its uncouth cub 
licks» 
Out of the bear’s shape into Chimeera’s, 
While Pure Art’s birth is still the 
republic's. 


Then one shall propose in a speech (curt 
Tuscan, 
Expurgate and sober, with scarcely an 
‘* assimo,”’) 
To end now our half-told tale of Cam- 
buscan, 
And turn the bell-tower’s alt te 
altissimo : 
And fine as the beak of a young beccaccia 
The Campanile, the Duomo’s fit ally, 


626 


Shall soar up in gold full fifty braccia, 
Completing Florence, as Florence 
Italy. 


Shall I bealive that morning the scaffold 
Is brokenaway, and the long-pent fire, 
Like the golden hope of the world, un- 
baffled 
Springs from its sleep, and up goes the 
spire 
While ‘‘ God and the People” plain for 
its motto, 
Thence the new tricolor flaps at the 
sky? 
At least to foresee that glory of Giotto 
And Florence together, the first am I! 
1855. 


“DE GUSTIBUS—” 


Your ghost will walk, you lover of trees, 
(If our loves remain) 
In an English lane, 
By acornfield-side a-flutter with poppies. 
Hark, those two in the hazel coppice— 
A boy and a girl, if the good fates please, 
Making love, say,— 
The happier they ! 
Draw yourself up from the ight of the 
moon, 
And let them pass, as they will too soon. 
With the beanflowers’ boon, 
And the blackbird’s tune, 
And May, and June! 


What I love best in all the world 

Is a castle, precipice-encurled, 

In a gash of the wind-grieved Apennine. 

Or look for me, old fellow of mine, 

(If I get my head from out the mouth 

O’ the grave, and loose my spirit’s bands, 

And come again to the land of lands)— 

In a sea-side house to the farther South, 

Where the baked cicala dies of drouth, 

And one sharp tree—’t is a cypress— 
stands 

By the many hundred years red-rusted, 

Rough iron-spiked,ripe fruit-o’ercrusted, 

My sentinel to guard the sands 

To the water’s edge. For, what expands 

Before the house, but the great opaque 

Blue breadth of sea without a break ? 

While, in the house, forever crumbles 

Some fragment of the frescoed walls, 

From blisters where a scorpion sprawls. 

A girl bare-footed brings, and tumbles 

soo, 4 the pavement, green-flesh me- 
ons, 

And says there ’s news to-day—the king 


BRIDES He POLLS 


Was shot at. touched in the liver-wing, 
Goes with his Bourbon arm ina sling, 
—She hopes they have not caught the 
felons. 
Italy, my Italy! 
Queen Mary’s saying serves for me— 
(When fortune’s malice 
Lost her, Calais) 
Open my heart and you will see 
Graved inside of it, ‘* Italy.” 
Such lovers old are I and she: } 
So it always was, so shall ever be ! 
1855. 


MY STAR 


ALL that I know 
Of a certain star 
Is, it can throw 
(Like the angled spar) 
Now a dart of red, 
Now a dart of blue; 
Till my friends have said 
They would fain see, too, 
My star that dartles the red and the 
blue ! 
Then it stops like a bird; like a flower, 
hangs furled: 
They must solace themselves with the 
Saturn above it. 
What matter to me if their star isa 
world? 
Mine has opened its soul to me ; there- 
fore I love it. 1855. 


+ 


ANY WIFE TO ANY HUSBAND 


My love, this is the bitterest, that thou— 
Who art all truth, and who dost love me 
now 
As thine eyes say, as thy voice breaks ~ 
to say—— 
Shouldst love so truly, and couldst love 
me still — 
A whole long life through, had but love 
its will, 
Would death that leads me from thee 
brook delay ;— 


I have but to be by thee, and thy hand 
Will never let mine go, nor heart with- 
stand 
The beating of my heart to reach its 
place. 
When shall [I look for thee and feel thee 
gone ? 
When cry for the old comfort and find 
none? , 
Never, [know! Thy soulis in thy face. 


—_ 


ROBERT BROWNING - 629 





Oh, I should fade—’t is willed so ! Might 
I save, 
Gladly I would, whatever beauty gave 
Joy to thy sense, for that was pre- 
cious too. 
It is not to be granted. But the soul 
Whence the love comes, all ravage 
leaves that whole ; 
Vainly the flesh fades ; soul makes all 
things new. 


It would not be because my eye grew 
_dim 
Thou couldst not find the love there, 
thanks to Him 
Who never is dishonored in the spark 


-He gave us from his fire of fires and 


bade 
Remember whence it sprang, nor be 
afraid 
While that burns on, though all the 
rest grow dark. 


So, how thou wouldst be perfect, white 
and clean 

Outside as inside, soul and soul’s de- 
mesne 

Alike, this body given to show it by! 

Oh, three-parts through the worst of 
life’s abyss, 

What plaudits from the next world after 


this, 
Couldst thou repeat a stroke and gain 
the sky !— 


And is it not the bitterer to think 
That disengage our hands and thou wilt 
sink 
Although thy love was love in very 
deed ? 
I know that nature! Pass a festive day, 
Thou dost not throw its relic-flower away 
Nor bid its music’s loitering echo 


speed. 

Thou let’st the stranger’s glove lie where 
it fell ; 

If old things remain old things all is 
well, 

For thou art grateful as becomes man 

best : 

-And hadst thou only heard me play one 
tune, 

Or viewed me from a window, not so 
soon 


With thee would such things fade as 
with the rest. 


Tseem to see! We meet and part; ’t is 
brief ; 


The book I opened keeps a folded leaf, 
The very chair I sat on, breaks the 
rank ; 
That is a portrait of me on the wall— 
Three lines, my face comes at so slighta 


call : 
And for all this, one little hour to 
thank ! 


But now, because the hour through years 
was fixed, 
Because our inmost beings met and 
mixed, 
Because thou once hast loved me—wilt 
thou dare 
Say to thy soul and Who may list beside, 
‘* Therefore she is immortally my bride ; 
Chance cannot change my love, nor 
time impair. 


‘* So, what if in the dusk of life that’s 
left, 
I, a tired traveller of my sun bereft, 
Look from my path when, mimicking 
the same, 
The firefly glimpses past me, come and 
gone? 
—Where was it till the sunset? Where 
anon 
It will be at the sunrise! What ’s to 
blame? ” 


Is it so helpful to thee? Canst thou 


take 
The mimic up, nor, for the true thing’s 
sake, 


Put gently by such efforts at a beam ? 
Is the remainder of the way.so long, 
Thou need’st the little solace, thou the 

strong? 

Watch out thy watch, let weak ones 

doze and dream ! 


Ah, but the fresher faces! ‘‘Is it true,” 
Thou ‘It ask, ‘‘some eyes are beautiful 
and new ? 
Some hair,—how can one choose but 
grasp such wealth ? 
And if a man would press his lips to lips 
Fresh as the wilding hedge-rose-cup 
there slips 
The dewdrop out of, must it be by 
stealth ? 


‘“Tt cannot change the love still kept 
for Her, 
More than if such a picture I prefer 
Passing a day with. toa room’s bare 
side : 


628 


The painted form takes nothing she 
possessed, 
Yet, while the Titian’s Venus lies at rest, 
A man looks. Once more, what is 
there to chide ?” 


So must I see, from where I sit and 
watch, 
My own self sell myself, my hand attach 
Its warrant to the very thefts from 
me— 
Thy singleness of soul that made me 
proud, 
Thy purity of heart I loved aloud, 
Thy man’s-truth I was bold to bid God 
see ! 
Love so, then, if thou wilt! Give all 
thou canst 
Away to the new faces—disentranced, 


(Say it and think it) obdurate no ° 


more ; 
Re-issue looks and words from the old 
mint, 
Pass them afresh, no matter whose the 
print 
Image and superscription once they 
bore ! 


Re-coin thyself and give it them to 
spend ,— 
It all one to the same thing at the 
end, 
Since mine thou wast, mine art and 
mine shalt be, 
Faithful or faithless, sealing up the sum 
Or lavish of my treasure, thou must 
come 
Back to the heart’s place here I keep 
for thee! 


Only, why should it be with stain at all? 
Why must I, ’twixt the leaves of cor- 
onal, 
Put any kiss of pardon on thy brow ? 
Why need the other women know so 
much, 
And talk together, ‘‘ Such the look and 
such 
The smile he used to love with, then as 
now!” 


Might I die last and show thee! Should 


find 
Such hardship in the few years left 
behind, 
If free to take and light my lamp, and 
Zo 


Into thy tomb, and shut the door and sit, 


BRIYISHS POLES 


Seeing thy face on those four sides of it 
The better that they are so blank, 1 
know ! 


Why, time was what I wanted, to turn 
o’er 
Within my mind each look, get more 
and more = 
By heart each word, too much to learn 
at first : 

And join thee all the fitter for the pause 
"Neath the low doorway’s lintel. That 
were cause , 

For lingering, though thou calledst, 
if I durst ! 


And yet thou art the nobler of us two: 
What dare I dream of, that thou canst 
not do, 
Outstripping my ten small steps with 
one stride? 
I ’ll say then, here’s a trial and a task— 
Is it to bear ?—if easy, I ‘ll not ask : 
Though love fail, I can trust on in thy 
pride. 


Pride ?—when those eyes forestall the 
life behind 
The death I have to go through !—when 


find, 
Now that I want thy help most, all 
of thee! 
What did I fear? Thy love shall hold 
me fast 


Until the little minute’s sleep is past 
And I wake saved.—And yet it will 
not be! 1855. 


TWO IN THE CAMPAGNA 


I WONDER do you feel to-day 
As I have felt since, hand in hand, 
We sat down on the grass, to stray 
#n spirit better through the land, 
This morn of Rome and May ? 


For me, I touched a thought, I know, 
Has tantalized me many times, 

(Like turns of thread the spiders throw 
Mocking across our path) for rhymes 

To catch at and let go. 


Help me to hold it! First it left 
The yellowing fennel, run to seed 
There, branching from the brickwork’s 
cleft, 
Some old tomb’s ruin ; yonder weed 
Took up the floating weft, 


ROBERT BROWNING 


Where one small orange cup amassed 
Five beetles—blind and green they 
grope 
Among the honey-meal: and last, 
Everywhere on the grassy slope 
I traced it. Hold it fast! 


The champaign with its endless fleece 
Of feathery grasses everywhere ! 

Silence and passion, joy and peace, 
An everlasting wash of air— 

Rome’s ghost since her decease. 


Such life here, through such lengths of 
hours, 
_ Such miracles performed in play, 
Such primal naked forms of flowers, 
Such letting nature have her way, 
While heaven looks from its towers ! 


How say you? Let us, O my dove, 
Let us be unashamed of soul, 

As earth lies bare to heaven above! 
How is it under our control 

To love or not to love? 


I would that you were all to me, 
You that are just so much, no more. 
Nor yours nor mine, nor slave nor free! 
Where does the fault lie? What the 
core 
O’ the wound, since wound must be ? 


I would I could adopt your will, 

See with your eyes, and set my heart 
Beating by yours, and drink my fill 

At your soul’s springs,—your part my 


part 
In life, for good and ill. 


No, I yearn upward, touch you close, 
Then stand away. I kiss your cheek, 
Catch your soul’s warmth,—- I pluck the 
rose 
And love it more than tongue can 
speak— 
Then the good minute goes. 


Already how am I so far 
Out of that minute? Must I go 
Still like the thistle-ball, no bar, 
Onward, whenever light winds blow, 
Fixed by no friendly star ? 


Just when I seemed about to learn ! 
Where isthethread now? Off again! 

The old trick! Only I discern— 
Infinite passion, and the pain 

Of finite hearts that yearn. 1855 


MISCONCEPTIONS 


THIS is a spray the Bird clung to, 
Making it blossom with pleasure, 
Ere the high tree-topshe sprung to, 
Fit for her nest and her treasure. 

Oh, what a hope beyond measure 
Was the poor spray’s, which the flying 
feet hung to,— 
So to be singled out, built in, and sung 
to! 


This is a heart the Queen leaned on, 
Thrilled in a minute erratic, 
Ere the true bosom she bent on, 
Meet for love’s regal dalmatic. 
Oh, what a fancy ecstatic 
Was the poor heart’s, ere the wanderer 
went on— 
Love to be saved for it, proffered to, 
spent on! 1855. 


ONE WAY OF LOVE 


ALL June I bound the rose in sheaves. 

Now, rose by rose, I strip the leaves 

And strew them where Pauline 
pass. 

She will not turn aside? Alas! 

Let them lie. Suppose they die ? 

The chance was they might take her eye. 


may 


How many a month I strove to suit 
These stubborn fingers to the lute! 
To-day I venture all I know. 
She will not hear my music? So! 
Break the string; fold music’s wing : 
Suppose Pauline had bade me sing ! 


My whole life long I learned to love. 

This hour my utmost art I prove 

And speak my passion—heaven or 
hell ? 

She will not not give me heaven? ’T is 
well ! 

Lose who may—I still can say, 

Those who win heaven, blest ar eet ! 

89 


ANOTHER WAY OF LOVE 


JUNE was not over 
Though past the full, 
And the best of her roses 

Had yet to blow, 
When a man I know 
(But shall not discover, 
Since ears are dull, 

And time discloses) 





630 

Turned him and said with a man’s true 
alr, 

Half sighing a smile in a yawn, as ‘t 
were,— 


‘Tf I tire of your June, will she greatly 
care?” 


Well, dear, in-doors with you! 
True ! serene deadness 
Tries a man’s temper. 
What’s in the blossom 
June wears on her bosom ? 
Can it clear scores with you ? 
Sweetness and redness, 
Eadem semper ! 
Go, let me care for it greatly or slightly ! 
If June mend her bower now, your hand 
left unsightly 
By plucking the roses,—my June will do 
rightly. 


And after, for pastime, 
If June be refulgent 
With flowers in completeness, 
All petals, no prickles, 
Delicious as trickles 
Of wine poured at mass-time,— 
And choose One indulgent 
To redness and sweetness : 
Or if, with experience of man and of 
spider, 
June use my June-lightning, the strong 
insect-ridder, 
And stop the fresh film-work,—why, 
June will consider. 1855. 


RESPECTABILITY 


DEAR, had the world in its caprice 

Deigned to proclaim ‘‘I know you 

both, 

Have recognized your plighted troth, 
Am sponsor for you: live in peace !” 
How many precious months and years 

Of youth had passed, that speed so 

fast, ° 

Before we found it out at last, 

The world, and what it fears! 


How much of priceless life were spent 
With men that every virtue decks, 
And women models of their sex, 

Society’s true ornament,—— 

Kre we dared wander. nights like this, 
Through windand rain, and watch the 

Seine, 
And feel the Boulevard break again 

To warmth and light and bliss! 


BRITISH POETS 


I know! the world proscribes not love ; 
Allows my finger to caress 
Your lips’ contour and downiness, 
Provided it supply a glove, 
The world’s good word !—the Institute ! 
Guizot receives Montalembert ! 
Eh? Down the court three lampions 
flare : 
Put forward your best foot! 1855. 
LOVE IN A LIFE 


Room after room, 

I hunt the house through 

We inhabit together. 

Heart, fear nothing, for, 
shalt find her— 

Next time, herself !—not the trouble be- 
hind her 

Left in the curtain, the couch’s perfume! 

As she brushed it, the cornice-wreath 
blossomed anew : 

Yon looking-glass gleamed at the wave 
of her feather. 


heart, thou. 


Yet the day wears, 

And door succeeds door ; 

I try the fresh fortune— 

Range the wide house from the wing to 
the center. 

Still the same chance! she goes out as I 
enter. 

Spend my whole day in the quest,—-who 
cares ? 

But ’t is twilight, you see,—with such 
suites to explore, 

Such closets to search, such alcoves to 


importune ! 1855. 
LIFE IN A LOVE 
ESCAPE me? 
Never—- 
Beloved ! : 


While Iam I, and you are you, 
So long as the world contains us both, 
Me the loving and you the loth, 
While the one eludes, must the other 
pursue. 
My life isa fault at last, I fear: 
It seems too much like a fate, indeed ! 
Though I do my best I shall scarce 
succeed. 
But what if I fail of my purpose here ? 
It is but to keep the nerves at strain, 
To dry one’s eyes and laugh at a fall, 
And baffled, get up and begin again,— 
So the chase takes up one’s life, that’s 
all. 


ROBERT BROWNING 





While, look but once from your farthest 
bound 
At me so deep in the dust and dark, 
No sooner the old hope goes to ground 
Than a new one, straight to the self- 
same mark, 
I shape me— 
Ever 


Removed ! 185d. 


IN THREE DAYS 


So, I shall see her in three days 

And just one night, but nights are short, 
Then two long hours, and that is morn, 
See how I come, unchanged, unworn ! 
Feel, where my life broke off from thine, 
How fresh the splinters keep and fine,— 
Only a touch and we combine! 


Too long, this time of year, the days! 
But nights, at least the nights are short. 
As night shows where her one moon is, 
A hand’s-breadth of pure light and bliss, 
So life’s night gives my lady birth 

And my eyes hold her! What is worth 
The rest of heaven, the rest of earth ? 


O loaded curls, release your store 

Of warmth and scent, as once before 

The tingling hair did, lights and darks 

Outbreaking into fairy sparks, 

When under curl and curl I pried 

After the warmth and scent inside, 

Through lights and darks how mani- 
fold— 

The dark inspired, the light controlled ! 

As early Art embrowns the gold. 


What great fear, should one say, ‘“‘ Three 


days 
That change the world might change as 
well 
Your fortune ; and if joy delays, 
Be happy that no worse befell!” 
What small fear, if another says, 
‘‘Three days and one short night beside 
May throw no shadow on your ways ; 
But years must teem with change un- 
tried, 
With chance not easily defied, 
With an end somewhere undescried.” 
No fear !—or if a fear be born 
This minute, it dies out in scorn. 
Fear? I shall see her in three days 
And one night, now the nightsare short, 
Then just two hours, and that is le 
55. 


631 
THE GUARDIAN-ANGEL 
A PICTURE AT FANO 


DEAR and great Angel, wouldst thou 
only leave 
That child, when thou hast done with 
him, for me! 
Let me sit all the day here, that when eve 
Shall find performed thy special minis- 


try, 
And time come for departure, thou, sus- 
pending, 
Thy flight, may’st see another child for 
tending, 
Another still, to quiet and retrieve. 


Then I shall feel thee step one step, no 
more, 
From where thou standest now, to 
where I gaze, 
—And suddenly my head is covered o’er 
With those wings, white above the 
child who prays 
Now on that tomb—and I shall feel thee 
guarding 
Me, out of all the world ; for me, discard- 
ing 
Yon heaven thy home, that waits and 
opes its door. i 


I would not look up thither past thy 
head 
Because the door opes, like that child, 
I know, 
For I should have thy gracious face in- 
stead, 
Thou bird of God! 
bend me low 
Like him, and lay, like his, my hands 
together, 
And lift them up to pray, and gently 
tether 
Me, as thy lamb there, with thy gar- 
ment’s spread? 


And wilt thou 


If this was ever granted, I would rest 
My head beneath thine, while thy 
healing hands 
Close-covered both my eyes beside thy 
breast, 
Pressing the brain, which too much 
thought expands, 
Back to its proper size again, and smooth- 
in 
Distortion down till every nerve had 
soothing, 
And all lay quiet, happy and sup- 
pressed. 


632 


How soon all worldly wrong would be 
repaired ! 
I think how I should view the earth 
and skies 
And sea, when once again my brow was 
bared 
After thy healing, with such different 


eyes. 
O world, as God has made it! 


All is. 
beauty : 
And knowing this, is love, and love is 
duty. 


What further may be sought for or 
declared ? 


Guercino drew this angel I saw teach 
(Alfred, dear friend !)—that little child 
to pray 
Holding the little hands up, each to each 
Pressed gently,—with his own head 
turned away 
Over the earth where so much lay before 
him 
Of work to do, though heaven was open- 
ing o’er him, 
And he was left at Fano by the beach. 


We were at Fano, and three times we 
went 

To sit and see him in his chapel there, 

And drink his beauty to our soul’s con- 


tent 
—My angel with me too: and since I 
care 
For dear Guercino’s fame (to which in 
power 
And glory comes this picture for a 
dower, [cent)— 


Fraught with a pathos so magnifi- 


And since he did not work thus earnestly 
At all times, and has else endured 
some wrong— 
IT took one thought his picture struck 
from me, 
And spread it out, translating it to 
song. 
My love is here. 
old friend ? 
How rolls the Wairoa at your world’s 


Where are you, dear 


far end? 
This is Ancona, yonder is the sea. 
1855. 
MEMORABILIA 


AH, did you once see Shelley plain, 
And did he stop and speak to you, 

And did you speak to him again ? 
How strange it seems and new! 


BRITISH POETS 


But you were living before that, 
And also you are living after ; 
And the memory I started at— 
My starting moves your laughter ! 


I crossed a moor, with a name of its own 
And a certain use in the world no 
doubt, 
Yet a hand’s-breadth of it shines alone 
*Mid the blank miles round about: 


For there I picked up on the heather 
And there I put inside my breast 

A moulted feather, an eagle-feather ! 
Well, I forget the rest. 1855. 


POPULARITY 


STAND still, true poet that you are! 
I know you; let metry and draw you, 
Some night you ‘ll fail us: when afar 
You rise, remember one man saw you, 
Knew you, and named a star ! 


My star, God’s glow-worm! Why extend 
That loving hand of his which leads 
you, 
Yet locks you safe from end to end 
Of this dark world, unless he needs 
you, 
Just saves your light to spend ? 


His clenched hand shall unclose at last, 
I know, and let out all the beauty : 
My poet holds the future fast, 
Accepts the coming ages’ duty, 
Their present for this past. 


That day the earth’s feast-master’s brow 
Shall clear, to God the chalice raising ; 

‘* Others give best at first, but thou 
Forever set’st our table praising, 

{ 2 


Keep’st the good wine till now ! 


Meantime, I ‘ll draw you as you stand, 
With few or none to watch and 
wonder : 
I ‘ll say—a fisher, on the sand 
By Tyre the old, with ocean- plunder, 
A netful, brought to land. 


Who has not heard how Tyrian shells 
Enclosed the blue, that dye of dyes 
Whereof one drop worked miracles, 
And colored like Astarte’s eyes 
Raw silk the merchant sells ? 


And each bystander of them all 
Could criticise, and quote tradition 


ROBERT BROWNING 


How depths of blue sublimed some pall 
—To get which, pricked a king’s am- 
bition ; 
Worth sceptre, crown and ball. 


Yet there ’s the dye, in that rough mesh, 
The sea has only just o’er-whispered ! 
Live whelks, each lip’s beard dripping 
fresh, 
As if they still the water’s lisp heard 
Through foam the rock-weeds thresh. 


Enough to furnish Solomon 
Such hangings for his cedar-house, 
That, when gold-robed he took the 
throne 
In that abyss of blue, the Spouse 
Might swear his presence shone. 


Most like the centre-spike of gold 
Which burns deep in the bluebell’s 
womb 
What time, with ardors manifold, 
The bee goes singing to her groom, 
~ Drunken and overbold. 


Mere conches! not fit for warp or woof ! 
Till cunning come to pound and 
squeeze 
And clarify,—refine to proof 
The liquor filtered by degrees, 
While the world stands aloof. 


And there ’s the extract, flasked and 
fine, 
And priced and salable at last ! 
And Hobbs, Nobbs, Stokes and Nokes 
combine 
To paint the future from the past, 
Put blue into their line. 


Hobbs hints blue,—straight 
eats : 
Nobbs prints blue,—claret crowns his 
cup : 
Nokes outdares Stokes in azure feats,—. 
Both gorge. Who fished the murex 
up ? 


he turtle 


p? 
What porridge had John Keats ? 1 
1855. 


THE-PATRIOT 
AN OLD STORY 
IT was roses, roses, all the way, 
With myrtle mixed in my path like 
mad: 


1 See Chesterton’s Life of Browning, pp. 154-6. 


633 


The house-roofs seemed to heave and 
sway, 
The church-spires flamed, such flags 
they had, 
A year ago on this very day. 


The air broke into a mist with bells, 
The old walls rocked with the crowd 
and cries. 
Had I said, ‘‘ Good folk, mere noise re- 
pels-— 
But give me your sun from yonder 
skies!” 
They had answered, ‘‘ And afterward, 
what else ?”’ 


Alack, it was I who leaped at the sun 
To give it my loving friends to keep! 
Naught man could do, have I left un- 
done: 
And you see my harvest, what I reap 
This very day, now a year is run. 


There’s nobody on the house-tops now— 
Just a palsied few at the windows set ; 
For the best of the sight is, all allow, 
At the Shambles’ Gate—or, better yet, 
By the very scaffold’s foot, I trow. 


I go in the rain, and, more than needs, 
A rope cuts both my wrists behind ; 
And I think, by the feel, my forehead 

bleeds, 
For they fling, whoever has a mind, 
Stones at me for my year’s misdeeds. 


Thus I entered, and thus I go! 
In triumphs, people have 
down dead. 
‘*Paid by the world, what dost thou owe 
Me?”—God might question ; now in- 
stead, 
‘'T is God shall repay : I am safer so. 
1855. 


dropped 


A LIGHT WOMAN 


So far as our story approaches the end, 
Which do you pity the most of us 
three ?-- 
My friend, or the mistress of my friend 
With her wanton eyes, or me? 


My friend was already too good to lose, 
And seemed in the way of improve- 
ment yet, 
When she crossed his path with her 
hunting-noose, 
And over him drew her net. 


634 


BRITISH POETS 





When I saw him tangled in her toils, 
A shame, said J, if she adds just him 

To her nine-and-ninety other spoils, 
The hundredth for a whim ! 


And before my friend be wholly hers, 
How easy to prove to him, I said, 

An eagle’s the game her pride prefers, 
Though she snaps at a wren instead ! 


So, I gave her eyes my own eyes to take, 
My hand sought hers as in earnest 
need, 
And round she turned for my noble sake, 
And gave me herself indeed. 


The eagle am I, with my fame in the 
world, 
The wren is he, with his maiden face. 
—You look away and your lip is curled ? 
Patience, a moment’s space ! 


For see, my friend goes shaking and 
white ; 
He eyes me as the basilisk : 
I have turned, it appears, his day to 
night, 
Eclipsing his sun’s disk. 


And I did it, he thinks, as a very thief : 
** Though I love her—that, he compre- 
hends— 
One should master one’s passions, (love, 
in chief) 
And be loyal to one’s friends!” 


And she,—she lies in my hand as tame 
As a pear late basking over a wall; 
Just a touch to try and off it came; 
°T is mine,—-can I let it fall ? 


With no mind to eat it, that ’s the worst ! 
Were it thrown in the road, would the 
case assist ? 
°T was quenching a dozen _ blue-flies’ 
thirst 
When I gave its stalk a twist. 


And I,—what I seem to my friend, you 
see : 

What I soon shall seem to his love, 
you guess: 
What I seem to myself, do you ask of 

me? 
No hero, I confess. 


'T is an awkward thing to play with 
souls, 
And matter enough to save one’s own: 


Yet think of my friend, and the burning 
coals 7 
He played with for bits of stone ! 


One likes to show the truth for the 


truth ; 
That the woman was light is very 
true: 
But suppose she says,—Never mind that 
youth 


What wrong have I done to you? 


Well, anyhow, here the story stays, 
So far at least asI understand ; 
And, Robert Browning, you writer of 
plays, 
Here ’s a subject made to your hand! 
1855. 


THE LAST RIDE TOGETHER 


I sAip—Then dearest, since ‘t is so, 
Since now at length my fate I know, 
Since nothing all my love avails, 
Since all, my life seemed meant for, 
fails, 
Since this was written and needs must 
be— 
My whole heart rises up to bless 
Your name in pride and thankfulness ! 
Take back the hope you gave,—I claim 
Only a memory of the same, 
—And this beside, if you will not blame, 
Your leave for one more last ride with 
me. 


My mistress bent that brow of hers ; 
Those deep dark eyes where pride de- 
murs 
When pity would be softening through, 
Fixed me a breathing-while or two 
With life or death in the balance: 
right ! 
The blood replenished me again ; 
My last thought was at least not vain: 
I and my mistress, side by side 
Shall be together, breathe and ride, 
So, one day more am I deified. 
Who knows but the world may end 
to-night ? 


Hush ! if you saw some western cloud 

All billowy-bosomed, over-bowed 

By many benedictions—sun’s 

And moon’s and evening-star’s at once— 
And so, you, looking and loving best, 

Conscious grew, your passion drew 

Cloud, sunset, moonrise, star-shine too, 

Down on you, hear and yet more hear, 


ROBERT BROWNING 


635 





Till flesh must fade for heaven was 
here !— 
Thus leant she and lingered—joy and 
fear ! 
Thus lay she a moment on my breast. 


Then we began to ride. My soul 
Smoothed itself out, a long-cramped 
‘scroll 
Freshening and fluttering in the wind. 
Past hopes already lay behind. 
What need to strive with a life awry ? 
Had I said that, had I done this ? 
So might I gain, so might I miss. 
Might she have loved me? just as well 
She might have hated, who can tell ! 
Where had I been now if the worst be- 
fell? 
And here we are riding, she and I. 


Fail I alone, in words and deeds? 
Why, all men strive, aud who succeeds ? 
We rode ; it seemed, my spirit flew, 
Saw other regions, cities new, 
As the world rushed by on either side. 
I thought,—All labor, yet no less 
Bear up beneath their unsuccess, 
Look at the end of work, contrast 
The petty done, the undone vast, 
This present of theirs with the hopeful 
past ! 
I hoped she would love me; here we 
ride. 


What hand and brain went ever paired ? 

What heart alike conceived and dared ? 

What act proved all its thought had 
been ? 

What will but felt the fleshly screen? 
We ride and I see her bosom heave. 
There’s many a crown for us who can 

reach. 
Ten lines, a statesman’s life in each! 
The flag stuck on a heap of bones, 
A soldier’s doing ! what atones? 
They scratch his name on the Abbey- 
stones. 
My riding is better, by their leave. 


What does it all mean, poet? Well, 

Your brains beat into rhythm, you tell 

What we felt only ; you expressed 

You hold things beautiful the best, 
And place them in rhyme so, side by 

side. 

‘Tis something, nay ’tis much: but then, 

Have you yourself what’s best for men ? 

Are you—poor, sick, old ere your time— 

Nearer one whit your own sublime 





Than we who never have turned a 
rhyme? 


Sing, riding’s a joy. For me, I ride. 


And you, great sculptor—so, you gave 
A score of years to Art, her slave, 
And that’s your Venus, whence we turn 
To yonder girl that fords the burn! 
You acquiesce, and shall I repine ? 
What, man of music, you grown gray 
With notes and nothing else to say, 
Is this your sole praise from a friend, 
‘*Greatly his opera’s strains intend, 
But in music we know how fashions 
end!” 
I gave my youth; but we ride, in fine. 


Who knows what's fit for us? Had fate 
Proposed bliss here should sublimate 
My being—had I signed the bond— 
Still one must lead some life beyond, 
Have a bliss to die with, dim-descried. 
This foot once planted on the goal, 
This glory-garland round my soul, 
Could I descry such? Try and test! 
I sink back shuddering from the quest. 
Earth being so good, would heaven 
seem best? 
Now, heaven and she are beyond this 
ride. 


And yet—she has not spoke so long! 

What if heaven be that, fair and strong 

At life’s best, with our eyes upturned 

Whither life’s flower is first discerned, 
We, fixed so, ever should so abide ? 

What if we still ride on, we two, 

With life forever old yet new, 

Changed not in kind but in degree, 

The instant made eternity,— 

And heaven just prove that I and she 
Ride, ride together, forever ride’? 

1855. 


A GRAMMARIAN’S FUNERAL 


SHORTLY AFTER THE REVIVAL OF LEARN- 
ING IN EUROPE 


LET us begin and carry up this corpse, 
Singing together. 
Leave we the common crofts, the vulgar 
thorpes 
Each in its tether 
Sleeping safe on the bosom of the plain, 
Cared-for till cock-crow : 
Look out if yonder be not day again 
Rimming the rock-row ! 
That’s the appropriate country ; there, 
man’s thought, 


636 


Rarer, intenser, 
Self-gathered for 
ought, 

Chafes in the censer. 
Leave we the unlettered plain its herd 
and crop: 
Seek we sepulture 
On a tall mountain, citied to the top, 
Crowded with culture ! 
All the peaks soar, but one the rest ex- 
cels ; 
Clouds overcome it ; 
No! yonder sparkle is the citadel’s 
Circling its summit. 
Thither our path lies; wind we up the 
heights ; 
Wait ye the warning? 
Our low life was the level’s and the 
night’s ; 
He ’s for the morning. 
Step to atune, square chests, erect each 
head, 
*Ware the beholders! 
This is our master, famous, calm and 
dead, 
Borne on our shoulders. 


an outbreak, as it 


Sleep, crop and herd! sleep, darkling 
thorpe and croft, 
Safe from the weather ! 
He, whom we convoy to his grave aloft, 
Singing together, 
He was a man born with thy face and 
throat, 
Lyric Apollo! 
Long he lived nameless : 
Spring take note 
Winter would follow ? 
Till lo, the little touch, and youth was 
gone! 
Cramped and diminished, 
Moaned he, ‘‘ New measures, other feet 
anon ! 
My dance is finished ?” 
No, that ’s the world’s way : 
mountain-side, 
Make for the city !) 
He knewthe signal, and stepped on with 
pride 
Over men’s pity ; 
Left play for work, 
the world 
Bent on escaping : 
‘* What’s in the scroll,” quoth he, ‘‘ thou 
keepest furled ? 
Show me their shaping, 
Theirs who most studied man, the bard 
and sage,— 
Give !”,—So, he gowned him, 


how should 


(keep the 


and grappled with 


BRITISH POETS 





ee 


Straight got by heart that book to its 
last page : 
Learned, we found him. 
Yea, but we found him bald too, eyes 
like lead, 
Accents uncertain : 
‘* Time to taste life,” another would have 
said, 
‘*Up with the curtain!” 
This man said rather, ‘‘ Actual life comes 
next? 
Patience a moment ! 
Grant I have mastered learning’s crabbed 
text, 
Still there’s the comment. 
Let me know all! Prate not of most or 
least, 
Painful or easy ! 
Even to the crumbs I’d fain eat up the 
feast, 
Ay, nor feel queasy.” 
Oh, such a life as he resolved to live, 
When he had learned it, 
When he had gathered all books had to 
give! 
Sooner, he spurned it. 
Image the whole, then execute the 
parts— 
Fancy the fabric 
Quite, ere you build, ere steel strike fire 
from quartz, 
Ere mortar dab brick ! 


(Here’s the town-gate reached: there’s 
the market-place 
Gaping before us. ) 
Yea, this in him was the peculiar grace 
(Hearten our chorus !) 
That before living he’d learn how to 
live— 
No end to learning : 
Earn the means first—-God surely will 
contrive 
Use for our earning. 
Others mistrust and say, ‘‘ But time 
escapes : 
Live now or never 
He said, ‘*‘ What’s time? Leave Now for 
dogs and apes ! 
Man has Forever.” 
Back to his book then: deeper drooped 
his head : 
Calculus racked him: 
Leaden before, his eyes grew dross of 
lead : 
Tussis attacked him. 
‘* Now, master, take a little rest !’’—not 
he ! 
(Caution redoubled, 


lee 





ROBERT BROWNING 


Oe 


637 





Step two abreast, the way winds nar- 
rowly !) 
Not a whit troubled, 
Back to his studies, fresher than at first, 
Fierce as a dragon 
He (soul-hydroptic with a sacred thirst) 
Sucked at the flagon. 
Oh, if we draw a circle premature, 
Heedless of far gain, 
Greedy for quick returns of profit, sure 
Bad is our bargain ! 
Was it not great? did not he throw on 
God, 
(He loves the burthen)— 
God’s task to make the heavenly period 
Perfect the earthen ? 
Did not he magnify the mind, show clear 
Just what it all meant ? 
He would not discount life, as fools do 
here, 
Paid by instalment. 
He ventured neck or nothing—heaven’s 
success 
Found, or earth’s failure : 
‘Wilt thou trust death or not?” He 
answered *‘ Yes! 
Hence with life’s pale lure! ” 
That low man seeks a little thing to do, 
Sees it and does it: 
This high man, with a great thing to 
pursue, 
Dies ere he knows it. 
That low man goes on adding one to one, 
His hundred’s soon hit: 
This high man, aiming at a million, 
Misses an unit. 
That, has the world here—should he need 
the next, 
Let the world mind him ! 
This, throws himself on God, and unper- 
plexed 
Seeking shall find him. 
So, with the throttling hands of death 
at strife. 
Ground he at grammar ; 
Still, through the rattle, parts of speech 
were rife: 
While he could stammer 
He settled Hoti’s business—let it be !— 
Properly based Oun— 
Gave us the doctrine of the enclitic De, 
Dead from the waist down. 
Well, here’s the platform, here’s the 
proper place: 
Hail to your purlieus, 
All ye highfliers of the feathered race, 
Swallows and curlews! [low 


Here’s the top-peak ; the multitude be- 


Live, for they can, there : 


This man decided not to Live but Know— 
Bury this man there ? 
Here—here’s his place, where meteors 
shoot, clouds form, 
Lightnings are loosened, 
Stars come and go! Let joy break with 
the storm, 
Peace let the dew send! 
Lofty designs must close in like effects : 
Loftily lying. 
Leave him—still loftier than the world 
suspects, 
Living and dying. 1855. 


THE STATUE AND THE BUST 


THERE'S a palace in Florence, the world 
knows well, 

And a statue watches it from the square. 

And this story of both do our townsmen 
tell. 


Ages ago, a lady there, 

At the far thest window facing the East 

Asked, ‘‘ Who rides by with “the royal 
air!” 


The bridesmaids’ around her 
ceased ; 

She leaned forth, one on either hand : 

They saw how the blush of the bride in- 


creased— 


prattle 


They felt by its beats her heart expand— 

As one at each ear and both in a breath 

Whispered, ‘‘The Great-Duke Ferdi- 
nand.” 


That selfsame instant, underneath, 
The Duke rode past in his idle way, 
Empty and fine like a swordless sheath. 


Gay he rode, with a friend as gay, 

Till he threw his head back—‘* Who is 
she ?” 

—‘* A bride the Riccardi brings home 
to-day.” 


Hair in heaps lay heavily 

Over a pale brow spirit-pure— 

Carved like the heart of the coal-black 
tree, 


Crisped like a war steed’s encolure— 
And vainly sought to dissemble her eyes 
Of the blackest black our eyes endure, 


And lo, a blade for a knight’s emprise 

Filled the fine empty sheath of a man,— 

The Duke grew straightway brave and 
wise. 


638 


He looked at her as a lover can ; 
She looked at him, as one who awakes: 
The past was a sleep, and her life began. 


Now, love so ordered for both their 
sakes, 

A feast was held that selfsame night 

In the pile which the mighty shadow 
makes. 


(For Via Larga is three-parts light, 

But the palace overshadows one, 

Because of a crime, which may God re- 
quite ! 


To Florence and God the wrong was 
done, 

Through the first republic’s murder there 

By Cosimo and his cursed son.) 


The Duke (with the statue’s face in the 
square) 

Turned in the midst of his multitude 

At the bright approach of the bridal 
pair. 


Face to face the lovers stood 

A single minute and no more 

While the bridegroom bent as a man sub- 
dued— 


Bowed till his bonnet brushed the floor— 

For the Duke on the lady a kiss con- 
ferred, 

As the courtly custom was of yore. 


In a minute can lovers exchange a word ? 
If a word did pass, which I do not think, 
Only one out of a thousand heard. 


That was the bridegroom. At day’s 
brink 

He and his bride were alone at last 

In a bed chamber by a taper’s blink. 


Calmly he said that her lot was cast, 

That the door she had passed was shut 
on her 

Till the final catafalk repassed. 


The world meanwhile, its noise and stir, 

Through a certain window facing the 
East 

She could watch like a convent’s chroni- 
cler. 


Since passing the door might lead to a 


feast, 
And a feast might lead to so much be- 
side, 


He, of many evils, chose the least. 


BRITISH! PORLS 


‘* Freely I choose too,” said the bride—- 

‘** Your window and its world suffice,” 

Replied the tongue, while the heart 
replied— 


‘Tf I spend the night with that devil 
twice, 

May his window serve as my loop of hell 

Whence a damned soul looks on para- 
dise ! 


‘*T fly to the Duke who loves me well, 
Sit by his side and laugh at sorrow 
Ere I count another ave-bell. 


‘*°T is only the coat of a page to borrow, 

And tie my hair in a horse-boy’s trim, 

And I save my soul—but not to-mor- 
row—” 


(She checked herself and her eye grew 
dim 

‘*My father tarries to bless my state: 

I must keep it one day more for him. 


‘*Ts one day more so long to wait ? 
Moreover the Duke rides past, I know ; 
We shall see each other, sure as fate.” 


She turned on her side and slept. Just 
so! 

So we resolve on a thing and sleep : 

So did the lady, ages ago. 

That night the Duke said, ‘‘ Dear or 
cheap 

As the cost of this cup of bliss may 
prove 


To body or soul, I will drain it deep.” 


And on the morrow, bold with love, 
He beckoned the bridegroom (close on 


call, 
As his duty bade, by the Duke’s alcove) 


And smiled ‘‘’T was a very funeral, 

Your lady will think, this feast of 
ours,— 

A shame to efface whate’er befall ! 


‘What if we break from the Arno bow- 


ers, 

And try if Petraja, cool and green, 

Cure last night’s faults with this morn- 
ing’s flowers?” 


The bridegroom, not a thought to be 
seen 
On his steady brow and quiet mouth, 


‘Said, ‘‘ Too much favor for me so mean ! 


ROBERT BROWNING 


639 





‘* But alas! my lady leaves the South ; 

Each wind that comes from the Apen- 
nine 

Is amenace to her tender youth : 


‘Nor a way exists, the wise opine, 
If she quits her palace twice this year, 
To avert the flower of life’s decline.” 


Quoth the Duke, ‘‘ A sage and a kindly 
fear. 

Moreover Petraja is cold this spring : 

Be our feast to-night as usual here!” 


And then to himself—‘‘ Which night 
shall bring 

Thy bride to her lover’s embraces, fool—— 

Or I am the fool, and thou art the king ! 


*“ Yet my passion must wait a night, nor 
cool— 

For to-night the Envoy arrives from 
France 

Whose heart I unlock with thyself, my 
tool. 


‘*T need thee still and might miss per- 
chance. 

To-day is not wholly lost, beside, 

With its hope of my lady’s countenance : 


** For I ride—what should I do but ride ? 
And passing her palace, if I list, 
May glance at its window—well betide !” 


So said, so done: nor the lady missed 

One ray that broke from the ardent 
brow, 

Nor a curl of the lips where the spirit 
kissed. 


Be sure that each renewed the vow, 

No morrow’s sun should arise and set 

And leave them then as it left them 
now. 


But next day passed, and next day yet, 

With still fresh cause to wait one day 
more 

Ere each leaped over the parapet. 


And still, as love’s brief morning wore, 
With a gentle start, half smile, half sigh, 
They found love not as it seemed before. 


They thought it would work infallibly, 

But not in despite of heaven and earth : 

The rose would blow when the storm 
passed by. 


Meantime they could profit in winter’s 
dearth 

By store of fruits that supplant the rose : 

The world and its ways have a certain 
worth: 


And to press a point while these oppose 
Were simple policy ; better wait : 
We lose no friends and we gain no foes. 


Meantime, worse fates than a lover’s 
fate, 

Who daily may ride and pass and look 

Where his lady watches behind the 
grate ! 


And she—she watched the square like a 
book 

Holding one picture and only one, 

Which daily to find she undertook : 


When the picture was reached the book 
was done, 

And she turned from the picture at 
night to scheme 

Of tearing it out for herself next sun. 


So weeks grew months, years ; gleam by 


gleam 

The glory dropped from their youth and 
love, 

And both perceived they had dreamed a 
dream ; 

Which hovered as dreams do, still 


above: 
But who can take a dream for a truth ? 
Oh, hide our eyes from the next remove ! 


One day as the lady saw her youth 


Depart, and the silver thread that 
streaked 

Her hair, and, worn by the serpent’s 
tooth, 


The brow so puckered, the chin so 
peaked ,— 
And wondered who the woman was, 


Hollow-eyed and haggard-cheeked, 


Fronting her silent in the glass— 
‘*Summon here,” she suddenly said, 
‘* Before the rest of my old self pass, 


‘¢ Him, the Carver, a hand to aid, 

Who fashions the clay no love will 
change, 

And fixes a beauty never to fade. 


640 


BRITISH) POETS 





‘* Let Robbia’s craft so apt and strange 
Arrest the remains of young and fair, 
And rivet them while the seasons range. 


‘‘ Make me a face on the window there, 
Waiting as ever, mute the while, 
My love to pass below in the square ! 


‘* And let me think that it may beguile 
Dreary days which the dead must spend 
Down in their darkness under the aisle, 


‘*'To say, ‘ What matters it at the end? 

I did no more while my heart was warm 

Than does that image, my pale-faced 
friend.’ 


‘“Where is the use of the lip’s red 


charm, 

The heaven of hair, the pride of the 
brow, 

And the blood that blues the: inside 
arm— 


‘‘Unless we turn, as the soul knows how, 
The earthly gift to an end divine? 
A lady of clay is as good, I trow.” 


But long ere Robbia’s cornice. fine, 

With flowers and fruits which leaves en- 
lace, 

Was set where now is the empty shrine— 


(And, leaning out of a bright blue space, 

As a ghost might lean from a chink of 
sky, 

The passionate pale lady’s face— 


Kying ever, with earnest eye 

And quick-turned neck at its breathless 
stretch, 

Some one who ever is passing by—) 


The duke had sighed like the simplest 
wretch 

In Florence, ‘‘ Youth—my dream es- 
capes ! 

Will its record stay?” 
them fetch 


And he bade 

Some subtle moulder of brazen shapes— 

‘*Can the soul, the will, die out of a 
man 

Kre his body find the grave that gapes? 

‘* John of Douay shall effect my plan, 


Set me on horseback here aloft, - 
Alive, as the crafty sculptor can, 


‘‘In the very square I have crossed so 
oft: 

That men may admire, when future suns 

Shall touch the eyes to a purpose soft, 


‘“ While the mouth and the brow stay 
brave in bronze— 

Admire and say, ‘ When he was alive 

How he would take his pleasure once !’ 


‘* And it shall go hard but I contrive 

To listen the while, and laugh in my 
tomb 

At idleness which aspires to strive.” 


So! While these wait the trump of 
doom, 
How do their-spirits pass, I wonder, 


Nights and days in the narrow room ? 


Still, I suppose, they sit and ponder 
What a gift life was, ages ago, . 
Six steps out of the chapel yonder. 


Only they see not God, I know, 
Nor all that chivalry of his, 
The soldier-saints who, row on row, 


Burn upward each to his point of bliss— 

Since, the end of life being manifest, 

He had burned his way through the 
world to this. 


I hear you reproach, ‘‘ But delay was 
best, 

For their end wasa crime.’——Oh, acrime 
will do 

As well, I reply, to serve for a test, 


As a virtue golden through and through, 

Sufficient to vindicate itself 

And prove its worth at a moment's 
view ! 


Must a game be played for the sake of 
pelf ? 


Where a button goes, ’t were an epigram | 


To offer the stamp of the very Guelph. 


The true has no value beyond the sham ; 

As well the counter as coin, I submit, 

When your table’s a hat, and your prize, 
a dram. 


Stake your counter as boldly every whit, 

Venture as warily, use the same skill, 

Do your best, whether winning or losing 
it, 


oe 


ROBERT BROWNING 641 


If you choose to play !—-is my principle. 


Let a man contend to the uttermost 
For his life’s set prize, be it what it will! 


The counter our lovers staked was lost 

As surely as if it were lawful coin : 

And the sin I impute to each frustrate 
ghost 


Is—the unlit lamp and the ungirt loin, 

Though the end in sight was a vice, I 
say. 

You of the virtue (we issue join) 

How strive you? De te, fabula! 

: 855. 


‘*CHILDE ROLAND TO THE DARK 
TOWER CAME” 


See Edgar’s song in Lear. 


My first thought was, he lied in every 
word, 
That hoary cripple, with malicious eye 
eee to watch the working of his 
ie 
On mine, and mouth scarce able to afford 
Suppression of the glee, that pursed and 
scored 
Its edge, at one more victim gained 
thereby. 


What else should he be set for, with his 
staff ? 
What, save to waylay with his lies, 
ensnare 
All travellers.who might find him 
posted there, 
And ask the road? 
skull-like laugh 
Would break, what crutch ’gin write 
my epitaph 
For pastime in the dusty thorough- 
fare, 


I guessed what 


If at his counsel I should turn aside 
Into that ominous tract which, all 
agree, 
Hides the Dark Tower. 
cingl 
I did turn as he pointed : neither pride 
Nor hope rekindling at the end descried, 
So muchas gladness that some end 
might be. 


For, what with my whole world-wide 
wandering, 
What with my search drawn out 
through years, my hope 
Dwindled intoa ghost not fit to cope 


4I 


Yet. acquies- 


With that obstreperous 
would bring,— 
I hardly tried now to rebuke the spring 
My heart made, finding failure in its 
scope. 


joy success 


As when a sick man very near to death 
Seems dead indeed, and feels begin 
and end 
The tears, and takes the farewell of each 
friend, 
And hears one bid the other go, draw 
breath 
Freelier outside, (‘‘since all is o’er,” he 
saith, 
** And the blow fallen no grieving can 
amend ;”’) 


While some discuss if near the other 
graves 
Be room enough for this, and when a 
day 
Suits best for carrying the corpse away, 
With care about the banners, scarves 
and staves: 
And still the man hears all, and only 
craves 
He may not shame such tender love 
and stay. 


Thus, I had solong suffered in this quest, 
Heard failure prophesied so oft, been 
writ 
So many times among ‘‘ The Band ”— 
to wit, 
The knights who. to the Dark Tower’s 
search addressed 
Their steps—that just to fail as they, 
seemed best, 
And all the doubt was now—should I 
be fit ? 


So, quiet as despair, I turned from him, 
That hateful cripple, out of his high- 
way 
Into the path he pointed. All the day 
Had been a dreary one at best, and dim 
Was settling to its close, yet shot one 
grim 
Red leer to see the plain catch its 
estray. 


For mark ! no sooner was I fairly found 
Pledged to the plain, after a pace or 
two, 
Than, pausing to throw backward a 
last view 
O’er the safe road, ’t was gone; gray 
plain all round : 


642 


Nothing but plain to the horizon’s bound. 
Imight goon; naught else remained 
to do. 


So, on I went. I think I never saw 
Such starved ignoble nature; nothing 
throve : 
flowers—-as well expect a cedar 
grove! 
But cockle, spurge, according to their 
law 
Might propagate their kind, with none 
to awe, 
You ’d think : a burr had been a treas- 
ure trove. 


For 


No! penury, inertness and grimace, 
In some strange sort, were the land’s 
portion. ‘‘See 
Or shut your eyes,” said Nature peev- 
ishly, 
“It nothing skills: I cannot help my 
case : 
°T is the Last Judgment’s fire must cure 
this place, 
Calcine its clods and set my prisoners 
free.” 


If there pushed any ragged thistle-stalk 
* Above its mates, the head was chop- 
ped; the bents 
Were jealous else. 
holes and rents 
In the dock’s harsh 
bruised as to balk 
All hope of greenness ? ’t is a brute 
must walk 
Pashing their life out, with a brute’s 
intents. 


What made those 


swarth leaves, 


As for the grass, it grew as scant as hair 
In leprosy ; thin dry blades pricked 
the mud 
Which underneath looked kneaded up 
with blood. 
One stiff blind horse, his every bone a- 
stare, 
Stood stupefied, however he came there: 
Thrust out past service from the 
devil’s stud ! 


Alive? he might be dead for aught I 
know, 
With that red gaunt and colloped neck 
a-strain, 
And shut eyes underneath the rusty 
mane; 
Seldom went such grotesqueness with 
such woe ; 


BRITISH POETS 


I never saw a brute I hated so; . 
He must be wicked to deserve such 
pain. 


I shut my eyes and turned them on my 
heart. 
As a man calls for wine before he 
fights, 
I asked one draught of earlier, happier 
sights, 
Ere fitly I could hope to play my part. 
Think first, fight afterwards—the sol- 
dier’s art: 
One taste of the old time sets all to 
rights. 


Not it! I fancied Cuthbert’s reddening 
face 
Beneath its garniture of curly gold, 
Dear fellow, till I almost felt him fold 
An arm in mine to fix ine to the place, 
That way he used. Alas, one night’s 
disgrace ! 
Out went my heart’s new fire and left 


it cold. 
Giles then, the soul of honor—there he 
stands 
Frank as ten years ago when knighted 
first. 


What honest man should dare (he 
said) he durst. 
Good—but the scene shifts—faugh ! 
what hangman hands __ . 
Pin to his breast a parchment? His 
own bands } 
Read it. Poor traitor, spit upon and 
curst ! 


Better this present than a past like that ; 
Back therefore to my darkening path 
again ! 
No sound, no sight as far as eye could 
strain. 
Will the night send a howlet or a bat ? 
I se when something on the dismal 
at 
Came to arrest my thoughts and 
change their train. 


A sudden little river crossed my path 
As unexpected as a serpent comes. 
No sluggish tide congenial to the 


glooms ; 

This, as it frothed by, might have been a 
bath 

For the fiend’s glowing hoof—to see the 
wrath 


Of its black eddy bespate with flakes 
and spumes, 


ROBERT BROWNING 


643 





So petty, yet so spiteful! All along, 
Low scrubby alders kneeled down 
ever it } 

Drenched willows flung them head- 
long in a fit 

Of mute despair, a suicidal throng: 

The river which had done them all the 


wrong, 
Whate’er that was, rolled by, deterred 
no whit. 
Which, while I forded,—good saints, 


how I feared 
To set my foot upon a dead man’s 
cheek, 
Kach step, or feel the spear I thrust to 
seek 
For hollows, tangled in his hair or beard! 
—It may have been a water-rat Ispeared, 


But, ugh, it sounded like a_ baby’s 
shriek, 

Glad was I whenI reached the other 
bank. 

Now for a better country. Vain 


presage ! 
Who were the strugglers, what war 
did they wage, 
Whose savage trample thus could pad 
the dank 
Soil to a plash? 
tank, 
Or wild cats in a red-hot iron cage— 


Toads in a poisoned 


The fight must so have seemed in that 
fell cirque. — 
What penned them there, with all the 
plain to choose ? 
No footprint leading to that horrid 


mews, 

None out of it. Mad brewage set to 
work 

Their brains, no doubt, like galley- 


slaves the Turk 
Pits for his pastime, Christians against 
Jews. 


And more than that—a furlong on—_ 


why, there! 
What bad use was that engine for, 
that wheel, 
Or brake, not wheel—that harrow fit 
to reel [air 
Men’s bodies out like silk ? with all the 
Of Tophet’s tool, on earth left unaware. 
Or brought to sharpen its rusty teeth 
of steel. 


Then came a bit of stubbed ground, 
once a wood, 


Nexta marsh, it would seem, and now 
mere earth 
Desperate and done with: 
finds mirth, 
Makes a thing and then mars it, till his 
mood 
Changes and off he goes !) within a rood— 
Bog, clay and rubble, sand and stark 
black dearth. 


(so a fool 


Now blotches rankling, colored gay and 
grim, 
Now patches where some leanness of 
the soil’s 


Broke into moss or substances like 
boils ; 
Then came some palsied oak, a cleft in 
him 


Like a distorted mouth that splits its rim 
Gaping at death, and dies while it 
recoils. 


And just as far as ever from the end! 
Naught in the distance but the even- 
ing, naught 
To point my footstep further! At 
the thought. 
A great black bird, Apollyon’s bosom- 
friend, 
Sailed past, nor beat his wide wing 
dragon-penned 
That brushed my cap—perchance the 
guide I sought. 


For, looking up, aware [somehow grew, 
Spite of the dusk, the plain had given 
place 
All round to mountains—with such 
name to grace 
Mere ugly heights and heaps now stolen 
in view. 
How thus they had surprised me,— 
solve it, you! 
How to get from them was no clearer 
case. 


Yet half I seemed to recognize some 
trick 
Of mischief happened to me, God 
knows when— 
In.a bad dream perhaps. Here ended, 
then, [nick 
Progress this way. When, in the very 
Of giving up, one time more, came a 
click [the den ! 
As when a trap sbuts—yovw're inside 


Burningly it came on me all at once, 
This was the place! those two hills on 
the right, 


644 


Crouched like two bulls locked horn 
in horn in fight ; 
While to the left, a tall scalped mountain 
. Dunce, 
Dotar d, a- “dozing at the very nonce, 
After a life ‘spent training for 
sight! 


the 


What in the midst lay but the Tower 
itself ? 
The round squat turret, blind as the 
fool’s heart, 
Built of brown stone, without a coun- 
terpart 
In the whole world. 
mocking elf 
Points to the shipman thus the unseen 


The tempest’s 


shelf 

He strikes on, only when the timbers 
start. 

Not see? because of night perhaps ?— 

why, day 

Came back again for that! before it 
left 

The dying sunset kindled through a 
cleft : 


The hills, like giants at a hunting, lay, 
Chin upon hand, to see the game at 
bay ,— 
‘* Now stab and end the creature—to 
the heft !” 


Not hear? when noise was everywhere ! 
it tolled 
Increasing like a bell. 
ears, 
Of all the lost adventurers my peers,— 
How such a one was strong, and such 
was bold, 
And such was fortunate, yet each of old 
Lost, lost! one moment knelled the 
woe of years. 


Names in my 


There they stood, ranged along the hill- 
sides, met 
To view the last of me, a living frame 
For one more picture! in a sheet of 
flame 
I saw them and I knew them all. 
yet 
Datiiess the slug-horn to my lips I set, 
And blew: ‘ Childe Roland to the 
Dark Tower came.” 1855. 


And 


FRA LIPPO LIPPI 


I am poor brother Lippo, by your leave ! 
You Beet not clap your torches to my 
ace. 


BRITISH POETS 


Zooks, what ’s to blame? you think you 
see a monk! 

What, ’t is past midnight, and you go 
‘the rounds, 

And here you catch me at an alley’s end 

Where sportive ladies leave their doors 
ajar? 

The Carmine ’s my cloister: hunt it up, 

Do,—harry out, if you must show your 
zeal, 

Whatever rat, there, haps on his wrong 
hole, 

And nip each softling of a wee white 
mouse, 

Weke, weke, that ’s crept to keep him 
company ! 

Aha, you know your betters! 
you ‘ll take 

Your hand away that ’ 8 fiddling on my 
throat, 

And please to know me likewise. 
am I? 

Why, one, sir, who is lodging eID a 
friend 

Three streets off-—he’sacertain . 
d’ ye call? 

Master—a .. . Cosimo of the Medici. 

I’ the house that caps the corner. Boh! 
you were best! 

Remember and tell me, the day you ’re 
hanged, 

How you affected such a gullet’s-gripe ! 

But you, sir, it concerns you that your 
knaves 

Pick up a manner nor discredit you : 

Zooks, are we pilchards, that they sweep 
the streets 

And count fair prize what comes into 
their net ? 

He’s Judas to a tittle, that man is! 

Just such a face! Why, sir, you make 


Then, 


Who 


. how 


amends. 

Lord, I’m not angry! Bid your hang- 
dogs go 

Drink out this quarter-florin to the 
health 

Of the munificent House that harbors 
me 

(And many more beside, lads! more 
beside !) 

And all ’s come square again. I’d like 


his face— 

His, elbowing on his comrade in this 
door 

With the pike and lantern,—for the 
slave that holds 

John Baptist’s head a-dangle by the hair 

With one hand (‘‘ Look you, now,” as 
who should say ) 


ROBERT BROWNING 


And his weapon in the other, yet un- 
wiped ! 

It’s not your chance to have a bit of 
chalk, 

A wood-coal or the like? or you should 
see ! 

Yes, I’m the painter, since you style me 


so. 

What, brother Lippo’s doings, up and 
down 

You know them and they take you? 
like enough ! 

Isaw the proper twinkle in your eye— 

Tell you, I liked your looks at very first. 

Let ’s sit and set things straight now, 
hip to haunch. 

Here ’s spring come, and the nights one 
makes up bands 

To roam the town and sing our carnival, 

And I’ve been three weeks shut within 
my mew, 

A-painting for the great man, saints and 
saints 

And saints again. 

night— 

I leaned out of window for fresh 
air. : 
There came a hurry of feet and little 

feet, 
A sweep of lute strings, laughs, and 
whifts of song,— 
Flower o’ the broom, 
Take away love, and our earth is a tomb! 
Flower o’ the quince, 
I let Lisa go, and what good in life since ? 


I could not paint all 


Ouf ! 


Flower o’ the thyme—and so on. Round 
_ they went. 
Searce had they turned the corner when 
a titter 


Like the skipping of rabbits by moon- 
light,—three slim shapes, 

Anda face that looked up... zooks, sir, 
flesh and blood, 

That ’s all I ‘m made of ! 
went, 

Curtain and counterpane and coverlet, 

All the bed-furniture—a dozen knots, 

There was a ladder! Down I let myself, 

Hands and feet, scrambling somehow, 
and so dropped, - 

And after them. I came up with the 
fun 

Hard by Saint Laurence, hail fellow, 
well met,— 

Flower o’ the rose, 

If [ve been merry, what matter who 
knows ? 

And so as I was stealing back again 

To get to bed and have a bit of sleep 


Into shreds it 


645 


Ere I rise up to-morrow and go work 

On Jerome knocking at his poor old 
breast 

With his great round stone to subdue 
the flesh, 

You snap me of the sudden. -Ah, I see! 

Though your eye twinkles still, youshake 
your head— 

Mine’s shaved—a monk, you say—the 
sting ’s in that! 

If Master Cosimo announced himself, 

Mum's the word naturally ; buta monk! 

Come, what am Ia beast for? tell us, 
now ! 

T was a baby when my mother died 

And father died and left me in the street. 

I starved there, God knows how, a year 


or two 

On fig-skins, melon-parings, rinds and 
shucks, 

Refuse and rubbish. One fine frosty 


day 
My stomach being empty as your hat, 
The wind doubled me up and down I 


went. 
Old Aunt Lapaccia trussed me with one 
hand, 


(Its fellow was a stinger as I knew) 

And so along the wall, over the bridge, 

By the straight cut to the convent. Six 
words there, 

While I stood munching my first bread 
that month : 

“So, boy, youw’re minded,” quoth the 
good fat father, 

Wiping his own mouth, ’t was refection- 
time,— 

‘To quit this very miserable world ? 

Will you renounce”... ‘‘ the mouth- 
ful of bread?” thought I; 

By nomeans! Brief, they made a monk 


of me; 

I did renounce the world, its pride and 
greed, 

Palace, farm, villa, shop, and banking- 
house, 

Trash, such as these poor devils of 
Medici 


Have given their hearts to—all at eight 
years old. 

Well, sir, I found in time, you may be 
sure, 

’T was not for nothing—theyood bellyful, 

The warm serge and the rope that goes 
all round, 

And day-long blessed idleness beside ! 

‘‘Tet’s see what the urchin ’s fit for” 
—that came next. 

Not overmuch their way, I must confess, 


646 


BRITISH’ POETS 





Such a to-do! They tried me with their 
books ; 

Lord, they’d have taught me Latin in 
pure waste ! 

Flower o’ the clove, 

All the Latin I construe is ** amo,” I 
love ! 

But, mind you, when a boy starves in 
the streets 

Kight years together, as my fortune was, 

Watching folk’s faces to know who will 


fling 

The bit of half-stripped grape-bunch he 
desires, . 

And who will curse or kick him for his 
pains,— 

Which gentleman processional and fine, 

Holding a candle to the Sacrament, 

Will wink and let him lift a plate and 
catch 

The droppings of the wax to sell again, 

Or holla for the Eight and have him 
whipped,— 

How say I?—nay, which dog bites, 
which lets drop 

His bone from the heap of offal in the 
street ,— 

Why, soul and sense of him grow sharp 
alike, 

He learns the look of things, and none 
the less 

For admonition from the hunger-pinch. 

I had a store of such remarks, be sure, 

Which, after I found leisure, turned to 
use. 

I drew men’s faces on my copy-books, 

Scrawled them within the antiphonary’s 


marge, 

Joined legs and arms to the long music- 
notes, 

Found eyes and nose and chin for A’s 
and B's, 

And made a string of pictures of the 
world 

Betwixt the ins and outs of verb and 


noun, 

On the wall, the bench, the door. 
monks looked black. 

“Nay,” quoth the Prior, ‘‘turn him 
out, d’ ye say ? 

In no wise. Lose a crow and catch a 
lark. 

What if at last we get our man of parts, 

We Carmelites, like those Camaldolese 

And Preaching Friars, to do our church 
up fine 

And Duy the front on it that ought to 
pe 1” 

And hereupon he bade me daub away. 


The 


Thank you! my head being crammed, 
the walls a blank, 

Never was such prompt disemburdening. 

First, every sort of monk, the black and 
white, 

I drew them, fat and lean: then, folk 
at church, 

From good old gossips waiting to confess 

Their cribs of barrel-droppings, candle- 
ends,— 

To the breathless fellow at the altar-foot, 

Fresh from his murder, safe and sitting 


there 

With the little children round him in a 
row 

Of admiration, half for his beard and 
half 


For that white anger of his victim’s son 

Shaking a fist at him with one fierce 
arm, 

Signing himself with the other because 
of Christ 

Nae sad face on the cross sees only 
this 

After the passion of a thousand years) 

Till some poor girl, her apron o’er her 
head, 

(Which the intense eyes looked through) 
came at eve 

On tiptoe, said a word, dropped in a loaf, 

Her pair of earrings and a bunch of 
flowers 

(The brute took growling), prayed, and 
so was gone. 

I painted all, then cried ‘“ ’T is ask and 
have ; 

Choose, for more’s ready !”—laid the 
ladder flat, 

And showed my covered bit of cloister- 


wall, 

The monks closed in a circle and praised 
loud 

Till checked, taught what to see and not 
to see, 

Being simple bodies,—** That’s the very 
man ! 

Look at the boy who stoops to pat the 
dog! 

That woman’s like the Prior’s niece who 
comes 


To care about hisasthma: it’s the life!” 

But there my triumph’s straw-fire flared 
and funked ; . 

Their betters took their turn to see and 

cit payee 

The Prior and the learned pulled a face 

And stopped all that inno time. ‘*‘ How? 
what’s here? [us all! 

Quite from the mark of painting, bless 


GO eee 


ROBERT BROWNING 647 


Faces, arms, legs, and bodies like the 


true 

As much as pea and pea! it’s devil’s- 
game ! 

Your business is not to catch men with 
how 


Ss ’ 

With homage to the perishable clay, 

But lift them over it, ignore it all, 

Make them forget there ’s such a thing 
as flesh. 

Your business is to paint the souls of 
men— 

Man’s soul, and it ’sa fire, smoke... 
no, it’snot... 

It’s vapor done up like a new-born 
babe— 

(In that shape when you die it leaves 
your mouth) 

It’s... well, what matters talking, 
it ’s the soul! 

Give us no more of body than shows 
soul ! 

Here ’s Giotto, with his Saint a-praising 
God, 

That sets us praising,—why not stop 
with him? 

Why put all thoughts of praise out of 
our head 

With wonder at lines, colors, and what 
not ? 

Paint the soul, never mind the legs and 
arms! 

Rub all out, try at it a second time. 

Oh, that white smallish female with the 
breasts, 

She ’s just my niece . 
would say,— 

Who went and danced and got men’s 

heads cut off ! 

Have it all out!” Now, is this sense, I 
ask ? 

A fine way to paint soul, by painting 
body 

So ill, the eye can’t stop there, must go 
further 

And can’t fare worse! Thus, yellow 
does for white 

When what you put for yellow ’s simply 
black, 

And any sort of meaning looks intense 

When all beside itself means and looks 


jas terodias,: 1 


naught. 

Why can’t a painter lift each foot in 
turn, 

Left foot and right foot, go a double 
step, 

Make his flesh liker and his soul more 
like, [face, 


Both in their order? Take the prettiest 


The Prior’s niece . 
it so pretty 

You can’t discover if it means hope, 
fear, 

Sorrow or joy? won’t beauty go with 
these ? 

Suppose I’ve made her eyes all right 
and blue, 

Can’t I take breath and try to add life’s 
flash, 

And then add souland heighten them 
three-fold ? 

Or say there ’s beauty with no soul at 
all— 

(I never saw it—put the case the same—) 

If you get simple beauty and naught else, 

You get about the best thing God in- 
vents: 

That ’s somewhat: and you ’ll find the 
soul you have missed, 

Within yourself, when you return him 

thanks. 


. . patron-saint—is 


‘* Rub all out!” Well, well, there ’s my 


life, in short, 
And so the thing has gone on ever since. 
I’m growna man no doubt, I’ve broken 


bounds : 

You should not take a fellow eight years 
old 

And make him swear to never kiss the 
girls. 

I’m my own master, paint now as I 
please— 

Having a friend, you see, in the Corner- 
house ! 

Lord, it ’s fast holding by the rings in 
front— 


Those great rings serve more purposes 
than just 

To plant a flag in, or tie up a horse! 

And yet the old schooling sticks, the old 
grave eyes 

Are peeping o’er my shoulder as I work, 

The heads shake still—‘‘It’s art’s de- 
cline, my son! 

You ’re not of the true painters, great 
and old; 

Brother Angelico’s the man, you'll find ; 

Brother Lorenzo stands his single peer : 

Fag on at flesh, you ‘ll never make the 
third !” 

Flower o’ the pine, 

You keep your mistr... 
I'll stick to mine! 

I’m not the third, then: bless us, they 
must know ! 

Don’t you think they ’re the likeliest to 
know, [my rage, 

They with their Latin? So, I swallow 


Manners, and 


648 


Clench my teeth, suck my lips in tight, 
and paint 

To please them—sometimes do and some- 
times don’t ; 

For, doing most, there ’s pretty sure to 


come 
A turn, some warm eve finds me at my 
saints— 
A laugh, a cry, the business of the 
world— 


(Flower o’ the Peach, 

Death for us all, and his own life for 
each /) 

And my whole soul revolves, the cup 
runs over, 

The world and life ’s too big to pass for 
a dream, 

And I do these wild things in sheer 
despite, 

And play the fooleries you catch me at, 

In pure rage! The old mill-horse, out 


at grass 

After hard years, throws up his stiff 
heels so, 

Although the miller does not preach to 
him 


The only good of grass is to make chaff. 

What would men have? Do they like 
grass or no— 

May they or may n’t they? all I want’s 
the thing 

Settled forever one way. As it is, 

You tell too many lies and hurt your- 

elf: 

You don’t like what you only like too 
much, 

You do like what, if given you at your 
word, 

You find abundantly detestable. 

For me, I think I speak as I was taught ; 

I always see the garden and God there 

A-making man’s wife: and, my lesson 
learned, 

The value and significance of flesh, 

I can’t unlearn ten minutes afterwards. 


You understand me: I’m a beast, I 

know. 

But see, now—why, I see as certainly 

As that the morning-star ’s about to 
shine, 

What will hap some day. 
youngster here 

Comes to our convent, studies what I do, 

Slouches and stares and lets no atom 


We've a 


drop: 
His name is Guidi—he ’ll not mind the 
monks— ‘[talk— 


They call him Hulking Tom, he lets them 


BRITISH POETS 


He picks my practice up—he ‘ll paint 
apace. 

I hope so—though I never live so long, 

I know what’s sure to follow. You be 
judge ! 

You speak no Latin more than I, belike; 

However, you ’re my man, you ’ve seen 
the world 

—The beauty and the wonder and the 
power, 

The shapes of things, their colors, lights 
and shades, 

See ae surprises,—and God made it 
all! 


—For what? Do you feel thankful, ay 
or no, 

For oH fair town’s face, yonder river’s 
ine, 

The mountain round itand the sky above, 

Much more the figures of man, woman, 
child, 

These are the frame to? What’s it all 
about ? 

To be passed over, despised ? or dwelt 


upon, 

Wondered at? oh, this last of course !— 
you say. 

But why not do as well as say,—paint 
these : 

Just as they are, careless what comes of 
it ? 

God’s works—- paint any one, and count 
it crime 

To let a truth ship. Don’t object, ‘‘ His 
works : 

Are here already : nature is complete : 

Suppose you reproduce her——(which you 
can’t) 

There ’s no advantage! you must beat 
her, then.” 

For, don’t you mark? we ’re made so 
that we love 

First when we see them painted, things 
we have passed 

Perhaps a hundred times nor cared to 
see ; 

And so they are better, painted—better 
to us, 

Which is the same thing. Art was 
given for that ; 

God uses us to help each other so, 

Lending our minds out. Have you no- 
ticed, now, 

Your cullion’s hanging face? A bit of 
chalk, 

And trust me but you should, though! 
How much more, 

If I drew higher things with the same 
truth! 


ROBERT BROWNING 


That were to take the Prior’s pulpit- 
place, 

Interpret God to all of you! Oh, oh, 

It makes me mad to see what men shall 
do ° 

And we in our graves! This world’s 
no blot for us, 

Nor blank; it means intensely, and 
means good : 

To find its meaning is my meat and 
drink. 

‘* Ay, but you don’t so instigate to 
prayer !” 

Strikesin the Prior: ‘‘ when your mean- 
ing ’s plain 

It does not say to folk—-remember 


matins, 

Or, mind you fast next Friday !” Why, 
for this 

What need of art at all? A skull and 
bones, 


Two bits of stick nailed crosswise, or, 
what ’s best, 

A bell to chime the hour with, does as 
well. 

I painted a Saint Laurence six months 
since 

At Prato, splashed the fresco in fine 
style : 

‘** How looks my painting, now the scaf- 
fold ’s down?” 

I ask a brother : ‘‘ Hugely,” he returns— 

** Already not one phiz of your three 
slaves 

Who turn the Deacon off his toasted 


side, 
But ’s scratched and prodded to our 
heart’s content, 
The pious people have so eased their own 
With coming to say prayers there ina 
rage : 
We get on fast to see the bricks beneath. 
Expect another job this time next year, 
For pity and religion grow i the 
crowd—- : 
Your painting serves 
Hang the fools ! 


its purpose!” 


—That is—you ‘ll not mistake an idle 


word 

Spoke in a huff by a poor monk, God 
wot, 

Tasting the air this spicy night which 
turns 

The unaccustomed head like Chianti 
wine! 

Oh, the church knows! don’t misreport 
me, now ! 


It ’s natural a poor monk out of bounds 


649 


Should have his apt word to excuse 
himself : 


And harken how I plot to make 
amends. 

I have bethought me: I shall paint a 
piece 


... There ’s for you! Give me six 


months, then go, see 


Something in Sant’ Ambrogio’s! Bless 
the nuns! 
They want a cast o’ my office. I shall 


paint 
God inthe midst, Madonnaand her babe, 
Ringed by a bowery, flowery angel- 
brood, 
Lilies and vestments and white faces, 
sweet 
As puff on puff of grated orris-root 
When ladies crowd to Church at mid- 


summer. 

And then i’ the front, of course a saint 
or two-- 

Saint John, because he saves the Flo- 
rentines, 


Saint Ambrose, who puts down in black 
and white 

The convent’s friends and gives them a 
long day, 

And Job, I must have him there past 
mistake, 

The man of Uz (and Us without the z, 

Painters who need his patience). Well, 
all these 

Secured at their devotion, up shall come 

Out of a corner when you least expect, 

As one by a dark stair intoa great light, 

Music and talking, who but Lippo! 
[ !—- 

Mazed, motionless, and moonstruck— 
I ’m the man! 

Back I shrink—-what is this I see and 
hear ? 

I, caught up with my monk’s-things by 
mistake, 

My old serge gown and rope that goes 
all-round, 

I, in this presence, this pure company ! 

Where ’s a hole, where ’s a corner for 
escape ? 

Then steps asweet angelic slip of a thing 

Forward, puts out asoft palm—‘ Not so 
fast!” 

— Addresses 
‘* nay— 

He made you and devised you, after all, 

Though he’s none of you! Could Saint 
John there draw-~ 

His camel-hair make up a painting- 
brush ¢ 


the celestial presence, 


650 


BRITISH POETS 





We come to brother Lippo for all that, 

Iste perfecit opus!” So, all smile— 

I shuffle sideways with my blushing face 

Under the cover of a hundred wings 

Thrown like a spread of kirtles when 
you’re gay 

And play hot cockles, all the doors being 
shut, 

Till, wholly unexpected, in there pops 

The hothead husband! Thus I scuttle 
off 

To some safe bench behind, not letting 


go 

The palm of her, the little lily thing 

That spoke the good word for me in the 
nick, 

Like the Prior’s niece. . 
I would say, 

And so all’s saved for me, and for the 
church 

A pretty picture gained. Go, six months 
hence! 

Your hand, sir, and good-by : no lights, 
no lights ! 

The street ’s hushed, and I know my 
own way back, 

Don’t fear me! There ’s the gray be- 
ginning. Zooks! 1855. 


. Saint Lucy, 


ANDREA DEL SARTO 
CALLED ‘‘ THE FAULTLESS PAINTER ” 


But do not let us quarrel any more, 

No, my Lucrezia; bear with me for 
once: 

Sit down and all shall happen as you 
wish. 

You turn your face, but does it bring 
your heart ? 

T’ll work then for your friend’s friend, 
never fear, 

Treat his own subject after hisown way, 

Fix his own time, accept too his own 
price, 

And shut the money into this small hand 


When next it takes mine. Will it? 
tenderly ? 

Oh, V’ll content him,—-but to-morrow, 
Love! 


Toften am much wearier than youthink, 
This evening more than usual, and it 


seems 

As if—forgive now—should you let me 
sit 

Here by the window with your hand in 
mine 


‘And look a half-hour forth on Fiesole, 
Both of one mind, as married people use, 


Quietly, quietly the evening through, — 

I might get up to-morrow to my work 

Cheerful and fresh as ever. Let us try. 

aes how you shall be glad for 
this ! 

Your soft hand is a woman of itself, 

And mine the man’s bared breast she 
curls inside. 

Don’t count the time lost, neither ; you 
must serve 

For each of the five pictures we require : 

It saves a model. So! keep looking so— 

My serpentining beauty, rounds on 
rounds! 

—How could you ever prick those per- 
fect ears, 

Even to put the pearl there! oh, so 
sweet— 

My face, my moon, my everybody’s 
moon, 

Which everybody looks on and calls his, 

And, I suppose, is looked on by in turn, 

While she looks—no one’s: very dear, 
no less, 

You smile? why, there’s my picture 
ready made, 

There ’s what we painters call our har- 
mony ! 

A common grayness silvers everything,— 

Allin a twilight, you and I alike 

—You, at the point of your first pride in 
me 

(That ’s gone you know),—but I, at 
every point ; 

My youth, my hope, my art, being all 
toned down 

To yonder sober pleasant Fiesole. 

There ’s the bell clinking from the chapel- 


top ; 

That length of convent-wall across the 
wa 

Holds the trees safer, huddled more in- 
side ; 

The last monk leaves the garden; days 
decrease, 

And autumn grows, autumn in every- 
thing, 

Kh? the whole seems to fall into ashape 

As if I saw alike my work and self 

And all that I was born to be and do, 

A twilight-piece. Love, weare in God’s 
hand. 

How strange now looks the life he makes 
us lead ; 

So free we seem, so fettered fast we are! 

I feel he laid the fetter: let it lie! 

This chamber for example—-turn your 
head— [stand 

All that ’s behind us! You don’t under- 


ROBERT BROWNING 


Nor care to understand about my art, 

But you can hear at least when people 
speak : 

And that cartoon, the second from the 
door 

—It is the thing, Love! so such things 
should be— 

Behold Madonna !—I am bold to say. 

I can do with my pencil what I know, 

What I see, what at bottom of my heart 

I wish for, if I ever wish so deep— 

Do easily, too—when I say, perfectly, 

I do not boast, perhaps: yourself are 
judge 


Who listened to the Legate’s talk last 
week, 

And just as much they used to say in 
France. 


At any rate ’t is easy, all of it! 

No sketches first, no studies, that ’s long 
past : 

I do what many dream of all their lives, 

—Dream? strive to do, and agonize to 


do, 

And fail in doing. Icould count twenty 
such 

On twice your fingers, and not leave this 
town, 


Who strive—you don’t know how the 
others strive 

To paint a little thing like that you 
smeared 

Carelessly passing with 
afloat,— 

Yet do much less, so much less, Some- 
one says, 

(I know his name, no matter)—so much 
less ! 

Well, less is more, 

judged. 

There burns a truer light of God in them, 

In their vexed beating stuffed and 
stopped-up brain, 

Heart, or whate’er else, than goes on to 
prompt 

This low-pulsed forthright craftsman’s 
hand of mine. 

Their works drop groundward, but them- 
selves, I know, 

Reach many a time a heaven that ’s shut 
to me, 

Enter and take their place there sure 
enough, 

Though they come back and cannot tell 
the world. 

My works are nearer heaven, but I sit 
here. 

The sudden blood of these men! at a 
word— 


your robes 


Lucrezia: I am 


651 


Praise them, it boils, or blame them, it 
boils too. 

I, painting from myself and to myself, 

Know what I do, am unmoved by men’s 
blame 

Or their praise either. 
marks 

Morello’s outline there is wrongly traced, 

His hue mistaken; what of that? or 
else, 

Rightly traced and well ordered ; what. 
of that? 

Speak as they please, what does the 
mountain care? 

Ah, but a man’s reach should exceed his 
grasp, 

Or what ’s a heaven for? 


Somebody re- 


All is silver- 


gray 

Placid and perfect with my art: the 
worse ! 

I know both what I want and what might 
gain, 

And yet how profitless to know, to sigh 

**‘Had I been two, another and myself, 

Our head would have o’erlooked the 
world!” No doubt. 

Yonder ’s a work now, of that famous 
youth 

The Urbinate who died five years ago. 

(T is copied, George Vasari sent it me.) 

Well, I can fancy how he did it all, 

Pouring his soul, with kings and popes 


to see, 

Reaching, that heaven might so replenish 
him, 

Above and through his art—for it gives 
way ; 

That arm is wrongly put—-and there 
again— 


A fault to pardon in the drawing’s lines, 

Its body, so to speak: its soul is right, 

He means right—that, a child may un- 
derstand. 

Still, what anarm! andI could alter it: 

But all the play, the insight and the 
stretch— 

Out of me, out of me! 
out ? © 

Had you enjoined them on me, given 
me soul, 

We might have risen to Rafael, I and 
you! 

Nay, Love, you did give all I asked, I 
think— 

More than I merit, yes, by many times. 

But had you—oh, with the same perfect 
brow, 

And perfect eyes, and more than perfect 
mouth, 


And wherefore 


+652 

And the low voice my soul hears, as a 
bird 

The fowler’s pipe, and follows to the 
snare— 


Had you, with these the same, but 
brought a mind! 

Some women do so. 
there urged 

‘* God and the glory ! never care for gain, 

The present by the future, what is that? 

Live for fame, side by side with Agnolo! 

Rafael is waiting : up to God, all three!” 

I might have done it for you. So it 
seems : 

Perhaps not. All is as God overrules. 

Beside, incentives come from the soul’s 
self ; 

The rest availnot. Why do Ineed you? 

What wife had Rafael, or has Agnolo? 

In this world, who can do a thing, will 
not ; 

And who would do it, cannot, I perceive : 

Yet the will’s somewhat—somewhat, 
too, the power— 

And thus we half-men struggle. 
end, 

God, I conclude, compensates, punishes. 

*T is safer for me, if the award be strict, 

That I am something underrated here, 

Poor this long while, despised, to speak 
the truth. 

I dared not, do you know, leave home 
all day, 

For fear of chancing on the Paris lords. 

The best is when they pass and look 
aside ; 

But they speak sometimes ; I must bear 
it all. 

Well may they speak! 
that first time, 

And that long festal year at Fontaine- 
bleau ! 

I surely then could sometimes leave the 
ground, 

Put on the glory, Rafael’s daily wear, 

In that humane great monarch’s golden 
look,— 

One finger in his beard or twisted curl 

Over his mouth’s good mark that made 
the smile, 

One arm about my shoulder, round my 
neck, 

The jingle of his gold chain in my ear, 

I painting proudly with his breath on 


Had the mouth 


At the 


That Francis, 


me, 

All his court round him, seeing with his 
eyes, 

Such frank French eyes, and such a fire 
of souls 


BRITISH POETS 





Profuse, my hand kept plying by those 
hearts,— 

And, best of all, this, this, this face be- 
yond, 

This in the background, waiting on my 
work, 

To crown the issue with a last reward ! 

A good time, was it not, my kingly days? 

And had you not grown restless . . . but 
I know— 

°T is done and past; *t was right, my 
instinct said ; 

Too live the life grew, golden and not 


gray, 

And I’m the weak-eyed bat no sun 
should tempt 

Out of the grange whose four walls 
make his world. 

How could it end in any other way ? 

You called me, and I came home to your 
heart. 

The triumph was—to reach and stay 
there ; since 

Treached itere the triumph, what is lost ? 

Let my hands frame your face in your 
hair’s gold, 

You beautiful Lucrezia that are mine! 

‘* Rafael did this, Andrea painted that; 

The Roman’s is the better when you pray, 

But still the other’s Virgin was his 
wife ”— 

Men willexcuse me. I am glad to judge 

Both pictures in your presence ; clearer 
grows 

My better fortune, I resolve to think. 

For, do you know, Lucrezia, as God lives, 

Said one day Agnolo, his very self, 

To Rafael . . . [have known it all these 
years... 

(When the young man was flaming out 
his thoughts 

Upon a palace-wall for Rome to see, 

Too lifted up in heart because of it) 

‘‘ Friend, there ’s a certain sorry little 
scrub 

Goes up and down our Florence, none 
cares how, 

Who, were he set to plan and execute 

As you are, pricked on by your popes 
and kings, 

Would bring the sweat into that brow 
of yours!” 

To Rafael’s!—And indeed the arm is 
wrong. 

I hardly dare ... yet, only you to see, 

Give the chalk here—quick, thus the 
line should go! 

Ay, but the soul! he’s Rafael! rub it 
out ! 


ROBERT BROWNING 


653 





Still, all I care for, if he spoke the truth, 

(What he? why, who but Michel Agnolo? 

Do you forget already words like those ?) 

If really there was such a chance, so 
lost,— 

Is, whether you ’re—not grateful—but 
more pleased. 

Well, let me think so. 
indeed ! 

This hour has been an hour ! 
smile? 

If you would sit thus by me every night 

I should work better, do you compre- 
hend ? 

I mean that I should earn more, give 
you more. 

See, it is settled dusk now; there’s a 
star ; 

Morello’s gone, the watch-lights show 
the wall, 

The cue-owls speak the name we call 
them by. 

Come from the window, love,—come in, 
at last, 

Inside the melancholy little house © 

We built to be so gay with. God is just. 

King Francis may forgive me: oft at 
nights 

When I look up from painting, eyes tired 
out, 

The walls become illumined, brick from 
brick 

Distinct, instead of mortar, fierce bright 


And you smile 


Another 


old, 
That i of hisI did cement them with! 
Let us but love each other. Must you go? 
That Cousin here again? he waits out- 
side ? 
Must see you—you, and not with me? 
Those loans? 
More gaming debts to pay ? you smiled 
. for that ? 
Well, let smiles buy me! have you more 
to spend? 
While hand and eye and something of a 
heart 
Are left me, work’s my 
what ’s it worth ? 
I’ll pay my fancy. Only let me sit 
The gray remainder of the evening out, 
Idle, you call it, and muse perfectly 
How I could paint, were I but back in 


ware, and 


France, re 
One picture, just one more—the Virgin’s 
face. 
Not yours this time! I want you at my 
side 


To hear them—that is, Michel Agnolo— 
Judge all I do and tell you of its worth. 


Will you? 
friend. 

I take the subjects for his corridor, 

Finish the portrait out of hand—there, 
there, 

And throw him in another thing or two 

If he demurs; the whole should prove 


To-morrow, satisfy your 


enough 

To pay for this same Cousin’s freak. 
Beside, 

What’s better and what’s all I care 
about, 


Get you the thirteen scudi for the ruff! 

Love, does that please you? Ah, but 
what does he, 

The Cousin! what does he to please you 
more? 


I am grown peaceful as old age to- 

night. 

I regret little, I would change still less. 

Since there my past life lies, why alter 
it? 

The very wrong to Francis !—it is true 

I took his coin, was tempted and com- 
plied, 

And built this house and sinned, and all 
is said. 

My father and my mother died of want. 

Well, had I riches of my own? you see 

How one getsrich! Let each one bear 
his lot. 

They were born poor, lived poor, and 
poor they died ; 

And I have labored somewhat in my 
time 

And not been paid profusely. 
good son 

Paint my two hundred pictures—let him 


Some 


try ! 
No doubt, there’s something strikes a 
balance. Yes. 


You loved me quite enough, it seems 
to-night. 

This must suffice me here. 
one have? 

In heaven, perhaps, new chances, one 
more chance— 

Four great walls in the New Jerusalem, 

Meted on each side by the angel’s reed, 

For Leonard, Rafael, Agnolo and me 

To cover—the three first without a wife, 

While I have mine! So—still they 
overcome 

Because there’s still Lucrezia,—as_ I 


What would 


choose. 
Again the Cousin’s whistle! Go, my 
Love. 1855. 


654 





ONE WORD MORE.} 


TO E. B. B. 


London, September, 1855. 
I 


THERE they are, my fifty men and 
women 

Naming me the fifty poems finished ! 

Take them, Love, the book and me 
together : 

Where the heart lies, let the brain lie 
also. 

II 


Rafael made a century of sonnets, 

Made and wrote them in a certain 
volume 

Dinted with the silver-pointed pencil 

Else he only used to draw Madonnas : 

These, the world might view—but one, 
the volume. 

Who that one, you ask? 
instructs you. 

Did she live and love it all her lifetime ? 

Did she drop, his lady of the sonnets, 

Die, and let it drop beside her pillow 

Where it lay in place of Rafael’s glory, 

Rafael’s cheek so duteous and so loving, 

Cheek, the world was wont to. hail a 
painter’s, 

Rafael’s cheek, her love had turned a 
poet's? 


Your heart 


Ill 


You and I would rather read that 
volume, 

(Taken to his beating bosom by it) 

Lean and list the bosom-beats of Rafael, 

Would we not? than wonder at Madon- 
nas— 

Her, San Sisto names, and Her, Foligno, 

Her, that visits Florence in a vision, 

Her, that’s left with lilies in the Louvre— 

Seen by us and all the world in circle. 


IV 


You and I will never read that volume. 

Guido Reni, like his own eye’s apple 

Guarded long the treasure-book and 
loved it. 

Guido Reni dying, all Bologna 

Cried, and the world cried too, ‘* Ours, 
the treasure ! ” 

Suddenly, as rare things will, it vanished. 


1The last poem of the Collection Men and 
Women, two volumes, published in 1855, and 
containing a large part of Browning’s: greatest 
work. Here, for once, Browning speaks in his 
own person. 


BRITISH’ POETS 


Vv 


Dante once prepared to paint an angel: 

Whom to please? You whisper ‘‘ Bea- 
trice.” 

While he mused and traced it and re- 
traced it, 

(Peradventure with a pen corroded 

Still by drops of that hot ink he dipped 


or, 

When, his left-hand i’ the hair o’ the 
wicked, 

Back he held the brow and pricked its 
stigma, 

Bit into the live man’s flesh for parch- 
ment, 

Loosed him, laughed to see the writing 
rankle, 

Let the wretch go festering through 
Florence)— 

Dante, who loved well because he hated, 

Hated wickedness that hinders loving, 

Dante standing, studying his angel,— 

In there broke the folk of his Inferno. 

Says he—‘‘Certain people of import- 

“ance” 

(Such he gave his daily dreadful line to) 

‘* Entered and would seize, forsooth, the 
poet.” 

Says the poet — ‘‘Then I stopped my. 
painting.” 


VI 


You and I would rather see that angel, 

Painted by the tenderness of Dante, 

Would we not?—than read a fresh 
Inferno. 


VII 


You and I will never see that picture. 

While he mused on love and Beatrice, 

While he softened o’er his outlined angel, 

In they broke, those ‘* people of import- 
ance :” 

We and Bice bear the loss forever. 


VIIl 


What of Rafael’s sonnets, Dante’s pic- 
ture? 

This: no artist lives and loves, that longs 
not 

Once, and only once, and for one only, 

(Ah, the prize!) to find his love a lan- 
guage 

Fit and fair and simple and sufficient— 

Using nature that’s an art to others, 

Not, this one time, art that’s turned his 
nature, 

Ay, of all the artists living, loving, 


ROBERT BROWNING 


None but would forego his proper 
dowry ,— 

Does he paint? he fain would write a 
poem ,— 

‘Does he write? he fain would paint a 
picture, 

Put to proof art alien to the artist’s, 

Once, and only once, and for one only, 

So to be the man and leave the artist, 

Gain the man’s joy, miss the artist’s 
sorrow. 


Ix 


Wherefore? Heaven’s gift takes earth’s 
abatement ! 

He who smites the rock and spreads the 
water, 

Bidding drink and live a crowd beneath 
him, 

Even he, the minute makes immortal, 

Proves, perchance, but mortal in the 
minute. 

Desecrates, belike, the deed in doing. 

While he smites, how can he but re- 
member, 

So he smote before, in such a peril, 

When they stood and mocked—‘‘ Shall 

' smiting help us?” 

When they drank and sneered — ‘‘ A 
stroke is easy!” 

When they wiped their mouths and went 
their journey, 

Throwing him for thanks—‘ But drought 
was pleasant.” 

Thus old memories mar 
triumph ; 

Thus the doing savors of disrelish ; 

Thus achievement lacks a gracious some- 


the actual 


what; 

O’er-importuned brows’ becloud the 
mandate, 

Carelessness or consciousness—the ges- 
ture. 


For he bears an ancient wrong about him, 

Sees and knows again those phalanxed 
faces, 

Hears, yet one time more, the ?customed 
prelude— 

‘* How shouldst thou, of all men, smite, 
and save us?” 

Guesses what is like to prove the sequel— 

‘“Kgypt’s flesh-pots—nay, the drought 
was better.” 


x 


Oh, the crowd must have emphatic 
warrant ! 

Theirs. the Sinai-forehead’s cloven bril- 
liance, 


655 


Right-arm’s rod-sweep, tongue’s imperial 
fiat. 
Never dares the man put off the prophet. 


XI 


Did he love one face from out the 
thousands, 

(Were she Jethro’s daughter, white and 
wifely, 

Were she but the Aithiopian bondslave,) 

He would envy yon dumb patient camel, 

Keeping a reserve of scanty water 

Meant to save his own life in the desert ; 

Ready in the desert to deliver 

(Kneeling down to let his breast be 
opened) 

Hoard and life together for his mistress. 


XII 


I shall never, in the years remaining, 

Paint you pictures, no, nor carve you 
statues, 

Make you music that should all-express 
me ; 

So it seems: I stand on my attainment. 

This of verse alone, one life allows me ; 

Verse and nothing else have I to give you. 

Otber heights in other lives, God willing : 

All the gifts from all the heights, your 


own, Love! 
©. 


XIII 


Yet a semblance of resource avails us— 
Shade so finely touched, love’s sense must 


seize it, 

Take these lines, look lovingly and 
nearly, 

Lines I write the first time and the last 
time. 

He who works in fresco, steals a hair- 
brush, 

Curbs the liberal hand, subservient 


proudly, 
Cramps his spirit, crowds its all in little, 
Makes a strange art of an art familiar, 
Fills his lady’s missal-marge with 
flowerets. 
He who blows through bronze, may 
breathe through silver, 
Fitly serenade a slumbrous princess. 
He who writes, may write for once as I 
do. 
XIV 


Love, you saw me gather men and 
women, 

Live or dead or fashioned by my fancy, 

Enter each and all, and use their service, 


656 


Speak from every mouth,—the speech, a 
poem.. 

Hardly shall I tell my joys and sorrows, 

Hope and fears, belief and disbelieving : 

I am mine and yours—the rest be all 
men’s, 

Karshish, Cleon, Norbert, and the fifty. 

Let me speak this once in my true per- 
son, 

Not as Lippo, Roland. or Andrea, 

Though the fruit of speech be just this 
sentence : 

Pray you, look on these my men and 
women, 

Take and keep my fifty poems finished ; 

Where my heart lies, let my brain lie 
also ! 

Poor the speech ; be how I speak, for all 
things. 


avi 


Not but that you know me! 
moon’s self ! 

Here in London, yonder late in Florence, 

Still we find her face, the thrice-trans- 
figured, 

Curving on a sky imbrued with color, 

Drifted over Fiesole by twilight, 

Came she, our new crescent of a hair’s- 
breadth. 

Full she flared it, lampiffg Samminiato, 

Rounder ‘twixt the cypresses and 
rounder, 

Perfect till the nightingales applauded. 

Now, apiece of her old self, impoverished, 

Hard to greet, she traverses the house- 
roofs, 

Hurries with unhandsome thrift of silver, 

Goes dispiritedly, glad to finish. 


Lo, the 


XVI 


What, there’s nothing in the moon note- 
worthy ? 

Nay : forif that moon could love a mortal, 

Use, to charm him (so to fit a fancy), 

All her magic (‘tis the old sweet mythos), 

She would turn a new side to her mortal, 

Side unseen of herdsman, huntsman, 
steersman— 

Blank to Zoroaster on his terrace, 

Blind to Galileo on his turret, 

Dumb to Homer, dumb to Keats—him, 
even ! 

Think, the wonder of the moonstruck 
mortal— 

When she turns round, comes again in 
heaven, 

Opens out anew for worse or better ! 


BRITISH POETS 


pees she like some portent of an ice- 

er 

Swimming full upon the ship it founders, 

Hungry with huge teeth of splintered 
crystals ? 

Proves she as the paved work of a sap- 
phire 

Seen by Moses: when he climbed the 
mountain ? 

Moses, Aaron, Nadab and Abihu 

Climbed and saw the very God, the 
Highest, 

Stand upon the paved work of a sapphire. 

Like the bodied heaven in his clearness 

Shone the stone, the sapphire of that 
paved work, ; 

When they ate and drank and saw God 
also ! 


XVII 


What were seen? None knows, none 
ever shall know. 

Only this is sure—the sight were other, 

Not the moon’s same side, born late in 
Florence, 

Dying now impoverished here in London. 

God be thanked, the meanest of his 
creatures 

Boasts two soul-sides, one to face the 
world with, 

One toshow a woman when he loves her ! 


XVIII 


This I say of me, but think of you, Love! 

This to you—yourself my moon of poets ! 

Ah, but that ’s the world’s side, there ’s 
the wonder, 

Thus they see you, praise you, think 
they know you! 

There, in turn I stand with them and 
praise you— 

Out of my own self, I dare to phrase it. 

But the best is when I glide from out 
them, : 

Cross a step or two of dubious twilight, 

Come out on the other side. the novel 

Silent silver lights and darks undreamed 


of, 
Where I hush and bless myself with 
silence. 
XIX 


Oh, their Rafael of the dear Madonnas, 
Oh, their Dante of the dread Inferno, 
Wrote one song—and in my brain I sing 


it, 
Drew one angel—borne, see, on my 
bosom ! 


R. B. 1855. 


ROBERT 


BEN KARSHOOK’S WISDOM 


I 


‘‘ WOULD a man ’scape the rod ? ” 
Rabbi Ben Karshook saith, 
“See that he turn to God 
The day before his death.” 


‘* Ay, could a man inquire 
When it shall come!” I say. 
The Rabbi’s eye shoots fire— 
“Then let him turn to-day !” 


II 


Quoth a young Sadducee : 
‘* Reader of many rolls, 
Is it so certain we 
Have, as they tell us, souls?” 


‘< Son, there is no reply!” 
The Rabbi bit his beard: 
** Certain, a soul have J— 
We may have none,” he sneered. 


Thus Karshook, the Hiram’s-Hammer, 
The Right-hand Temple-column, 
Taught babes in grace their grammar, 
And struck the simple, solemn. 
1856. 


AMONG THE ROCKS 


Oh, good gigantic smile 0’ the brown old 
earth, 
This autumn morning! 
his bones 
To bask i’ the sun, and thrusts out knees 
and feet 
For the ripple to run over in its 
mirth ; 
Listening the while, where on the heap 
of stones 
The white breast of the sea-lark twitters 
sweet. 


How he sets 


That is the doctrine, simple, ancient, 
true ; 
Such is life’s trial, as old earth smiles 
and knows. 
If you loved only what were worth your 


love, 
Love were clear gain, and wholly well 
for you: 
Make the low nature better by your 
throes ! 
Give earth yourself, go up for gain 
above ! 1864. 


42 


BROWNING 


657 


ABT VOGLER 


(AFTER HE HAS BEEN EXTEMPORIZING 
UPON THE MUSICAL INSTRUMENT OF HIS 
INVENTION) 


WouLp that the structure brave, the 
manifold music I build, 
Bidding my organ obey, calling its 
keys to their work, 
Claiming each slave of the sound, at a 
touch, as when Solomon willed 
Armies of angels that soar, legions of 
demons that lurk, 
Man, brute, reptile, fly,—alien of end 
and of aim, 
Adverse, each from the other heaven- 
high, hell-deep removed,— 
Should rush into sight at once as he 
named the ineffable Name, 
And pile him a palace straight, to pleas- 
ure the princess he loved ! 


Would it might tarry like his, the beau- 
tiful building of mine, 

This which my keys in a crowd 
pressed and importuned to raise ! 
Ah, one and all, how they helped, would 
dispart now and now combine, 

Zealous to hasten the work, heighten 
their master his praise ! 
And one would bury his brow with a 
blind plunge down to hell, 
Burrow awhile and build, broad on 
the roots of things, 
Then up again swim into sight, having 
based me my palace well, 
Founded it, fearless of flame, flat on 
the nether springs. 


And another would mount and march, 
like the excellent minion he was, 
Ay, another and yet another, one 
crowd but with many a crest, 
Raising my rampired walls of gold as 
transparent as glass, 
Eager to do and die, yield each his 
place to the rest : 
For higher still and higher (as a runner 
tips with fire, 
When a great illumination surprises a 
festal night—— 
Outlined round and round Rome’s dome 
from space to spire) 
Up, the pinnacled glory reached, and 
the pride of my soul was in sight. 


In sight? Not half! for it seemed, it 
was certain, to match man’s birth, 


658 


Nature in turn conceived, obeying an 
impulse as I; 
And the emulous heaven yearned down, 
made effort to reach the earth, 
As the earth had done her best, in my 
passion, to scale the sky : 
Novel splendors burst forth, grew fami- 
liar and dwelt with mine, 
Not a point nor peak but found and 
fixed its wandering star ; 
Meteor-moons, balls of blaze: and they 
did not pale nor pine, 
For earth had attained to heaven, 
there was no more hear nor far. 


Nay more; for there wanted not who 
walked in the glare and glow, 
Presences plain in the place; or, fresh 
from the Protoplast, 
Furnished for ages to come, when a 
kindlier wind should blow, 
Lured now to begin and live, in a 
house to their liking at last ; 
Or else the wonderful Dead who have 
passed through the body and gone, 
But were back once more to breathe 
in an old world worth their new : 
What never had been, was now ; what 
was, as it shall be anon ; 
And what is,—shall I say, matched both ? 
for I was made perfect too. 


All through. my keys that gave their 
sounds to a wish of my soul, 
All through my soul that praised as its 
wish flowed visibly forth, 
All through music and me! For think, 
had I painted the whole, 
Why, there it had stood, to see, nor 
the process so wonder-worth : 
Had I written the same, made verse— 
still, effect proceeds from cause, 
Ye know why the forms are fair, ye 
hear how the tale is told ; 
It is all triumphant art, but art in obed- 
ience to laws, 
Painter and poet are proud in the 
artist-list enrolled :— 


But hereis the finger of God, a flash of 
the will that can, 
‘Existent behind all laws, that made 
them and, lo, they are! 
And I know not if, save in this, such 
gift be allowed to man, 
That out of three sounds he frame, not 
a fourth sound, but a star. 
Consider it well: each tone of our scale 
in itselfis naught : 


BRITISH POETS 








It is everywhere in the world—loud, 
soft, and all is said: 
Give it to me to use! I mix it with two 
in my thought : 
And there! Ye have heard and seen: 
consider and bow the head ! 


Well, it is gone at last, the palace of 
music I reared ; 
Gone! and the good tears start, the 
praises that come too slow ; 
For one is assured at first. one scarce can 
say that he feared, 
That he even gave it a thought, the 
gone thing was to go. 
Never to be again! But many more of 
the kind : 
As good, nay, better, perchance: is 
this your comfort to me? 
To me, who must be saved because I 
cling with my mind 
To the same, same self, same love, same 
God: ay, what was, shall be. 


Therefore to whom turn I but to thee, 
the ineffable Name? 
Builder and maker, thou, of houses 
not made with hands! 
What, have fear of change from thee 
who art ever the same ? 

Doubt that thy power can fill the 
heart that thy power expands? 
There shall never be one lost good ! What 

was, shall live as before ; 
The evil is null, is naught, is silence 
implying sound ; 
What was good shall be good, with, for 
evil, so much good more ; 
On the earth the broken arcs; in the 
heaven a perfect round. 


All we have willed or hoped or dreamed 
of good shall exist ; 
Not its semblance, but itself; no 
beauty, nor good, nor power 
Whose voice has gone forth, but each 
survives for the melodist 
When eternity affirms the conception 
of an hour, 
The high that proved too high, the heroic 
for earth too hard, 
The passion that left the ground to 
lose itself in the sky. 
Are music sent up to God by the lover 
and the bard ; 
Enough .that he heard it once: we 
shall hear it by and by. 


And what is our failure here but a tri- 
umph’s evidence 


ROBERT BROWNING 659 





For the fulness of the days? Have 
we withered or agonized ? 
Why else was the pause prolonged but 
that singing might issue thence ? 
Why rushed the discords in, but that 
harmony should be prized ? 
Sorrow is hard to bear,and doubt is 
slow to clear, 
Each sufferer says his say, his scheme 
of the weal and woe: 
But God has a few of us whom he whis- 
pers in the ear ; 
The rest may reason and welcome ; ’t is 
we musicians know. 


Well, it is earth with me; silence re- 
sumes her reign: 

I will be patient and proud, and soberly 
acquiesce. 
Give me the keys. I feel for the com- 

mon chord again, 
Sliding by semitones till I sink to the 
minor,—yes, 
And I blunt it into a ninth, and I stand 
on alien ground, 
Surveying awhile the heights I rolled 
from into the deep ; 
Which, hark, I have dared and done, 
for my resting-place is found, 
The C Major of this life : so, now I will 
try to sleep. 1864. 


RABBI BEN EZRA 


GRow old along with me ! 

The best is yet to be, 

The last of life, for which the first was 
made : 

Our times are in his hand 

Who saith, ‘‘ A whole I planned, 

Youth shows but half ; trust God: see 
all, nor be afraid ! ” 


Not that, amassing flowers, 

Youth sighed, ‘*Which rose make ours, 

Which lily leave and then as best re- 
call ? ” 

Not that, admiring stars, 

It yearned, ‘‘ Nor Jove, nor Mars ; 

Mine be some figured flame which 
blends, transcends them all! ” 


Not for such hopes and fears 

Annulling youth’s brief years, 

Do I remonstrate : folly wide the mark ! 

Rather I prize the doubt 

Low kinds exist without, 

Finished and finite clods, untroubled by 
a spark, 


Poor vaunt of life indeed, 

Were man but formed to feed 

On joy, to solely seek and find a feast : 

Such feasting ended, then 

As sure an end to men ; 

Irks care the crop-full bird? Frets 
doubt the maw-crammed beast ? 


Rejoice we are allied 

To that which doth provide 

And not partake, effect and not receive! 

A spark disturbs our clod ; 

Nearer we hold of God 

Who gives, than of his tribes that take, 
I must believe. 


Then, welcome each rebuff 

That turns earth’s smoothness rough, 

Each sting that bids nor sit nor stand 
but go! 

Be our joys three-parts pain ! 

Strive, and hold cheap the strain ; 

Learn, nor account the pang; dare, 
never grudge the throe ! 


For thence,—a paradox 

Which comforts while it mocks,— 

Shall life succeed in that it seems to fail; 

What I aspired to be, 

And was not, comforts me: 

A brute I might have been, but would 
not sink i the scale. 


What is he but a brute 

Whose flesh has soul to suit, 

Whose spirit works lest arms and legs 
want play ? 

To man, propose this test— 

Thy body at its best, 

How far can that project thy soul on its 
lone way? 


Yet gifts should prove their use : 

T own the Past profuse 

Of power each side, perfection every 
turn : 

Eyes, ears took in their dole, 

Brain treasured up the whole ; 

Should not the heart beat once ‘* How 
good to live and learn”? 


Not once beat ‘‘ Praise be thine! 

I see the whole design, 

I, who saw power, see now Love perfect 
TOO: 

Perfect I call thy plan: 

Thanks that I was a man ! 

Maker, remake, complete,—I trust what 
thou shalt do!” 


] 


660 


For pleasant is this flesh ; 

Our soul, in its rose-mesh 

Pulled ever to the earth, still yearns for 
rest : 

Would we some prize might hold 

To match those manifold 

Possessions of the brute, 
we did best! 





gain most, as 


Let us not always say, 

‘‘Spite of this flesh to-day 

I strove, made head, gained ground upon 
the whole!” 

As the bird wings and sings, 

Let us cry, ‘‘ All good things 

Are ours, nor soul helps flesh more, now, 
than flesh helps soul!” 


Therefore I summon age 

To grant youth’s heritage, 

Life’s struggle having so far reached its 
term : 

Thence shall I pass, approved 

A man, for aye removed 

From the developed brute ; a God though 
in the germ. 


And I shall thereupon 

Take rest, ere I be gone 

Once more on my adventure brave and 
new : 

Fearless and unperplexed, 

When I wage battle next, 

What weapons to select, what armor to 
indue. 


Youth ended, I shall try 

My gain or loss thereby ; 

Leave the fire ashes, what survives is 
gold : 

And I shall weigh the same, 

Give life its praise or blame: 

Young, all lay in dispute ; I shall know, 
being old. 


For note, when evening shuts, 

A certain moment cuts 

The deed off, calls the glory from the 
gray : 

A whisper from the west 

Shoots—‘‘ Add this to the rest, 

Take it and try its worth: here dies an- 
other day.” 


So, still within this life, 

Though lifted o’er its strife, 

Let me discern, compare, pronounce at 
last, 

‘*This rage was right i’ the main, 


BRITISH POETS 


That acquiescence vain : 
The Future I may face now I have proved 
the Past.” 


For more is not reserved 

To man, with soul just nerved 

To act to-morrow what he learns to-day : 

Here, work enough to watch 

The Master work, and catch 

Hints of the proper craft, tricks of the 
tool's true play. 


As it was better, youth 

Should strive, through acts uncouth, 

Toward making, than repose on aught 
found made: 

So, better, age, exempt 

From strife, should know, than tempt 

Further. Thou waitedst age: wait death 
nor be afraid ! 


Enough now, if the Right 

And Good and Infinite 

Be named here, as thou callest thy hand 
thine own, 

With knowledge absolute, 

Subject to no dispute 

From fools that crowded youth, nor let 
thee feel alone. N 


Be there, for once and all, 

Severed great minds from small, 

Announced to each his station in the 
Past ! 

Was I, the world arraigned, 

Were they, my soul disdained, 

Right? Let age speak the truth and 
give us peace at last ! 


Now, who shall arbitrate ? 

Ten men love what I hate, 

Shun what I follow, shght what I re- 
ceive ; 

Ten, who in ears and eyes 

Match me; we all surmise, 

They this thing, andI that: whom shall 
my soul believe ? 

Not on the vulgar mass 

Called ‘‘ work,” must sentence pass, 

Things done, that took the eye and had 
the price ; 

O’er which, from level stand, 

The low world laid its hand, 

Found straightway to its mind, could 
value in a trice: 


But all, the world’s coarse thumb 
And finger failed to plumb, 


ROBERT BROWNING 





So passed in making up the main ac- 
count ; 

All instincts immature, 

All purposes unsure, 

That weighed not as his work, yet 
swelled the man’s amount : 


Thoughts hardly to be packed 

Into a narrow act, 

Fancies that broke through language 
- and escaped ; 

All I could never be, 

All, men ignored in me, 

This, I was worth to God, whose wheel 

the pitcher shaped. 


Ay, note that Potter’s wheel, 

That metaphor ! and feel 

Why time spins fast, why passive lies 
our clay,— 

Thou, to whom fools propound, 

When the wine makes its round, 

“Since life fleets, all is change; the 
Past gone, seize to-day!” 


Fool! All that is, at all, 

Lasts ever, past recall ; 

Earth changes, but thy soul and God 
stand sure: 

What entered into thee, 

That was, is, and shall be: 

Time’s wheel runs back or stops : 
and clay endure. 


Potter 


He fixed thee ’mid this dance 

Of plastic circumstance, 

This Present, thou, forsooth, would fain 
arrest : 

Machinery just meant 

To give thy soul its bent, 

Try thee and turn thee for th, sufficiently 
impressed. 


What though the earlier grooves, 

Which ran the laughing loves 

Around thy base, no longer pause and 
press ? 

What though, about thy rim, 

Skull-things in order grim 

Grow out, in graver mood, obey the 
sterner stress ? 


Look not thou down but up! 

To uses of a cup, 

The festal board, lamp’s flash and trum- 
pet’s peal, 

The new wine’s foaming flow, 

The master’s lips aglow! 

Thou, heaven’s consummate cup, what 
needst thou with earth’s wheel ? 


661 


But I need, now as then, 

Thee, God, who mouldest men ; 

And since, not even while the whirl was 
worst, 

Did I—to the wheel of life 

With shapes and colors rife, 

Bound dizzily—mistake my end, to 
slake thy thirst : 


So, take and use thy work : 

Amend what flaws may lurk, 

What strain o’ the stuff, what warpings 
past the aim ! 

My times be in thy hand! 

Perfect the cup as planned! 

Let age approve of youth, and death 
complete the same ! 1864. 


CALIBAN UPON SETEBOS ; 
OR, NATURAL THEOLOGY IN THE ISLAND 


*Thou thoughtest that I was altogether such 
an one as thyself.” 


("WILL sprawl, now that the heat of day 
is best, 

Flat on his belly in the pit’s much mire, 

With elbows wide, fists clenched to prop 

his chin. 

while he kicks both feet in the cool 

slush, 

And feels about his spine small eft-things 
course, 

Run in and out each arm, and make 
him laugh : [plant, 

And while above his heada pompion- 

Coating the cave-top as a brow its eye, 

Creeps down to touch and tickle hair and 
beard, 

And now a flower drops with a bee inside, 

And now a fruit to snap at, catch .and 
crunch,— 

He looks out o’er yon sea which sun- 
beams Cross 

And recross till they weave a spider-web, 

(Meshes of fire, some great fish breaks 
at times, ) [please, 

And talks to his own self, howe’er he 

Touching that other, whom his dam 
called God. 

Because to talk about Him, vexes—--ha, 

Could He but know ! and time to vex is 
now, 

When talk is safer than in winter-time. 

Moreover Prosper and Miranda sleep 

In confidence he drudges at their task, 

And it is good to cheat the pair, and gibe, 

Letting the rank tongue blossom into 
speech. | 


And, 


662 





BRITISH; POETS 





Setebos, Setebos, and Setebos ! 
*Thinketh, 
moon. 


*Thinketh He made it, with the sun to 
match, 

But not the stars : the stars came other- 
wise ; 

Only made clouds, winds, meteors, such 
as that: . 

Also this isle, what lives and grows 
thereon, 

And snaky sea which rounds and ends 
the same. 


*Thinketh, it came of being ill at ease: 

He hated that He cannot change His 
cold, 

Nor cure its ache. 
fish 

That longed to’ scape the rock-stream 
where she lived, 

And thaw herself within the lukewarm 
brine 

O’ the lazy sea her stream thrusts far 
amid, 

A crystal spike ’twixt two warm walls 
of wave; 

Only, she ever sickened, found repulse 

At the other kind of water, not her life, 

(Green-dense and dim-delicious, bred 0’ 
the sun,) 

Flounced back from bliss she was not 
born to breathe, 

Andin her old bounds buried her despair, 

Hating and loving warmth alike : so He. 


’Hath spied an icy 


*Thinketh, He made thereat the sun, 
this isle, 

Trees and the fowls here, beast and creep- 
ing thing. 

Yon otter, sleek-wet, 
leech ; 

Yon auk, one fire-eye in a ball of foam, 

That floats and feeds; a certain badger 
brown 

He hath watched hunt with that slant 
whitewedge eye 

By moonlight ; and the pie with the long 
tongue 

That pricks deep into oakwarts for a 
worm, 

And says a plain word when ane finds 
her prize, [selves 

But will not eat the ants ; the ants them- 

That build a wall of seeds and settled 
stalks 

About their hole—He made all these 
and more, 


black, lithe asa 


He dwelleth i’ the cold o’ the 





Made all we see, and us, in spite : how 
else ? 

He could not, Himself, make a second 
self 

To be His mate; as well have made 
Himself : 

He would not make what He mislikes 
or slights, 

An eyesore to Him, or 
pains: 

But did, in envy, listlessness or sport, 

Make what Himself would fain, in a 
manner, be— 

Weaker in most points, stronger ina few, 

Worthy, and yet mere playthings all 
the while, 

Things He admires and mocks too,—that 
is it. 

Because, so brave, so better though they 


not worth His 


be, 
It nothing skills if He begin to plague. 
Look now, I melt a gourd-fruit into mash, 
Add honeycomb and pods, I have per- 


ceived, 

Which bite like finches when they bill 
and kiss,— 

Then, when froth rises bladdery, drink 
up all, 

Quick, quick, till maggots scamper 


through my brain ; 

Last, throw me on my back i’ the seeded 
thyme, 

And wanton, wishing I were born a bird. 

Put case, unable to be what I wish, 

I yet could make a live bird out of clay : 

Would not I take clay, pinch my Caliban 

Able to fly ?—for, there, see, he hath 
wings, 

And great comb like the hoopoe’s to 
admire, 

And there, a sting to do his foes offence, 

There, and I will that he begin to live, 

Fly to yon rock-top, nip me off the horns 

Of grigs high up that make the merry din 

Saucy “through their veined wings, and 
mind me not. 

In which feat, if his leg snapped, brittle 
clay, 

And he lay stupid-ike.—why I should 
laugh ; 

And if he, spyin g me should fall to weep 

Beseech me to be good, repair his wrong, 

Bid his poor leg smart less or grow 
again,— 

Well, as the chance were this might 
take or else 

Not take my fancy : I might hear his cry 

And give the manikin three sound legs 
for one, 


ROBERT BROWNING 


Or pluck the other off, leave him like an 


ess, 

And lessoned he was mine and merely 
clay. 

Were this no pleasure lying in the 
thyme, 

Drinking the mash, with brain become 
alive 

Making and marring clay at will? So 
He. 


’‘Thinketh such shows nor right nor 
- wrong in Him, 
Nor kind nor cruel: Heis strong and 


Lord. 

*’Am strong myself compared to yonder 
crabs 

That march now from the mountain to 
the sea ; 

> Let twenty pass and stone the twenty- 
first, 


Loving not, hating not, just choosing so. 

’Say, the first straggler that boasts purple 
spots 

Shall join the file, one pincer twisted off ; 

*Say this bruised fellow shall receive a 
worm, 

And two worms he whose nippers end 
in red; 

As it likes me each time I do: so He. 


Well then, ’supposeth He is good i’ the 
main, 

Placable if His mind and ways were 
guessed, 

But rougher than His handiwork, be 
sure ! 

Oh, He hath made things worthier than 
Himself, 

And envieth that, so helped, such things 
do more ; 

Than He who made them! What con- 
soles but this? 

That they, unless through Him, do 
naught at all, 

And must submit: what other use in 
things? 

*Hath cut a pipe of pithless elder-joint 

That, blown through, gives exact the 
scream 0’ the jay 

When from her wing you twitch the 
feathers blue: 

Sound this, and little birds that hate the 
jay 

Flock within stone’s throw, glad their 
foe is hurt : 

Put case such pipe could prattle and 
boast forsooth, [thing, 


““T catch the birds, I am the crafty | 


663 


I make the cry my maker cannot make 

With his great round mouth; he must 
blow through mine!” 

Would not I smash it with my foot? So 
He. 


But wherefore rough, why cold and ill 
at ease? 
Aha, that is a question! Ask, for that, 
What knows,—the something over Sete- 
bos 
That made Him, or He, may be, found 
and fought, 
Worsted, drove off and did to nothing, 
perchance. 
There may be something quiet o’er His 
head, 
Out of His reach, that feels nor joy nor 
grief, 
Since both 
some way. 
I joy because the quails come; would 
not joy 
Could I bring quails here when I have a 
mind : 
This Quiet, all it hath a mind to, doth. 
’Esteemeth stars the outposts of its 
couch, 
But never spends much thought nor care 
that way. 
It may look up, work up, the worse for 
those | 
It works on! ’Careth but for Setebos 
The many-handed as a cuttle-fish, 
Who, making Himself feared through 
what He does, 
Looks up, first, and perceives he cannot 
soar 
To what is quiet and hath happy life ; 
Next looks down here, and out of very 
spite 
Makes this a bauble-world to ape yon 
real, 
These good things to match those as hips 
do grapes. 
‘Tis solace making baubles, ay, and 
sport. 
Himself peeped late, eyed Prosper at his 
books 
Careless and lofty, lord now of the isle: 
Vexed, ’stitched a book of broad leaves, 
arrow-shaped, 
Wrote thereon, he knows what, prodi- 
gious words ; 
Has peeled a wand and called it by a 
name ; 
Weareth at whiles for an enchanter’s 
robe 
The eyed skin of a supple oncelot ; 


derive from weakness in 


664 


And hath an ounce sleeker than young- 
ling mole, 

A four-legged serpent he makes cower 
and couch, 

Now snarl, now hold its breath and 
mind his eye, 

And saith she is Miranda and my wife: 

*Keeps for his Ariel a tall pouch-bill 
crane 

He bids go wade for fish and straight 
disgorge ; 

Also a sea-beast, lumpish, which hé 
snared, 

Blinded the eyes of and brought some- 
what tame, 

And split its toe-webs, and now peus the 
drudge 

In a hole o’ the rock, and calls him Cali- 
ban ; 

A bitter heart that bides its time and 
bites. 

‘Plays thus at being Prosper in a way. 

Taketh his mirth with make-believes: so 
He. 


His dam held that the Quiet made all 
things 
Which Setebos vexed only: “holds not 


So. 

Who made them weak, meant weakness 
He might vex. 

Had He meant other, while His hand 
was in, 

Why not make horny eyes no thorn 
could prick, 

Or plate my scalp with bone against 
the snow, 

Or overscale my flesh “neath joint and 
joint 

Like an ore’s armor ? 
sport ! 

He is the One now: only He doth all. 


Ay,—so spoil His 


‘Saith, He may like, perchance, what 
profits him. 

Ay, himself loves what does him good ; 
but why? 

’Gets good no otherwise. This blinded 
beast 

Loves whoso places flesh-meat on his 
nose, 

But, had he eyes, would want no help, 
but hate 

Or love, just as it liked him: he hath 
eyes. 

Also it pleases Setebos to work, 

Use all His hands, and exercise much 
craft, [ worked. 

By no means for the love of what is 


BRITISH POETS 





‘Tasteth himself, no finer good 7 the 
world 

When all goes right, in this safe sammer- 
time, 

And he wants little, hungers, aches not 
much, 

Than trying what to do with wit and 
strength. 

‘Falls to make something: ’piled yon 
pile of turfs, 

And squared and stuck there squares of 
soft white chalk, 

And, with a fish-tooth, scratched a moon 
on each, 

And set up endwise certain spikes of 


tree, 

And crowned the whole with a sloth’s 
skull a-top, 

Found dead i’ the woods, too hard for 
one to kill. 

No use at all 1’ the work, for work’s sole 
sake ; 

‘Shall some day knock it down again: so 
He. 


‘Saith He is terrible: watch His feats in 
proof ! 

One hurricane will spoil six good 
months’ hope. 

He hath a spite against me, that Iknow, 

Just as He favors Prosper, who knows 
why? 

So it is, all the same, as well I find. 

*Wove wattles half the winter, fenced - 
them firm 

With stone and 
tortoises 

Crawling to lay their eggs here: well, 
one wave, 

Feeling the foot of Him upon its neck, 

Gaped as a snake does, lolled. out its 
large tongue, 

And licked the whole labor flat: so 
much for spite. 


stake to stop she- 


‘Saw a ball flame down late (yonder it 
lies) 

Where half an hour before, I slept i’ the 
shade : 

Often they scatter sparkles: there is 
force ! 

‘Dug up a newt He may have envied 
once 

And turned to stone, shut up inside a 
stone. 

Please Him and hinder this?—What 
Prosper does ? 

Aha, if He would tellmehow! Not He! 

There is the sport: discover how or die! 


ROBERT BROWNING 





All need not die, for of the things o’ the 


isle 

Some flee afar, some dive, some run up 
trees ; 

Those at His mercy,—why they please 
Him most 

When ... when... well, never try 


the same way twice! 

Repeat what act has pleased, He may 
grow wroth. 

You must not know His ways, and play 
Him off, 

Sure of the issue. 
self : 

‘Spareth a squirrel that it nothing fears 

But steals the nut from underneath my 
thumb, 

And when I threat, bites stoutly in de- 
fence: 

‘Spareth an urchin that contrariwise, 

Curls up into a ball, pretending death 

For fright at my approach : the two ways 

i please. 

But what would move my choler more 
than this, 

That either creature-counted on its life 

To-morrow and next day and all days to 
come, 

Saying, forsooth, in the inmost of its 
heart, 

‘* Because he did so yesterday with me, 

And otherwise with such another brute, 

So must he do henceforth and always.”— 


Doth the like him- 


Would teach the reasoning couple what 
‘*must” means! 

‘Doth as he likes, or wherefore Lord ? 
So He. 


’Conceiveth all things will continue thus, 

And we shall have to live in fear of Him 

So long as He lives, keeps his strength : 
no change, 

If He have done His best, make no new 
world 

To please Him more, so leave off watch- 
ing this,— 

If He surprise not even the Quiet’s self 

Some strange day,—or, suppose, grow 


into it 
As grubs grow butterflies: else, here we 
are, [all. 


And there.is He, and nowhere help at 


‘Believeth with the life, the pain shall 
stop. 

His dam held different, that after death 

He both plagued enemies and feasted 
friends : 


665 


Idly! He doth His worst in this our 
life. 

Giving just respite lest we die through 
pain, € 

Saving last pain for worst,—with which, 
an end. 

Meanwhile, the best way to escape His 
ire 

Is, not to seem too happy. ’Sees, him- 
self, 

Yonder two flies, with purple films and 
pink, 

Bask on the pompion-bell above: kills 
both. 

Sees two black painful beetles roll their 
ball 


On head and tail as if to save their lives : 
Moves them the stick away they strive 
to clear. 


Even so,’ would have him misconceive, 
suppose 

This Caliban strives hard and ails no less, 

And always, above all else, envies Him ; 

Wherefore he mainly dances on dark 


nights, 
Moans in the sun, gets under holes to 
laugh, 


And never ‘speaks his mind save housed 
as now : 

Outside, ‘groans, curses. 
me here, 

O’erheard this speech, and asked ‘‘ What 
chucklest at?” 

"Would, to appease Him, cut a finger off, 

Or of my three kid yearlings burn the 
best, 

Or let the toothsome apples rot on tree, 

Or push my tame beast for the orc to 
taste : 

While myself lit a fire, and made a song 

And sung it, *‘ What I hate, be consecrate, 

To celebrate Thee and Thy state, no mate 

For Thee; what see for envy in poor 
me ?” 

Hoping the while, since evils sometimes 
mend, 

Warts rub away and sores are cured with 
slime, 

That some strange day, will either the 
Quiet catch 

And conquer Setebos, or likelier He 

Decrepit may doze, doze, as good as die. 


If He caught 


[What, what? <A curtain o’er the world 
at once! 

Crickets stop hissing; not a bird—or, 
yes, 


666 


There scuds His raven that has told Him 
all! 

It was fool’s play, this a ! 
The wind 

Shoulders the pillared dust death’s house 
o’ the move, 

And fast invading fires begin! 
blaze— 

A tree’s head snaps—and there, there, 
there, there, there, 

His thunder follows! Fool to gibe at 
Him! 

Lo! ’Lieth flat and loveth Setebos ! 

*Maketh his teeth meet through his upper 
lip, [month 

Will let those quails fly, will not eat this 

One little-mess of whelks, so he may 
scape !] 1864, 


Ha! 


White 


CONFESSIONS 


WHAT is he buzzing in my ears? 
‘* Now that I come to die, 

Do I view the world as a vale of tears?” 
Ah, reverend sir, not I! 


What I viewed there once, what I view 
again 
Where the physic bottles stand 
On the table’s edge,—is a suburb lane, 
With a wall to my bedside hand. 


That lane sloped, much as the bottles do, 
From a house you could descry 

O’er the garden-wall ; is the curtain blue 
Or green to a healthy eye? 


To mine, it serves for the old June 


weather 
Blue above lane and wall; 
And that farthest bottle labelled 


‘* Kther ” 
Is the house o’ertopping all. 
At a_ terrace, near the 
stopper, 
There watched for me, one June, 
A girl: I know. sir, it ’s improper, 
My poor mind ’s out of tune. 


somewhere 


Only, there was away... 
Close by the side, to dodge 

Eyes in the house, two eyes except : 
They styled their house ‘‘ The Lodge.” 


you crept 


What right had a lounger up their lane ? 
But, by creeping very close, 
With the good wall’s help,—their eyes 
might strain 
And stretch themselves to Oes, 


BRITISH POETS 


Yet never catch her and me together, 
As she left the attic, there, 
By the rim of the _ bottle 

‘¢ Ether,” 
And stole from stair to stair, 


labelled 


And stood by the rose-wreathed gate. 
Alas, 
We loved, sir—used to meet : 
How sad and bad and mad it was— 
But, then, how it was sweet! 1864. 


YOUTH AND ART 


IT once might have been, once only : 
We lodged in a street together, 

You, a sparrow on the house top lonely, 
I, a lone she-bird of his feather. 


Your trade was with sticks and clay, 
You thumbed, thrust, patted and 
polished, 
Then laughed ‘‘ They will see some day 
Smith made, and Gibson demolished.” 


My business was song, song, song ; 
I chirped, cheeped, trilled and twit- 
tered, 
‘* Kate Brown’s on the boards ere long, 
And Grisi’s existence embittered ! ” 


T earned no more by a warble 
Than you-by a sketch in plaster : 
You wanted a piece of marble, 
I needed a music-master. 


We studied hard in our styles, 
Chipped each at a crust like Hindoos, 
For air, looked out on the tiles, 
For fun, watched each other’s win- 
dows. 


You lounged, like a boy of the South, 
Cap and blouse—nay, a bit of beard 
too: 
Or you got it, rubbing your mouth 
With fingers the clay adhered to. 


And I—soon managed to find 
Weak points in the flower-fence facing, © 
Was forced to put up a blind 
And be safe in my corset-lacing. 


No harm! It was not my fault 

If you never turned your eye’s tail up 
As I shook upon E in alt., 

Or ran the chromatic scale up : 


For spring bade the sparrows pair, 
And the boys and girls gave guesses, 


ROBERT BROWNING 


667 





And stalls in our street looked rare 
With bulrush and watercresses. 


Why did not you pinch a flower 
In a pellet of clay and fling it? 
Why did not I put a power 
Of thanks in a look, or sing it? 


I did look, sharp as a lynx, 
(And yet the memory rankles,) 
When models arrived, some minx 
Tripped up-stairs, she and her ankles. 


But I think I gave you as good! 

‘** That foreign fellow,—who can know 
How she pays, in a playful mood, 

For his tuning her that piano?” 


Could you say so, and never say, 
‘* Suppose we join hands and fortunes, 
And I fetch her from over the way, 
Her, piano, and long tunes and short 
tunes?” 


No, no: you would not be rash, 
Nor I rasher and something over: 

You’ve to settle yet Gibson’s hash, 
And Grisi yet lives in clover. 


But you meet the Prince at the Board, 
“I’m queen myself at bals-paré, 
I ’ve married a rich old lord, 
And you ’re dubbed knight and an 
ik. 


Each life unfulfilled, you see ; 
It hangs still, patchy and scrappy : 
We have not sighed deep, laughed free, 
Starved, feasted, despaired,—been 
happy. 


And nobody calls you a dunce, 
And people suppose me clever : 
This could but have happened once, 
And we missed it, lost it forever. 
1864. 


A FACE 


IF one could have that little head of hers 
Painted upon a background of pale gold, 
Such as the Tuscan’s early art prefers! 

No shade encroaching on the matchless 


mould ; 

Of those two lips, which should be open- 
ing soft 

In the pure profile: not as when she 
laughs, 


For that spoils all : but rather as if aloft 
Yon hyacinth, she loves so, leaned its 
staft’s 


Burden of honey-colored buds to kiss 

And capture “twixt the lips apart for 
this. 

Then her lithe neck, three fingers might 
surround, 

How it should waver on the pale gold 
ground 

Up to the fruit-shaped, perfect chin it 
lifts ! 

I know, Correggio loves to mass, in rifts 

Of heaven, his angel faces, orb on orb 

Breaking its outline, burning shades 
absorb : 

But these are only massed there, I should 
think, 

Waiting to see some wonder momently 

Grow out, stand full, fade slow against 
the sky 

(That ’s the pale ground you ‘d see this 
sweet face by), 

All heaven, meanwhile, condensed into 
one eye 

Which fears to lose the wonder, should 
it wink. 1864. 


PROSPICE 


FEAR death?—to feel the fog in my 
throat, 
The mist in my face, 
When the snows begin, and the blasts 
denote 
I am nearing the place, 
The power of the night, the press of the 
storm, 
The post of the foe ; 
Where he stands, the Arch Fear in a 
visible form, 
Yet the strong man must go: 
For the journey is done and the summit 
attained, 
And the barriers fall, 
Though a battle’s to fight ere the guer- 
don be gained, 
The reward of it all. 


‘IT was ever a fighter, so—one fight more, 


The best and the last! 
I would hate that death bandaged my 
eyes, and forbore, 
And bade me creep past. 
No! let me taste the whole of it, fare 
like my peers 
The heroes of old, 
Bear the brunt, in a minute pay glad 
life’s arrears 
Of pain, darkness and cold. 
For sudden the worst turns the best to 
the brave, 
The black minute’s at end, 


668 


BRITISH POETS 





And the elements’ rage, the fiend-voices 
that rave, 
Shall dwindle, shall blend, 
Shall change, shall become first a peace 
out of pain, 
Then a light, then thy breast, ¢ 
O thou soul of my soul! I shall clasp 
thee again, 
And with God be the rest! 1867. 1864. 


EPILOGUE 
TO DRAMATIS PERSONAB 


WITLEsS alike of will and way divine, 

How heaven’s high with earth’s low 
should intertwine! 

Friends, I have seen through your eyes: 
now use mine! 


Take the least man of all mankind, asI; 

Look at his head and heart, find how 
and why 

He differs from his fellows utterly : 


Then, like me, watch when nature by 
degrees 

Grows alive round him, as in Arctic seas 

(They said of old) the instinctive water 
flees 


Toward some elected point of central 
rock, 

As though, for its sake only, roamed the 
flock 

Of waves about the waste: awhile they 
mock 


With radiance caught for the occasion, 
—hues 

Of blackest hell now, now such reds and 
blues 

As only heaven could fitly interfuse,— 


The mimic monarch of the whirlpool, 
king 

O’ the current for a minute: then they 
wring 

Up by the roots and oversweep the thing, 


And hasten off, to play again elsewhere 

The same part, choose another peak as 
bare, 

They find and flatter, feast and finish 
there. 


When you see what I tell you,—-nature 
dance 

About each man of us, retire, advance, 

As though the pageant’s end were to 
enhance 


His worth, and—once the life, his pro- 
duct, gained— 

Roll away elsewhere, keep the strife 
sustained, 

And show thus real, a thing the North 
but feigned— 


When you acknowledge that one world 
could do 

All the diverse work, old yet ever new, 

Divide us, each from other, me from 
you,— 


Why, where’s the need of Temple, when 
the walls 

O’ the world are that? 
swells and falls 

From Levites’ choir, Priests’ cries, and 
trumpet-calls ? 


What use of 


That one Face, far from vanish, rather 
grows, 

Or decomposes but to recompose, 

Become my universe that feels and 
knows! 1864. 


DEDICATION OF THE RING AND 
THE BOOK 


(END OF BOOK I) 


Sucu, British Public, ye who like me not, 

(God love you! )—whom I yet have 
labored for, 

Perchance more careful whoso runs may 
read 

Than erst when all, it seemed, could 
read who ran,— 

Perchance more careless whoso reads 
may praise 

Than late when he who praised and read 
and wrote 

Was apt to find himself the selfsame 
me,— 

Such labor had such issue, so I wrought 

This are, by furtherance of such alloy, 

And so, by one spirt, take away its trace 

Till, justifiably golden, rounds my ring. 


A ring without a posy, and that ring 
mine ? 


O lyric Love, half angel and half bird, 

And all a wonder and a wild desire,— 

Boldest of hearts that ever braved the 
sun, 

Took sanctuary within the holier blue, 

And sang a kindred soul out to his face,— 

Yet human at the red-ripe of the heart— 


ROBERT BROWNING 


When the first summons from the dark- 
ling earth 

Reached thee amid thy 
blanched their blue, 

And bared them of the glory—to drop 
down, 

To toil for man, to suffer or to die,— 

This is the same voice: can thy soul 

, know change? 

Hail then, and harken from the realms 

of help ! 

Never may Icommence my song, my due 

To God who best taught song by gift of 
thee 

Except with bent head and beseeching 
hand— 

That still, despite the distance and the 
dark, [change 

What was, again may be; some inter- 

Of grace, some splendor once thy very 
thought, 

Some benediction anciently thy smile: 

—Never conclude, but raising hand and 
head 

Thither where eyes, that cannot reach, 
yet yearn 

For all hope, all sustainment, all reward, 

Their utmost up and on,—so_ blessing 
back 

In those thy realms of help, that heaven 
thy home, 

Some whiteness which, I judge, thy face 
makes proud, 

Some wanness where, I think, thy foot 
may fall! 1868 


chambers, 


HERVE RIEL 


I 


ON the sea and at the Hogue, sixteen 
hundred ninety-two, 

Did the English fight the French,—woe 
to France ! 

And, the thirty-first of May, 
skelter through the blue, 
Like a crowd of frightened porpoises a 

shoal of sharks pursue, 
Came crowding ship. on ship to Saint 
Malo on the Rance, 
With the English fleet in view. 


helter- 


II 


’T was the squadron that escaped, with 
the victor in full chase ; 
First and foremost of the drove, in his 
great ship, Damfreville ; 
Close on him fled, great and small, 
Twenty-two good ships in all; 


669 


And they signalled to the place 
‘* Help the winners of a race ! 
Get us guidance, give us harbor, take 
us quick—or, quicker still, 
Here ’s the English can and will!” 


Il 


Then the pilots of the place put out brisk 
and leaped on board ; 
** Why what hope or chance have ships 
like these to pass ?” laughed they : 
‘* Rocks to starboard, rocks to port, all 
the passage scarred and scored, 
Shall the ‘Formidable’ here with her 
twelve and eighty guns 
Think to make the river-mouth by the 
single narrow way, 
Trust to enter where ’t is ticklish for a 
craft of twenty tons, 
And with flow at full beside ? 
Now, ’t is slackest ebb of tide. 
Reach the mooring? Rather say, 
While rock stands or water runs, 


1” 


Not a ship will leave the bay ! 
Iv 


Then was called a council straight. 
Brief and bitter the debate : 
‘* Here’s the English at our heels ; 
you have them take in tow 
All that’s left us of the fleet, linked to- 
gether stern and bow, 
For a prize to Plymouth Sound ? 
Better run the ships aground !” 
(Ended Damfrev ille his speech). 
‘*Not a minute more to wait ! 
Let the Captains all and each 
Shove ashore, then blow up, burn the 
vessels on the beach ! 
France must undergo her fate. 


would 


V 


‘*Give the word!” But no such word 

Was ever spoke or heard : 

For up stood, for out stepped, for in 
struck amid all these 

—A Captain? A Lieutenant? A Mate— 
first, second, third ? 

No such man of mark, and meet 

With his betters to compete ! 

But asimple Breton sailor pressed by 
Tourville for the fleet, 

A poor coasting-pilot he. Hervé Riel the 
Croisickese. 


vi 


And ‘‘ What mockery or malice have we 
here?” cries Hervé Riel : 


670 


‘Are you. mad, you Malouins? Are you 
cowards, fools, or rogues ? 
Talk to me of rocks and shoals, me who 
took the soundings, tell 
On my fingers every bank, every shallow, 
every swell, 
*Twixt the offing here and Gréve where 
the river disembogues ? 
Are you bought by English gold? 
love the lying’s for? 
Morn and eve, night and day, 
Have I piloted your bay, 
Entered free and anchored fast at the 
foot of Solidor. 
Burn the fleet and ruin France? That 
were worse than fifty Hogues ! 
Sirs, they know I speak the truth! Sirs, 
believe me there’s a way ! 
Only let me lead the line, 
Have the biggest ship to steer, 
Get this ‘ Formidable’ clear, 
Make the others follow mine. 
AndI lead them, most and least, by 
a passage I know well, 
Right to Solidor past Greve, 
And there lay them safe and sound: 
And if one ship misbehave, 
—-Keel so much as grate the ground, 
Why I’ve nothing but my life.—here’s 
my head!” cries Hervé Riel. 


Is it 


VII 


Not a minute more to wait, 
‘* Steer us in, then, small and great ! 
Take the helm, lead the line, save the 
squadron !” cried its chief. 
Captains, give the sailor place ! 
He is Admiral, in brief. 
Still the north-wind, by God’s grace ! 
See the noble fellow’s face 
As the big ship, with a bound, 
Clears the entry like a hound, 
Keeps the passage as its inch of way 
were the wide sea’s profound ! 
See, safe through shoal and rock, 
How they follow in a flock, 
Not a ship that misbehaves, nota keel 
that grates the ground, 
Not a spar that comes to grief! 
The peril, see, is past, 
All are harbored to the last, 
And just as Hervé Riel 
‘* Anchor !”—sure as fate, 
Up the English come—too late ! 


hollas 


VIII 


So, the storm subsides to calm : 
They see the green trees wave 


BRITISH POETS 





On the heights o’erlooking Greve. 
Hearts that bled are stanched with balm. 
‘* Just our rapture to enhance, 

Let the English rake the bay, 

Gnash their teeth and glare askance 
As they cannonade away ! 
‘Neath rampired Solidor pleasant riding 
on the Rance!” 
How hope succeeds despair on each Cap- 
tain’s countenance ! 
Out burst all with one accord, 
‘* This is Paradise for Hell! 
Let France, let France’s King 
Thank the man that did the thing !” 
What a shout, and all one word, 
‘* Hervé Riel!” 
As he stepped in front once more, 
Not a symptom of surprise 
In the frank blue Breton eyes, 
Just the same man as before. 


IX 


Then said Damfreville, ‘‘ My friend, 

I must speak out at the end, 
Though I find the speaking hard. 

Praise is deeper than the lips: 

You have saved the King his ships, 
You must name your own reward. 

‘Faith, our sun was near eclipse! 

Demand whate’er you will, 

France remains your debtor still. 

Ask to heart’s content and have! or my 

name’s not Damfreville.” 


x 


Then a beam of fun outbroke 
On the bearded mouth that spoke, 
As the honest heart laughed through 
Those frank eyes of Breton blue: 
‘*Since I needs must say my say, 
Since on board the duty ’s done, 
And from Malo Roads to Croisic Point, 
what is it but a run ?— 
Since ’t is ask and have, I may— 
Since the others go ashore— 
Come! <A good whole holiday ! 
Leave to go and see my wife, whom I 
call the Belle Aurore!” 
That he asked and that he got,—noth- 
ing more. 


XI 


Name and deed alike are lost : 
Not a pillar nor a post 
In his Croisic keeps alive the feat as it 
befell ; 
Not a head in white and black 
On a single fishing-smack, 


ROBERT BROWNING 


671 





In memory of the man but for whom 
had gone to wrack 
All that France saved from the fight 
whence England bore the bell. 
Go to Paris: rank on rank 
Search the heroes flung pell-mell 
‘On the Louvre, face and flank ! 
You shall look long enough ere you 
come to Hervé Riel. 
So, for better and for worse, 
Hervé Riel, accept my verse, 

In my verse, Herve Riel, do thou once 
more 
Save the squadron, honor France, love 

thy wife, the Belle Aurore! 1871. 


FIFINE AT THE FAIR 
PROLOGUE 


AMPHIBIAN 


THE fancy I had to-day, 
Fancy which turned a fear! 
I swam far out in the bay, 
Since waves laughed warm and clear. 


I lay and looked at the sun, 

The noon-sun looked at me: 
Between us two, no one 

Live creature, that I could see. 


Yes! There came floating by 
Me, who lay floating too, 

Such a strange butterfly ! 
Creature as dear as new : 


Because the membraned wings 
So wonderful, so wide, 

So sun-suffused, were things 
Like soul and naught beside. 


A handbreadth overhead ! 
All of the sea my own, 
It owned the sky instead ; 
Both of us were alone. 


I never shall join its flight, 
For, naught buoys flesh in air. 

If it touch the sea—good night ! 
Death sure and swift waits there. 


Can the insect feel the better 
For watching the uncouth play 
Of limbs that slip the fetter, 
Pretend as they were not clay ? 


Undoubtedly I rejoice 
That the air comports so well 

With a creature which had the choice 
Of the land once. Who can tell? 


What if a certain soul 

_ Which early slipped its sheath, 

And has for its home the whole 
Of heaven, thus look beneath, 


Thus watch one who, in the world, 
Both lives and likes life’s way, 
Nor wishes the wings unfurled 
That sleep in the worm, they say ? 


But sometimes when the weather 
Is blue, and warm waves tempt 
To free one’s self of tether, 
And try a life exempt 


From worldly noise and dust, 
In the sphere which overbrims 
With passion and thought,—why, just 
Unable to fly, one swims! 


By passion and thought upborne, 
One smiles to one’s self—‘‘ They fare 
Scarce better, they need not scorn 
Our sea, who live in the air!” 


Emancipate through passion 
And thought, with sea for sky, 
We substitute, in a fashion, 
For heaven—poetry : 


Which sea, to all intent, 

Gives flesh such noon-disport 
As a finer element 

Affords the spirit-sort. 


Whatever they are, we seem: 
Imagine the thing they know ; 

All deeds they do, we dream ; 
Can heaven be else but so? 


And meantime, yonder streak 
Meets the horizon’s verge ; 
That is the land, to seek 
If we tire or dread the surge : 


Land the solid and safe— 
To welcome again (confess !) 
When, high and dry, we chafe 
The body, and don the dress. 


Does she look, pity, wonder 
At one who mimics flight, 
Swims—heaven above, sea under, 
Yet always earth in sight ? 1872. 


EKPILOGUE 
THE HOUSEHOLDER 


SAVAGE I was sitting in my house, late, 
lone: 








Till God did please to grant him ease. 
Do end!” quoth I: 
‘*Tend with—Love is all, and Death 


672 BRITISH? POELS 
Dreary, weary with the long day’s 
work : 
Head of me, heart of me, stupid as a 
stone : 


Tongue-tied now, 
like a Turk ; 
When, in a moment, just a knock, call, 
cry, 
Half a pang and all a rapture, there 
again were we !— 
“What, and is it really you again?” 
quoth I: 
‘‘T again, what else did you expect?” 
quoth She. 


now blaspheming 


‘*Never mind, hie away from this old 
house— 
Every crumbling brick embrowned 
with sin and shame! 
Quick, in its corners ere certain shapes 
arouse ! 
Let them—every devil of the night— 
lay claim, 
Make and mend, or rap and rend, for 
me! Good-by ! 
God be their guard from disturbance 
at their glee, 
Till, crash, comes down the carcass in a 
heap!” quoth I: 
‘‘Nay, but there’s a decency re- 
quired !” quoth She. 


‘Ah, but if you knew how time has 
dragged, days, nights! 
All the neighbor-talk with man and 
maid—such men ! 
All the fuss and trouble of street-sounds, 
window-ssights : 
All the worry of flapping door and 
echoing roof ; and then, 
Allthe fancies . . . Whowere they had 
leave, dared try 
Darker arts that almost struck despair 


in me? 
If you knew but how I dwelt down 
here!” quoth I: 


‘*And was Iso better off up there ree 
quoth She. 


“Help and get it over! Reunited to 
his wife 
(How draw up the paper lets the par- 
ish people know ?) 
Lies M. or N., departed from this life, 
Day the this or that, month and year 
the so and so. 
What i’ the way of final flourish? Prose, 
verse? Try! 
Affliction sore long time he bore, or, 
what is it to be? 


is nought! ” quoth She. —1872. 


HOUSE 


SHALL I sonnet-sing you about myself? 
Do I live ina house you would like to 
see? 
Is it scant of gear, has it store of pelf? 
‘*Unlock my heart with a sonnet- 
key ?” 


Invite the world, as my betters have 
done? 
‘* Take notice: this building remains 
on view, 
Its suites of reception every one, 
Its private apartment and bedroom 
too ; 


‘*For a ticket, apply to the Publisher.” 
No: thanking the public, I must de- 
cline. 
A peep through my window, if folk pre- 
fer ; 
But, please you, no foot over threshold 
of mine! 


I have mixed with a crowd and heard 


free talk 
In a foreign land where an earthquake 
chanced 
And.a house stood gaping, naught to 
balk 
Man’s eye wherever he gazed or 
glanced. 


The whole of the frontage shaven sheer, 
The inside gaped : exposed to day, 
Right and wrong and common and 
queer, 
Bare, as the palm of your hand, it lay. 


The owner? Oh, he had been crushed, 
no doubt ! 
‘* Odd tables and chairs for a man of 
wealth ! 
What a parcel of musty old books about ! 
He smoked;—no wonder he lost his 
health ! 


‘*T doubt if he bathed before he dressed. 
A brasier?—the pagan, he burned 
perfumes! 
You see it is proved, what the neighbors 
guessed : 
His wife and himself had separate 
rooms.’ 


ROBERT BROWNING 


Friends, the good man of the house at 
least 
Kept house to himself till an earth- 
quake came : 
’T is the fall of its frontage permits you 
feast 
On the inside arrangement you praise 
or blame. 


Outside should suffice for evidence : 
And whoso desires to penetrate 

Deeper, must dive by the spirit-sense— 
No optics like yours, at any rate! 


‘* Hoity-toity! A street to explore, 


Your house the exception ! ‘ With this 


same key 
Shakespeare unlocked his 
Once more, 
Did Shakespeare ? 
Shakespeare he ! 


heart !?”’-- 


the less 
1876. 


Tr? so; 


FEARS AND SCRUPLES 


HERE’s my case. Of old I used to love 
him, 
This same unseen friend, before I 
knew : 
Dream there was none like him, none 
above him,— 
Wake to hope and trust my dream was 
true. 


Loved I not his letters full of beauty ? 
Not his actions famous far and wide ? 
Absent, he would know I vowed him 
duty ; 
Present, he would find me at his side. 


Pleasant fancy ! for I had but letters, 
Only knew of actions by hearsay : 
He himself was busied with iny betters ; 
What of that? My turn must come 
some day. 


‘‘Some day ” proving—no day! Here’s 
the puzzle. 
Passed and passed my turn is. Why 


complain ? 
He’s so busied! If I could but muzzle 
People’s foolish mouths that give me 
pain ! 


‘‘Tetters?” (hear them!) 
judge of writing? 
Ask the experts! How they shake the 
head 
O’er these char acters, your friend’s in- 
diting— 
Call them forgery from A to Z! 


43 


Ley ou a 


673 


‘“‘ Actions? Where’s your certain proof ” 
(they bother) 
‘‘He, of all you find so great and 
good, 
He, he only, claims this, that, the other 
Action—claimed by men, a multi- 
tude?” 


I can simply wish I might refute you, 
Wish my friend would,—by a word, a 
wink,— 
Bid me stop that foolish mouth,—you 
brute you! 
He keeps absent,—why, 
think. 


I cannot 


Never mind! Though foolishness may 


flout me, 
One thing ’s sure enough: ’t is neither 
frost, 
No, nor fire, shall freeze or burn from 
out me 


Thanks for truth—though falsehood, 
gained—though lost. 


All my days, I'll go the softlier, sadlier, 
For that dream’s sake! How forget 
the thrill 
Through and through me as I thought 
‘*The gladlier 
Lives my friend because I love him 
still!” 


Ah, but there ’s a menace some one 
utters ! 
‘“ What and if your friend at home 
play tricks ? 
Peep at hide-and-seek behind the shut- 
ters ? 
Mean your eyes should pierce through 
solid bricks? 


‘¢What and if he, frowning, wake you, 
, dreamy ? 
Lay on you the blame that bricks— 
conceal ? 
Say, ‘ At least ITsaw who did not see me. 
Does see now, and presently shall 
feel’ ? 


‘Why, that makes your friend a mon- 
ster!” say you: 
‘‘ Had his house no window? At first 
nod, 
Would you not have hailed him?” 
Hush, I pray you! 
What if this friend happened to be— 
God ? 1876. 


674 


NATURAL MAGIC 


ALL I can say is—I saw it! 

The room was as bare as your hand. 

I locked in the swarth little lady,—I 
swear, 

From the head to the foot of her—well, 
quite as bare ! 

‘*No Nautch shall cheat me,” said I, 
‘* taking my stand 

At this bolt which I draw!” 
bolt—I withdraw it, 

And there laughs the lady, not bare, but 
embowered 

With—who knows what verdure, 0o’er- 
fruited, o’erflowered ? 

Impossible ! Only—I saw it! 


And this 


All I can sing is—I feel it ! 

This life was as blank as that room ; 

I let you passin here. Precaution, in- 
deed ? 

Walls, ceiling and floor,—not a chance 
for a weed ! 

Wide opens the entrance: where ’s cold 
now, where ’s gloom? 

No May to sow seed here, no June to 
reveal it, 

Behold you enshrined in these blooms 
of your bringing, 

These fruits of your bearing—nay, birds 
of your winging ! 

A fairy-tale! Only—I feel it! 1876. 

MAGICAL NATURE 


FLOWER—I never fancied, jJewel—I pro- 
fess you! 
Bright I see and soft I feel the outside 
of a flower. 
Save but glow inside and—jewel, I 
should guess you, 
Dim to sight and rough to touch: the 
glory is the dower. 


You, forsooth, a flower? Nay, my love, 
a jewel— 
Jewel at no mercy of a moment in 
your prime ! 
Time may fray the flower-face: kind be 
time or cruel, 
Jewel, from each facet, flash your 
laugh at time! 1876. 


APPEARANCES 


AND so you found that poor room dull, 
Dark, hardly to your taste, my dear? 
Its features seemed unbeautiful ; 


BRITISH POETS 


But this I know—’t was there, not here, 
You plighted troth to me, the word 
W hich—ask that poor room how it heard. 


And this rich room obtains your praise 
Unqualified,—so bright, so fair, 
So all whereat perfection stays? 
Ay, but remember—here, not there, 
The other word was spoken !—Ask 
This rich room how you dropped the 
mask ! 1876. 


EPILOGUE 


TO THE PACCHIAROTTO VOLUME 


MeoTOL... 
ot S audopys oivov pédavos avOocpiov. 


‘* THE poets pour us wine—” 

Said the dearest poet I ever knew, 
Dearest and greatest and best to me. 
You clamor athirst for poetry— 

We one ‘But when shall a vintage 
e"— 
You cry—‘‘ strong grape, squeezed 
gold from screw. 
Yet sweet juice, flavored flowery-fine ? 
That were indeed the wine!” 





One pours your cup—stark strength, 
Meat for a man; and you eye the pulp 
Strained, turbid still, from the viscous 
blood 
Of the snaky bough: and you grumble 
‘* Good ! 

For it swells resolve, breeds hardihood ; 
Dispatch it, then, in a single gulp!” 
So, down, with a wry face, goes at 

length 
The lquor : stuff for strength. 


One pours your cup—sheer sweet, 
The fragrant fumes of a year con- 
densed : 
Suspicion of all that ’s ripe or rathe, 
From the bud on branch to the grass in 


swathe, 
‘* We suck mere milk of the seasons,” 
saith 
A curl of each nostril—-‘‘ dew, dis- 
pensed 


Nowise for nerving man to feat: 
Boys sip such honeyed sweet ! ” 


And thus who wants wine strong, 
Waves each sweet smell of the year 
away ; 
Who likes to swoon as the sweets suffuse 


ROBERT BROWNING 


His brain with a mixture of beams and 
dews 

Turned syrupy drink—rough strength 
eschews ; 

‘* What though in our veins your wine- 

stock stay ? 

The lack of the bloom does our palate 
wrong. 

Give us wine sweet, not strong!” 


Yet wine is—some affirm— 
Prime wine is found in the world 
somewhere, 
Of portable strength 
match. 
You double your heart its dose, yet 
catch— 
As the draught descends—a_ violet- 
smatch, 
Softness—however it came there, 
Through drops expressed by the fire and 
worm: 
Strong sweet wine—some affirm. 


with sweet to 


Body and bouquet both? 
‘Tis easy to ticket a bottle so; 
But what was the case in the cask, my 
friends ? 
Cask? Nay, the vat—where the maker 
mends 
His strong with his sweet (you suppose) 
and blends 
His rough with his. smooth, till none 
can know 
How it comes you may tipple. nothing 
loth, 
Body and bouquet both. 


** You” being just—the world. 
No poets—who turn, themselves, the 
winch 
Of the press; no critics—I’ll even say, 
(Being flustered and easy of faith to- 


day,) 

Who for love of the work have learned 
the way 

Till themselves produce home-made, 

at a pinch: 

No! You are the world, and wine ne’er 
purled 

Except to please the world ! 


** For, oh the common heart! 
And, ah the irremissible sin 
Of poets who please themselves, not us! 
Strong wine yet sweet wine pouring 
thus ! 
How please still—Pindar and Aischy- 
lus! 


675 





Drink—dipped into by the bearded 
chin 
Alike and the bloomy lip—no part 
Denied the common heart ! 


‘And might we get such grace, 
And did you moderns but stock our 
vault 
With the true half-brandy half-attar-gul, 
How Neue seniors indulge at a hearty 
pu 
Bt eases tossed off their thimble- 
ul! 
Our Shakespeare and Milton escaped 
your fault, 
So, they reign supreme o’er the weaker 
race 
That wants the ancient grace!” 


If I paid myself with words 
(As the French say well) I were dupe 
indeed ! 
I were found in belief that you quaffed 
and bowsed 
At your Shakespeare the whole day 
long, caroused 
In your Milton pottle-deep nor drowsed 
A moment of night—toped on, took 
heed 
Of nothing 
curds. 
Pay me with deeds, not words! 


like modern cream-and- 


For—see your cellarage ! 
There are forty barrels with Shakes- 
peare’s brand. 
Some five or six are abroach: the rest 
Stand spigoted, fauceted. Try and test 
What yourselves call best of the very 
best ! 
How comes it that still untouched they 
stand ? 
Why don’t you try tap, advance a stage 
With the rest in the cellarage ? 


For—see your cellarage ! 
There are four big butts of Milton’s 
brew. 
How comes it you make old drips and 
drops 
Do duty, and there devotion stops ? 
Leave such an abyss of malt and hops 
Embellied in butts which bungs still 
glue? [rage ! 
You hate your bard! A fig for your 
Free him from cellarage ! 


’T is said I brew stiff drink, 
But the deuce a flavor of grape is 
there. 


676 


Hardly a May-go-down, ’t is just 
A sort of a gruff Go-down-it-must— 
No Merry-go-down, no gracious gust 
Commingles the racy with Spring- 
tide’s rare ! 
‘‘What wonder,” say you, ‘that we 
cough, and blink 
At Autumn’s heady drink ?” 


Is it a fancy, friends ? 
Mighty and mellow are never mixed, 
Though mighty and mellow be born at 
once. 
Sweet for the future,—strong for the 
nonce ! 
Stuff you should stow away, ensconce 
In the deep and dark, to be found fast- 
fixed 
At the century’s close: 
strength spends 
A-sweetening for my friends ! 


such time 


And then—why, what you quaff 
With a smack of lip and a cluck of 
tongue, 
Is leakage and leavings—just what haps 
From the tun some learned taster taps 
With a promise ‘**‘ Prepare your watery 
chaps! 
Here ’s properest wine for old and 
young ! 
Dispute its perfection ? 
laugh ! 
Have faith, 
quaff !” 


You make us 


give thanks, but— 





Leakage, I say, or—worse— 
Leavings suffice, pot-valiant souls. 
Somebody, brimful, long ago, 
Frothed flagon he drained to the dregs ; 
and, lo, 
Down whisker and beard what an over- 
flow ! 
Lick spilth that has trickled from 
classic jowls, 
Sup the single scene, sip the only verse— 
Old wine, not new and worse! 


I grant you: worse by much! 
Renounce that new where you never 
gained 
One glow at heart, one gleam at head, 
And stick to the warrant of age in- 
stead ! 
No dwarf’s-lap! Fatten, by giants fed ! 
You fatten, with oceans of drink un- 
drained ? 
You feed—who would choke did a cob- 
web smutch 
The Age you love so much ? 


BRITISH POETS 


A mine’s beneath a moor: 
Acres of moor roof fathoms of mine 
Which diamonds dot where you please 


to dig ; 

Yet who ples spade for the bright and 
big? 

Your product is—truffles, you hunt with 
a pig ! 


Since bright-and-big, when a man 
would dine, 
Suits badly: and therefore the Koh- 
i-noor 
May sleep in mine ’neath moor! 


Wine, pulse in might from me ! 
It may never emerge in must from 
vat, 
Never fill cask nor furnish can, 

Never end sweet, which strong began— 
God’s gift to gladden the heart of man ; 
But spirit ’s at proof, I promise that ! 
No sparing of juice spoils what should 

be 


Fit brewage—mine for me. 


Man’s thoughts and loves and hates ! 
Earth is my vineyard, these grew 
there: 
From grape of the ground, I made or 
marred 
My vintage ; easy the task or hard, 
Who set it—his praise be my reward ! 
Earth’s yield! Who yearn for the 
Dark Blue Sea’s, 
Let them ‘* lay, pray, bray ”—the addle- 
pates ! 
Mine be 
hates ! 


Man’s thoughts, loves, 


But some one says, ‘‘ Good Sir!” 
(T is a worthy versed in what concerns 
The making such labor turn out well, ) 
‘* You don’t suppose that the nosegay- 
smell 
Needs always come from the grape ? 
Each bell 
At your foot, each bud that your cul- 
ture spurns 
The very cowslip would act like myrrh 
On the stiffest brew—good Sir ! 


‘* Cowslips, abundant birth 
O’er meadow and hillside, vineyard 


too, 
—Like a schoolboy’s scrawlings in and 
out 
Distasteful lesson-book—all about 
Greece and Rome, victory and rout— 
Love-verses instead of such vain ado ! 


ROBERT BROWNING 


So, fancies frolic it o’er the earth 
Where thoughts have rightler birth. 


‘* Nay, thoughtlings they themselves ; 
Loves, hates—in little and less and 
least ! . 
Thoughts? ‘What isa man beside a 
mount !” 
Loves? ‘ Absent—poor lovers the min- 
utes count !? 
Hates? ‘ Fie—Pope’'s letters to Martha 
Blount !’ 
These furnish a wine for a children’s 
feast : 
Insipid to man, they suit the elves 
Like thoughts, loves, hates, them- 
selves.” 


And, friends, beyond dispute 
I too have the cowslips dewy and dear. 
Punctual as Springtide forth peep they : 
I leave them to make my meadow gay. 
But I ought to pluck and impound them, 
eh? 
Not let them alone, but deftly shear 
And shred and reduce to—what may 
suit 
Children, beyond dispute ? 


And, here ’s May-month, all bloom, 
All bounty: what if I sacrifice ? 
If I out with shears and shear, nor stop 
Shearing till prostrate, lo, the crop? 
And will you prefer it to ginger-pop 
When I’ve made you wine of the 
memories 
Which leave as bare as a churchyard 
tomb 
My meadow, late all bloom? 


Nay, what ingratitude 
Should I hesitate to amuse the wits 
That have pulled so long at my flask, 
nor grudged 
The headache that paid their pains, nor 


budged 

From bunghole before they sighed and 
judged 

‘Too rough for our taste, to-day, 

befits 

The racy and right when the years con- 
clude !” 

Out on ingratitude ! 


¢ 


Grateful or ingrate—none, 
No cowslip of all my fairy crew 
Shall help to concoct what makes you 
wink. 
And goes to your head till you think 
you think ! 


677 


I like them alive : the printer’s ink 
Would sensibly tell on the perfume 
too. 
I may use up my nettles, ere I’ve done ; 
But of cowslips—friends get none! 


Don’t nettles make a broth 
Wholesome for blood grown lazy and 
thick ? 
Maws out of sorts make mouths out of 
taste. 
My Thirty-four Port—no need to waste 
Ona tongue that’s fur and a palate— 
paste ! 
. A magnum for friends who are sound ! 
the sick— 
I’ll posset and cosset them, nothing 
loth, 
Henceforward with nettle-broth ! 
1876. 


LA SAISIAZ 
PROLOGUE 


Goon, to forgive ; 
Best, to forget ! 
Living, we fret ; 
Dying, we live. 
Fretless and free, 
Soul, clap thy pinion! 
Earth have dominion, 
Body, o’er thee ! 


Wander at will, 
Day after day, 
Wander away, 
Wandering still— 
Soul that canst soar! 
Body may slumber : 
Body shall cumber 
Soul-flight no more. 


Waft of soul’s wing! 
What lies above ? 
Sunshine and Love, 

Skyblue and Spring! 

Body hides—where ? 
Ferns of all feather, 
Mosses and heather, 

Yours be the care! 1878. 


THE TWO POETS OF CROISIC 
PROLOGUE 


SucH a starved bank of moss 
Till@that May-morn, 

Blue ran the flash across : 
Violets were born ! 


678 BRITISH POETS 


Sky—what a scowl of cloud 
Till, near and far, 

Ray on ray split the shroud: 
Splendid, a star! 


World—how it walled about 
Life with disgrace 

Till God’s own smile came out : 
That was thy face ! 


EPILOGUE 


What a pretty tale you told me 
Once upon a time 
—Said you found it somewhere (scold 
me !) 
‘Was it prose or was it rhyme, 
Greek or Latin? Greek, you said, 
While your shoulder propped my head. 


Anyhow there ’s no forgetting 
This much if no more, 

That a poet (pray, no petting !) 
Yes, a bard, sir, famed of yore, 

Went where suchlike used to go, 

Singing for a prize, you know. 


Well, he had to sing, nor merely 
Sing but play the lyre ; 
Playing was important clearly 
Quite as singing: I desire, 
Sir, you keep the fact in mind 
For a purpose that’s behind. 


There stood he, while deep attention 
Held the judges round, 
—Judges able, I should mention, 
To detect the slightest sound 
Sung or played amiss: such ears 
Had old judges, it appears! 


None the less he sang out boldly, 
Played in time and tune, 
Till the judges, weighing coldly 
Each note’s worth, seemed, late or 
soon, 
Sure to smile ‘‘ In vain one tries 
Picking faults out: take the prize!” 
When, a mischief! Were they seven 
Strings the lyre possessed ? 
Oh, and afterwards eleven, 
Thank you! Well, sir,—who had 
guessed 
Such ill luck in store ?—it happed 
One of those same seven strings snapped. 


All was lost, then! No! a cficket 
(What ‘‘ cicada 7 ?)" Pooh?) 
‘—Some mad thing that left its thicket 


For mere love of music—flew 
With its little heart on fire, 
Lighted on the crippled lyre. 


So that when (Ah, joy!) our singer 
For his truant string 

Feels with disconcerted finger, 
What does cricket else but fling 

Fiery heart forth, sound the note 

Wanted by the throbbing throat? 


Ay and, ever to the ending, 
Cricket chirps at need, 
Executes the hand’s intending, 
Promptly, perfectly,—indeed 
Saves the singer from defeat 
With her chirrup low and sweet. 


Till, at ending, all the judges 
Cry with one assent 

‘*Take the prize—a prize who grudges 
Such a voice and instrument ? 

Why, we took your lyre for harp, 

So it shrilled us forth F sharp !” 


Did the conqueror spurn the creature, 
Once its service done ? 

That ’s no such uncommon feature 
In the case when Music’s son 

Finds his Lotte’s power too spent 

For aiding soul-development. 


No! This other, on returning 
Homeward, prize in hand, 
Satisfied his bosom’s yearning : 
(Sir, I hope you understand !) 
—-Said ‘‘Some record there must be 
Of this cricket’s help to me!” 


So, he made himself a statue: 
Marble stood, life-size ; 
On the lyre, he pointed at you, 
Perched his partner in the prize ; 
Never more apart you found 
Her, he throned, from him, she crowned. 


That ’s the tale: its application ? 
Somebody [know * 

Hopes one day for reputation 
Through his poetry that ’s-—-Oh, 

All so learned and so wise 

And deserving of a prize! 


> 
If he gains one, will some ticket, 
When his statue ’s built, 
Tell the gazer ‘*‘ "T'was a cricket 
Helped my crippled lyre, whose hilt 
Sweet and low, when strength usurped 
Softness’ place i’ the scale, she chirped? 


oR 


=. 


ROBERT BROWNING 


‘* For as victory was nighest, 
While I sang and played ,— 
With my lyre at lowest, highest, 
Right alike,—one string that made 
‘Love’ sound soft was snapt in twain 
Never to be heard again,— 


‘¢ Had not a kind cricket fluttered, 
Perched upon the place 
Vacant left, and duly uttered 
‘ Love, Love, Love,’ whene’er the bass 
Asked the treble to atone 
For its somewhat sombre drone.” 


But you don’t know music! Wherefore — 


Keep on casting pearls 
To a—poet? All I care for 
Is—to tell him that a girl’s 
** Love” comes aptly in “when gruff 
Grows his singing. (There, enough !) 
1878. 


TRAY 
SING mea hero! Quench my thirst 
Of soul, ye bards! 
Quoth Bard the first : 
‘* Sir Olaf, the good knight, did don 
His helm and eke his habergeon ” 
Sir Olaf and his bard! 


‘That sin-scathed brow” (quoth Bard 
the second), 
“That eye wide ope as though Fate 
beckoned 
My hero to some steep, beneath 
Which pegeipiee smiled tempting 
death ” 
You too without. your host have reck- 
oned ; 
“A beggar child” (let ’s hear 
third !) 
‘* Sat on a quay’s edge: like a bird 
Sang to herself at careless play, 
And fell into the stream. ‘Dismay! 
‘Help, you the  standers-by!’ None 
stirred. 


this 


‘¢ Bystanders reason, think of wives 

And children ere they risk their lives. 

Over the balustrade has bounced 

A mere instinctive dog, and pounced 

Plumb on the prize. ‘How well he 
dives ! 


‘“¢Up he comes with the child, see, 
tight 

In mouth, alive too, clutched from quite 

A depth of ten feet—twelve, I bet! 


679 


Good dog! What, off again? There ’s 


yet 
Another child to save? Allright! 


‘‘ How strange we saw no other fall! 

It ’s instinct in the animal. 

Good dog! But he’s along while under: 
If he got drowned I should not wonder— 
Strong current, that against the wall ! 


‘** Here he comes, holds in mouth this 
time 

—What may the thing be ? 
prime ! 

Now, did you ever? Reason reigns 

In man alone, since all Tray’s pains 

Have fished—the child’s doll from the 
slime !’ 


Well, that’s 


‘* And so, amid the laughter gay, 
Trotted my hero off,—old Tray,— 

Till somebody, prerogatived 

With reason, reasoned: ‘ Why he dived, 
His brain would show us, I should say. 


*** John, go and catch—or, if needs be, 

Purchase that animal forme! 

By vivisection, at expense 

Of half-an-hour and eighteenpence, 

How brain secretes dog’s soul, we ’Il 
see !’” 1879. 


ECHETLOS 


HERE is a story, shall stir you! 
up, Greeks dead and gone, 

Who breasted, beat Barbarians, stemmed 
Persia rolling on, 

Did the deed and saved the world, for 
the day was Marathon ! 


Stand 


No man but did his manliest, kept rank 
and fought away 

In his tribe and file: up, back, out, 
down—was the spear-arm play : 

Like a wind-whipt branchy wood, all 
spear-arms a-swing that day ! 


But one man kept no rank, and his sole 
arm plied no spear, 

As a flashing came and went, and a 
form i’ the van, the rear, 

Brightened the battle up, for he blazed 
now there, now here. 


Nor helmed nor shielded, he! but, a 
goat-skin all his wear, 

Like a tiller of the soil, with a clown’s 
limbs broad and bare, 

Went he ploughing on and on: he 


pushed with a ploughman’s share. 


680 


BRITISH POETS 





Did the weak mid-line give way, as tun- 
nies on whom the shark 

Precipitates his bulk? Did the right- 
wing halt when, stark 

On his heap of slain lay stretched Kalli- 
machos Polemarch ? : 


Did the steady phalanx falter? To the 
rescue, at the need, 

The clown was ploughing Persia, clear- 
ing Greek earth of weed, 

As he routed through the Sakian and 
rooted up the Mede. 


But the deed done, battle won,—nowhere 
to be descried 

On the meadow, by the stream, at the 
marsh,—-look far and wide ' 

From the foot of the mountain, no, to 
the last blood-plashed sea-side,— 


Not anywhere on view blazed the large 
limbs thonged and brown, 

Shearing and clearing still with the 
share before which—down 

To the dust went Persia’s pomp, as he 
ploughed for Greece, that clown ! 

How spake the Oracle? ‘‘ Care for no 
name at all! 

Say but just this: ‘ We praise one help- 
ful whom we call 

The Holder of the Ploughshare.’ 
great deed ne’er grows small.” 


The 


Not the greatname! Sing—woe for the 
great name Miltiadés 

And its end at Paros isle! 
Themistokles 

—Satrap in Sardis court ! 
clown like these ! 


Woe for 


Name not the 
1880. 


EPILOGUE TO DRAMATIC IDYLS 


‘* ToucH him ne’er so lightly, into song 
he broke: 

Soil so quick-receptive,—not one feather- 
seed, 

Not one flower-dust fell but straight its 
fall awoke 

Vitalizing virtue: song would song suc- 
ceed ~ 

Sudden as spontaneous—prove a poet- 
soul !” 

Indeed ? 

Rock ’s the song-soil rather, surface 
hard and bare : 

Sun and dew their mildness, storm and 
frost their rage 





Vainly both expend,—few flowers 
awaken there: 

Quiet in its cleft broods—what the after- 
age 

Knows and names a pine, a nation’s 
heritage. 1880. 


WANTING IS—WHAT? 


WANTING is—what ? 
Summer redundant, 
Blueness abundant, 
—Where is the blot? 
Beamy the world, yet a blank all the 
same, 
—Framework which waits for a picture 
to frame : 
What of the leafage, what of the flower ? 
Roses embowering with naught they 
embower ! 
Come then, complete incompletion, O 
comer, : 
Pant through the blueness, perfect the 
summer ! 
Breathe but one breath 
Rose-beauty above, 
And all that was death 
Grows life, grows love, 
Grows love! 1883. 


ADAM, LILITH, AND EVE 


ONE day, it thundered and lightened. 

Two women, fairly frightened, 

Sank to their knees, transformed, trans- 
fixed, 

At the feet of the man who sat betwixt ; 

And ‘‘ Mercy !” cried each—‘ if I tell 
the truth 

Of a passage in my youth!” 


Said This: ‘‘ Do you mind the morning 

I met your love with scorning ? 

As the worst of the venom left my lips, 

I thought, ‘ If, despite this lie, he strips 

The mask from my soul with a kiss—I 
crawl 

His slave,—soul, body, and all!’ ” 


Said that: ‘‘ We stood to be married ; 
The priest, or some one, tarried ; 


1 Having been criticised for speaking thus of his 
own work (as well he might, if he chose), Brown- 
ing wrote the following lines in an album, for an 
American girl, at Venice : 


Thus I wrote in London, musing on my betters, 

Poets dead and gone; and lo, the critics cried, 

‘Out on sucha boast!’ as if I dreamed that 
fetters 

Binding Dante bind up—-me:! as if true pride 

Were not alsohumble!...., 


ROBERT 


BROWNING 


681 








‘If Paradise-door prove locked ?’ smiled 


you. 
I thought, as I nodded, smiling too, 
‘ Did one, that ’s away, arrive—nor late 
Nor soon should unlock Hell’s gate !’” 





It ceased to lighten and thunder. 
Up started both in wonder, 
Looked round and saw that the sky was 


clear, 

Then laughed af _ Confess you believed 
us, Dear !’ 

“IT saw Pepe h the joke!” the man 
replied. 

They re-seated themselves beside. 


1883. 
NEVER THE TIME AND THE PLACE 


NEVER the time and the place 
And the loved one all together ! 
This path—how soft to pace! 
This May—what magic weather ! 
Where is the loved one’s face ? 
In a dream that loved one’s face meets 
mine, 
But the house is narrow, the place is 
bleak 
Where, outside, rain and wind combine 
With a furtive ear, if I strive to speak, 
With a hostile eye at my flushing 
cheek, 
With a malice that marks each word, 
each sign ! 
O enemy sly and serpentine, 
Uncoil thee from the waking man! 
Do I hold the Past 
Thus firm and fast 
Yet doubt if the Future hold I can? 
This path so soft to pace shall lead 
Through the magic of May to herself 
indeed ! 
Or narrow if needs the house must be, 
Outside are the storms and strangers : 
we— 
Oh, close, safe, warm, sleep I and she, 
I and she. 1883. 


SONGS FROM FERISHTAH’S 
FANCIES 


RowunpD us the wild creatures, overhead 
the trees, 

Underfoot the moss-tracks,—life and 
love with these ! 

I to wear a fawn-skin, thou to dress in 
flowers: 

All the long lone summer-day, that 
greenwood life of ours} 


Rich-pavilioned, rather,—still the world 
without,— 

Inside—gold-roofed silk-walled silence 
round about ! 

Queen it thou on purple,—I, at watch 
and ward, 

Couched beneath the columns, gaze, thy 
slave, love’s guard ! 


So, for us no world? 
thee to me ! 

Up and down amid men, heart by heart 
fare we! 

Welcome squalid vesture, harsh voice, 
hateful face ! 

God is soul, souls Land thou: 
should souls have place. 


Let throngs press 


with souls 


Wish no word unspoken, want no look 
away ! 

What if words were but mistake, and 
looks—too sudden, say ! 

Be unjust for once, Love! Bear it—well 
I may ! 

Do me justice always? Bid my heart— 
their shrine— 

Render back its store of gifts, old looks 
and words of thine 

—Oh, so all unjust—the less deserved, 
the more divine ? 





Fire is in the flint: true, once a spark 
escapes, 

Fire forgets the kinship, soars till fancy 
shapes 

Some befitting cradle where the babe 
had birth— 

Wholly heaven’s the product, unallied 
to earth. 

Splendors recognized as perfect in the 
star! 

In our flint their home was, housed as 
now they are. 





Verse-making was least of my virtues: 
I viewed with despair 

Wealth that never yet was but might 
be—all that verse-making were 

If the life would but lengthen to wish, 
let the mind be laid bare. 

So I said ‘*To do little is bad, to do 
nothing is worse ”“— 

And made verse, 


682 


Love-making,—how simple a matter! 
No depths to explore, 

No heights in a life to ascend! 
heartening Before, 

No affrighting Hereafter,—love now will 
be love evermore. 

So I felt ‘*‘ To keep silence were folly :” 
—all language above, 

I made love. 


No dis- 





Ask not one least word of praise ! 
Words declare your eyes are bright? 
What then meant that summer day’s 
Silence spent in one long gaze ? 
Was my silence wrong or right ? 


Words of praise were all to seek ! 
Face of you and form of you, 

Did they find the praise so weak 

When my lips just touched your cheek— 
Touch which let my soul come through? 


“Why from the world,” Ferishtah 
smiled, ‘‘ should thanks 
Go to this work of mine ? 
praise, 
Praised let it be and welcome: as verse 
ranks, 
So rate my verse: if good therein out- 
weighs 
Aught faulty judged, judge justly! 
Justice says: 
Be just to fact, or blaming or approving : 
But—generous? No, nor loving! 


If worthy 


“Loving! what claim to love has work 
of mine ? 
Concede my life were emptied of its 
gains 
To furnish forth and fill work’s strict 
confine, 
Who works so for the world’s sake— 
he complains 
With cause when hate, 
rewards his pains. 
I looked beyond the world for truth and 
beauty : 
Sought, found, and did my duty.” 
1884. 


not love, 


WHY I AM A LIBERAL 


““Wuy ?” Becauseall I haply can and do, 

All that I am now, all I hope to be,— 

Whence comes it save from fortune set- 
ting free 


BRITISH POETS 


Body and soul the purpose to pursue, 


God traced for both? If fetters not a 
few, 

Of prejudice, convention, fall from me, 

These shall I bid men—each in his 
degree 

Also God-guided—bear, and gayly, too? 


But little do or can the best of us: 

That little is achieved through Liberty. 

Who, then, dares hold, emancipated 
thus, 

His fellow shall continue bound? NotI, 

Who live, love, labor freely, nor discuss 

A brother’s right to freedom. That is 
Soa oe 1885. 


ROSNY 


Wok, he went galloping into the war, 
Clara, Clara 
Let us two dream: shall he ’scape with 
a scar? 
Scarcely disfigurement, rather a grace 
Making for manhood which nowise we 
mar: 
See, while I kiss it, the flush on his 
face— 
Rosny, Rosny ! 


Light does he laugh: ‘‘ With your love 
in my soul” 
(Clara, Clara !) 
‘*How could I other than—sound, safe, 
and whole— 
Cleave who opposed me asunder, yet 
stand 
Scatheless beside you, as, touching 
love’s goal, 
Who won the race kneels, craves re- 
ward at your hand— 
Rosny, Rosny ?” 


Ay, but if certain who envied should 
see ! 
Clara, Clara, 

Certain who simper: ‘‘ The hero for me 
Hardly of life were so chary as miss 
Death—death and fame—that’s love’s 

guerdon when She 
Boasts, proud bereaved one, her choice 
fell on this 
Rosny, Rosny!” 


So,—go on dreaming,—he lies mid a 
hea 
(Clara, Clara.) 
Of the slain by his hand : what is death 
but a sleep? 


ROBERT 


Dead, with my portrait displayed on 
his breast : 
Love wrought his undoing: ‘‘ No pru- 
dence could keep 
The love-maddened wretch from his 
fate.” That is best, 
Rosny, Rosny ! 1889. 


POETICS 


‘So say the foolish!” Say the foolish 
so, Love? 
‘Flower she is, my rose”’-—or else, 
‘*My very swan is she”— 
Or perhaps, ‘* Yon maid-moon, blessing 
earth below, Love, 
That art thou! ’—to them, belike : no 
such vain words from me. 


‘‘Hush, rose, blush! no balm 
breath,” I chide it: 
‘* Bend thy neck its best, swan,—hers 
the whiter curve!” 
Be the moon the moon: my Love I place 
beside it: 
What is she? 
lower word will serve. 


SUMMUM BONUM 


ALL the breath and the bloom of the 
year in the bag of one bee: 

All the wonder and wealth of the mine 
in the heart of one gem: 

In the core of one pearl all the shade 
and the shine of the sea: 

Breath and bloom, shade and shine,— 
wonder, wealth, and—how far 
above them— 

Truth, that’s brighter than gem, 
Trust, that’s purer than pearl— 
Brightest truth, purest trust in the 
universe—all were for me 

In the kiss of one girl. 


like 


Her human self,—no 
1889. 


1889. 
A PEARL, A GIRL 


A SIMPLE ring with a single stone, 
To the vulgar eye no stone of price: 
Whisper the right word, that alone— 
Forth starts a sprite, like fire from ice, 
And lo, you are lord (says an Eastern 
scroll) [sole 
Of heaven and earth, lord whole and 
Through the power in a pearl. 


A woman (’t is I this time that say) 
With little the world counts worthy 
praise : 


* 


BROWNING 


683 


Utter the true word—out and away 
Escapes her soul : lam wrapt in blaze, 
Creation’s lord, of heaven and earth 
Lord sates and sole—by a minute’s 
irth— 


Through the love in a girl! 1889. 


MUCKLE-MOUTH MEG 


FROWNED the Laird on the Lord: 
redhanded I catch thee ? 
Death-doomed by our Law of the 
Border ! 
We’ve a gallows outside and a chiel to 
dispatch thee : 
Who _ trespasses—hangs : 
order.” 


0, 


alls is. ii 


He met frown with smile, did the young 
English gallant : 
Then the Laird’s dame: ‘“ Nay, Hus- 
band, I beg! 
He’s comely : be merciful! .Grace for 
the callant 


—If he marries our Muckle-mouth 
Meg! 
‘*“No mile-wide-mouthed monster of 


yours do I marry : 
Grant rather the gallows!” laughed he. 
‘* Foul fare kith and kin of you—why do 
you tarry ?” 
EO Boe your fierce temper !” quoth 
she. 


‘* Shove him quick in the Hole, shut him 

fast for a week : 
Cold, darkness, and 

wonders : 

Who lion-like roars now, mouse-fashion 
will squeak, 

And ‘it rains’ soon succeed to ‘it thun- 
ders.’ ” 


hunger work 


A week did he bide in the cold and the 
dark 
—Not hunger: for duly at morning 
In flitted a lass, and a voice like a lark 
Chirped, ‘‘Muckle-mouth Meg still 
ye re scorning ? 


‘*Go hang, but here ’s parritch to heart- 
en ye first!” 
‘Did Meg’s muckle-mouth 
within some 
Such music as yours, mine should match 
it or burst : 
No frog-jaws! 
some ! ” 


boast 


So tell folk, my Win- 


684 


BRITISH sPOERS 





Soon week came to end, and, from Hole’s 
door set wide, 
Out he marched,and there waited the 
lassie : 
‘Yon gallows, or Muckle-mouth Meg 
for a bride! 
Consider! Sky ’s blue and turf ’s 


grassy : 


‘‘Life ’s sweet: shall I say ye wed 
Muckle-mouth Meg ?” 
‘*Not I,” quoth the stout heart: ‘‘ too 
eerie 
The mouth that can swallow a bubbly- 
jock’s egg ; 
Shall I let it munch mine? Never, 
Dearie!” 


‘*Not Muckle-mouth Meg? Wow, the 
obstinate man ! 
Perhaps he would rather wed me 
* Ay, would he—with just fora dowry 
your can!” 
‘*T’m Muckle-mouth Meg,” chirruped 
she. 


1» 


‘¢ Then so—so—so—so—” as he kissed her 


apace— 
“Will I widen thee out till thou 
turnest 
From Margaret Minnikin-mou’, by God’s 
grace, 
To Muckle-mouth Meg in good 
earnest !” 1889. 
DEVELOPMENT 
My Father was a scholar and knew 
Greek. 
When I was five years old, I asked him 
once 


‘* What do you read about ? ” 
‘‘ The siege of Troy.” 
‘* What isa siege, and what is Troy?” 
Whereat 
He piled up chairs and tables fora town, 
Set me a-top for Priam, called our cat 
——-Helen, enticed away from home (he 
said) 
By wicked Paris, who couched some- 
where close 
Under the footstool, being cowardly, 
But whom-—-since she was. worth 
pains, poor puss— 
Towzer and Tray,—our dogs, the Atrei- 
dai,—sought 
By taking Troy to get possession of 
—Always.when great Achilles ceased to 
sulk, 


the 


(My pony in the stable)—forth would 
prance 

And Dinisto flight Hector—our page-boy’s 
self. 

This taught me who was who and what 
was what: 

So far I rightly understood the case 

At five years old; a huge delight it 
proved 

And still proves—thanks to that in- 
structor sage 

My Father, who knew better than turn 
straight 

Learning’s full flare on weak-eyed igno- 
rance, 

Or, worse yet, leave weak-eyes to grow 
sand-blind, 

Content with darkness and vacuity. 


It happened, two or three years after- 
ward, 

That—I and playmates playing at Troy’s 
Siege—— 

My Father came upon our make-believe. 

‘‘How would you like to read yourself 
the tale 

Properly told, of which I gave you first 

Merely such notion as a boy could 


bear ? 

Pope, now, would give you the precise 
account 

Of what, some day, by dint of scholar- 
ship, 

You ’l]1 hear — who knows ? — from 


Homer’s very mouth. 
Learn Greek by all means, read the‘ Blind 
Old Man, 
Sweetest of Singers —tuphlos which 
means ‘ blind,’ 
Hedistos which means ‘ sweetest’. 
enough ! 
Try, anyhow, to master him some day ; 
Until when, take what serves for sub- 
stitute, . 
Read Pope, by all means !” 
So I ran through Pope, 
Enjoyed the tale—what history so true ? 
Also attacked my Primer, duly drudged, 
Grew fitter thus for what was promised 
next— 
The very thing itself, the actual words, 
When I could turn—say, Buttmann to 
account. 


Time 


Time passed, I ripened somewhat: one 
fine day, 

‘‘Quite ready for the Iliad, nothing less ? 

There’s Heine, where the big books block 
the shelf ; 


ROBERT BROWNING 


Don’t skipa word, thumb well the 


Lexicon !” 


I thumbed well and skipped nowise till I 
‘ learned 

Who was who, what was what, from 
Homer’s tongue, 

And there an end of learning. 
asked 

The all-accomplished scholar, 
years old, 

‘* Who was it wrote the Iliad ?”—what a 


Had you 


twelve 


laugh ! 

‘*Why, Homer, all the world knows: of 
his life 

Doubtless some facts exist: it ’s every- 
where: 

We have not settled, though, his place of 
birth : 

He begged, for certain, and was blind 
beside : 

Seven cities claimed him—Scio, with 
best right, 

Thinks Byron. What he wrote? Those 


Hymns we have. 
Then there ’s the ‘ Battle of the Frogs 
~ and Mice,’ 
That’s all—unless they dig ‘ Margites’ up 
(Vd like that) nothing more remains to 
know.” 


Thus did youth spend a comfortable 
time ; 

Until—** What’s this the Germans say in 
fact 

That Wolf found out first ? 
pleasant work 

Their chop and change, unsettling one’s 
belief : 

All the same, where we live, we learn, 
that’s sure.” 

So, I bent brow o’er Prolegomena. 

And after Wolf, a dozen of his like 

Proved there was never any Troy at all, 

Neither Besiegers nor Besieged,—nay, 
worse,— 

No actual Homer, no authentic text, 

No warrant for the fiction I, as fact, 

Had treasured in my heart and soul so 
long— 

Ay, mark you! andas fact held still, 
still hold, 

Spite of new knowledge, in my heart of 
hearts 

And soul of souls, fact’s essence freed and 
fixed 

From accidental fancy’s guardian sheath. 

Assuredly thenceforward—-thank my 
stars !— 


it s.31n- 


685 


However it 
could— 

Wring from the shrine my precious ten- 
antry, 

Helen, Ulysses, Hector and his Spouse, 

Achilles and his Friend ?—though Wolf 
—ah, Wolf ! 

Why must he needs come doubting, spoil 
a dream ? 


got there, deprive who 


But then, ‘‘ No dream’s worth waking”— 
Br owning says: 

And here ’s the reason why I tell ots 
much. 

I, now mature man, you anticipate, 

May blame my Father justifiably 

For letting me dream out my nonage 
thus, 

And only by such slow and sure degrees 

Permitting me to sift the grain from 
chaff, 

Get truth and falsehood known and 
named as such. 

Why did he ever let me dream at all, 

Not bid me taste the story in its strength ? 

Suppose my childhood was scarce quali- 
fied 

To rightly understand mythology, 

Silence at least was in his power to keep: 

I might have—somehow—correspond- 

ingly— 

who knows by what 

gained my gains, 

Been taught, by forthrights not meand- 
erings, 


Well, method, 


My aim should be to loathe, like Peleus’ 
son, 

A lie as Hell’s Gate, love my wedded 
wife, 


Like Hector, and so on with all the rest. 

Could not I have excogitated this 

Without believing such men really were ? 

That is-—-he might have put into my 
hand 

The ‘ Ethics”? In translation, if you 
please, 

Exact, no pretty lying that improves, 

To suit the modern taste : no more, no 
less— 

The ‘“‘ Ethics:” ’t is a treatise I find hard 

To read aright now that my hair is gray, 

And I can manage the original. 

At five years old—how ill had fared its 
leaves ! 

Now, growing double o’er the Stagirite, 

At least I soil no page with bread and 
milk, 

Nor crumple, dogs-ear and deface—boys’ 

way. 1889. 


686 


EPILOGUE 


AT the midnight in the silence of the 

sleep-time, 
When you set your fancies free, 

Will they pass to where—by death, fools 
think, imprisoned— 

Low he les who onceso loved you, whom 
you loved so, 

—Pity me? 


Oh to love so, be so loved, yet so mis- 

taken ! 
What had I on earth to do 

With the slothful, with the mawkish, 
the unmanly ? 

Like the aimless, helpless, hopeless, did I 
drivel 

—Being—who? 


BRIFISH POETS 


One who never turned his back but 
marched breast forward. 
Never doubted clouds would break, 
Never dreamed, though right were 
worsted, wrong would triumph, 
Held we fall to rise, are baffled to fight 
better, ; 
Sleep to wake. 


No, at noonday in the bustle of man’s 

work-time 
Greet the unseen with a cheer ! 

Bid him forward, breast and back as 
either should be, 

“Strive and thrive!” cry ‘‘ Speed,— 
fight on, fare ever 

There as here !” 
1889. 


Cr OU GE 
LIST OF REFERENCES 
EDITIONS 


Poems, with Memoir by Charles Eliot Norton, Ticknor & Fields, 1862. 
Poems and Prose Remains, with Memoir by Mrs. Clough, 2 volumes, 
London, 1869. Poems, 1 volume, The Macmillan Company. Selections 
from the Poems, 1 volume (Golden Treasury Series). Prose Remains, 1 
volume, The Macmillan Company. 


BioGRAPHY AND REMINISCENCES 


Memoirs by * C. E. Norton and by Mrs. Clough, in the editions above 
mentioned. Sxuarrp (J. C.), Portraits of Friends. 


CRITICISM 


* Bacenot (W.), Literary Studies, Vol. II. Brvanck (W.G. C.). 
Poezie en Leven in de 19de Eeuw: Studien op het Gebied der Letterkunde, 
Haarlem, 1889. Downprn (E.), Studies in Literature: Transcendental 
Movement in Literature. Hupson (W. H.), Studies in Interpretation, 
* Hutton (R. H.), Literary Studies. Manre (H. W.), My Study Fire, Sec- 
ond Series. Oxiesanr (Margaret), Victorian Age of Literature. Pat- 
MORE (C.), Principle in Art. Prrry (T.8.), In Atlantic Monthly, 1875, 
p. 409. Rozertrson (J. M.), New Essays Towards a Critical Method. 
STEDMAN (E. C.), Victorian Poets, p. 243-4. Wapprineton (S.), Arthur 
Hugh Clough, a Monograph. Warp (T. H.), English Poets. 

ARMSTRONG (R. A.), Faith and Doubt. Macponarp (G.), England’s 
Antiphon. ScupprEr (V. D.), Life of the Spirit. Srxrsure (L.), Ueber A. 
H. Clough. Suarp (Amy), Victorian Poets. Swanwick (A.), Poets the 
Interpreters of their Age. 


TRIBUTES IN VERSE 


* Arnotp, The Scholar Gypsey; Thyrsis. * Lowret1, Agassiz: Sec- 
tion IIT. 


687 


(ale Giese re lal 


IN A LECTURE-ROOM 


AWAY, haunt thou not me, 

Thou vain Philosophy ! 

Little hast thou bestead. 

Save to perplex the head, 

And leave the spirit dead. 

Unto thy broken cisterns wherefore go, 

While from the secret treasure-depths 
below, 

Fed by the skiey shower, 

And clouds that sink and rest on hill- 
tops high, 

Wisdom at once, and Power, 

Are welling, bubbling forth, unseen, 
incessantly ? 

Why labor at the dull mechanic oar, 

When the fresh breeze is blowing, 

And the strong current flowing, 

Right onward to the Eternal Shore ? 

1840. 1849. 


BLANK MISGIVINGS 


How often sit I, poring o’er 
My strange distorted youth, 
Seeking in vain, in all my store, 
One feeling based on truth ; 
Amid the maze of petty life, 
A clue whereby to move, 
A spot whereon in toil and strife 
To dare to rest and love. 
So constant as my heart would be, 
So fickle as it must, 
°T were well for others as for me 
*T were dry as summer dust. 
Excitements come, and act and speech 
Flow freely forth ;—but no, 
Nor they, nor aught beside can reach 
The buried world below. 


1841. 1849. 


\ .F 
TO £ZOAOY 


I HAVE seen higher, holier things than 
these, , 
And therefore must to these refuse 
my heart, 





Yet am I panting for a little ease ; 
I'll take, and so depart. 


Ah, hold! the heart is prone to fall 
away, 
Her high and cherished visions to for- 


get, 
And if thou takest, how wilt thou re- 


pay 
So vast, so dread a debt? 


How will the heart, which now thou 
trustest, then 
Corrupt, yet in corruption mindful 
yet 


| Turn ‘with sharp stings upon itself! 


Again, 
Bethink thee of the debt ! 


—Hast thou seen higher, holier things 
than these, 
And therefore must to these thy heart 


refuse ? 
With the true best, alack, how ill 
agrees 


That best that thou would’st choose ! 


The Summum Pulchrum rests in heaven 
above ; 
Do thou, as best thou may’st, thy duty 
do: 
Amid the things allowed thee live and 
love ; 
Some day thou shalt it view. 
1841, 1849. 


QUA CURSUM VENTUS 


AS ships, becalmed at eve, that lay 
With canvas drooping, side by side, 
Two towers of sail at dawn of day 
Are scarce long leagues apart descried; 


When fell the night, upsprung the 
breeze, 
And all the darkling hours they plied, 
Nor dreamt but each the self-same seas 
By each was cleaving, side by side: 


688 


CLOUGH 


H’en so, but why the tale reveal 
Of those, whom year by year un- 
changed, 
Brief absence joined anew to feel, 
Astounded, soul from soul estranged ? 


At dead of night their sails were filled, 
And onward each rejoicing steered— 
Ah, neither blame, for neither willed, 
Or wist, what first with dawn ap- 
peared ! 


To veer, how vain! 
Brave barks! 
too, 
Through winds and tides one compass 
guides— 
To that, and your own selves, be true. 


On, onward strain, 
In light, in darkness 


But O blithe breeze ; and O great seas, 
Though ne’er, that earliest parting 
past, 
On your wide plain they join again, 
Together lead them home at last. 


One port, methought, alike they sought, 
One purpose hold where’er they fare,— 
O bounding breeze, O rushing seas! 
At last, at last, unite them there yi 
1849. 


THE NEW SINAI 


Lo, here is God, and there is God ! 
Believe it not, O Man; 

In such vain-sort to this and that 
The ancient heathen ran : 

Though old Religion shake her head, 
And say in bitter grief, 

The day behold, at first foretold, 
Of atheist unbelief : 

Take better part, with manly heart, 
Thine adult spirit can ; 

Receive it not, believe it not, 
Believe it not, O Man! 


As men at dead of night awaked 
With cries, ‘‘ The king is here,” 

Rush forth and greet whome’er they 

meet, 

Whoe’er shall first appear ; 

And still repeat, to all the street, 
“°Tis he,—the king is here ;” 

The long procession moveth on, 
Each nobler form they see, 

With changeful suit they still salute 
And cry, ‘‘’Tis he, ’tis he!” 


So, even so, when men were young, 
And earth and heaven were new, 


44 


689 


And His immediate presence He 
From human hearts withdrew, 
The soul perplexed and daily vexed 
With sensuous False and True, 
Amazed, bereaved, no less believed, 

And fain would see Him too: 
‘‘He is!” the prophet-tongues pro- 
claimed ; 
In joy and hasty fear, 
‘‘He is!” aloud replied the crowd, 
‘*Is here, and here, and here.” 


‘‘He is! They are!” in distance seen 
On yon Olympus high, 

In those Avernian woods abide 
And walk this azure sky : 

‘‘They are! They are!”—to every 

show 

Its eyes the baby turned, 

And blazes sacrificial, tall, 
On thousand altars burned : 

‘*They are! They are !”—On Sinai’s top 
Far seen the lightnings shone, 

The thunder broke, a trumpet spoke, 
And God said, ‘‘ I am One.” 


God spake it out, ‘‘I, God, am One;” 
The unheeding ages ran. 

And baby-thoughts again, again, 
Have dogged the growing man: 

And as of old from Sinai’s top 
God said that God is One, 

By Science strict so speaks He now 
To tell us, There is None! 

Earth goes by chemic forces ; Heaven’s 
A Mécanique Céleste ! 

And heart and mind of human kind 
A watch-work as the rest ! 


Is this a Voice, as was the Voice, 
Whose speaking told abroad, 

When thunder pealed, and mountain 

reeled, 

The ancient truth of God ? 

Ah, not the Voice; ’tis but the cloud, 
The outer-darkness dense, 

Where image none, nor e’er was seen 
Similitude of sense. 

Tis but the cloudy darkness dense 
That wrapt the Mount around ; 

While in amaze the people stays, 
To hear the Coming Sound. 


Is there no prophet-soul the while 
To dare, sublimely meek, 

Within the shroud of blackest cloud 
The Deity to seek ? 

"Midst atheistic systems dark, 
And darker hearts’ despair, 

That soul has heard perchance His word, 


690 


And on the dusky air 


His skirts, as passed He by, to see 
Hath strained on their behalf, 

Who on the plain, with dance amain, 
Adore the Golden Calf. 


Tis but the cloudy darkness dense ; 
Though blank the tale it tells, 

No God, no Truth! yet He, in sooth, 
Is there—within it dwells ; 

Within the sceptic darkness deep 
He dwells that none may see, 

Till idol forms and idle thoughts 
Have passed and ceased to be: 

No God, no Truth! ah though, in sooth 
So stand the doctrine’s half : 

On Egypt’s track return not back, 
Nor own the Golden Calf. 


Take better part, with manlier heart, 
Thine adult spirit can ; 

No God, no Truth, receive it ne’er— 
Believe it ne’er—O Man! 

But turn not then to seek again 
What first the ill began ; 

No God, it saith ; ah, wait in faith 
God’s self-compteting plan ; 

Receive it not, but leave it not, 
And wait it out, O man! 


“The Man that went the cloud within 
Is gone and vanished quite ; 

He cometh not,” the people cries, 
‘‘ Nor bringeth God to sight : 

Lo these thy gods, that safety give, 
Adore and keep the feast !” 

Deluding and deluded cries 
The Prophet’s brother-Priest : 

And Israel all bows down to fall 
Before the gilded beast. 


Devout, indeed! that priestly creed, 
O Man, reject as sin ; 

The clouded hill attend thou still, 
And him that went within. 

He yet shall bring some worthy thing 
For waiting souls to see: 

Some sacred word that he hath heard 
Their light and life shall be ; 

Some lofty part, than which the heart 
Adopt no nobler can, 

Thou shalt receive, thou shalt believe 
And thou shalt do, O Man! 

1845. 1869. 


THE QUESTIONING SPIRIT 


THE human spirits saw I on a day, 
Sitting and looking each a differ ent way ; 
And hardly tasking, subtly questioning, 


BRITISH POETS 


Another spirit went around the ring 
To each and each: and as he ceased his 


say, 
Each after each, I heard them singly 
sing, 
Some querulously high, some softly, 
sadly low, 
We know not—what avails to know? 
Weknow not—wherefore need we know? 
This answer gave they still unto his suing, 
We know not, let us do as we are doing. 
Dost thou not know that these things 
only seem ?— 
I know not, let me dream my dream. 
Are dust and ashes fit to make a 
treasure ?— 


I know not, let me take my pleasure. 

What shall avail the knowledge thou hast 
sought ?—- 

I know not, let me think my thought. 

What is the end of strife ?— 

I know not, let me live my life. 

How many days or e’er thou mean’st to 
move ?— 

I know not, let me love my love. 

Were not things old once new ?— 

I know not, let me do as others do. 

And when the rest were over past, 

I know not, I will do my duty, said the 
last. 


Thy duty do? rejoined the voice, 

Ah, do it, do it, and rejoice ; 

But shalt thou then, when all is anne 
Enjoy a love, embrace a beauty 

Like these, that may be seen and won 
In life, whose course will then be run ; 
Or wilt thou be where there is none ? 
I know not, I will do my duty. 


And taking up the word around, above, 
below, 

Some querulously high, 
sadly low, 

We know not, sang they all, nor ever 
need we know. 

We know not, sang they, what avails to 
know ? 

Whereat the questioning spirit, some 
short space, 

Though unabashed, stood quiet in his 
place. 

But as the echoing chorus died away 

And to their dreams the rest returned 
apace, 

By De one spirit Isaw him kneeling 
ow, 

And in a silvery whisper heard him say : 


some softly, 


CLOUGH 


691 





Truly, thou know’st not, and thou 
need’st not know ; 

Hope only, hope thou, and _ believe al- 
way ; 

Lalso know not, and I need not know, 

Only with questionings pass I to and 


fro, 
Perplexing these that sleep, and in their 
folly 
Imbreeding doubt and sceptic melan- 
choly ; 
Till that, their dreams deserting, they 
with me 
Come all to this true ignorance and 
thee. 1847. 1862. 
BETHESDA 
A SEQUEL 


I SAW again the spirits on a day, 

Where on the earth in mournful case 
they lay ; 

Five porches were there, and a pool, and 


round, 

Huddling in blankets, strewn upon the 
ground, 

Tied-up and bandaged, weary, sore and 
spent, 

The maimed and halt, diseased and im- 
potent. iS 

_For a great angel came, ’t was said, and 

stirred 

The pool at certain seasons, and the 
word 

Was, with this people of the sick, that 
they 


Who in the waters here their limbs 
should lay 

Before the motion on the surface ceased 

Should of their torment straightway be 
released. 

So with shrunk bodies and with heads 
down-dropped, 

Stretched on the steps, 
lars propped, 

Watching by day and listening through 
the night, 

They filled the place, a miserable sight. 


And I beheld that on the stony floor 

He too, that spoke of duty once before, 

No otherwise than: others here to-day, 

Foredone and sick and sadly muttering 
lay. 

‘<1 know not, I will do—what is it I 
would say : 

What was that word which once suf- 
ficed alone for all, 


and at the pil- 


Which now I seek in vain, and never 
can recall ?” 

And then, as weary of in vain renew- 
ing 

His question, thus his mournful thought 
pursuing, 

‘* T know not. I must do as other men 
are doing.” 


But ae the waters of that pool might 
e 
Of Lethe were they, or Philosophy ; 
And whether he, long waiting, did at- 
tain 
Deliverance from the burden of his pain 
There with the rest ; or whether, yet 


before, 

Some more diviner stranger passed the 
door 

With his small company into that sad 
place, 

And breathing hope into the sick man’s 
face, [ go, 


Bade him take up his bed, and rise and 

What the end were, and whether it 
were SO, 

Further than this I saw not, neither 
know. 1849. 1862. 


FROM AMOURS DE VOYAGE 
EN ROUTE 


Over the great windy waters, and over 
the clear-crested summits, 
Unto the sun and the sky, and unto the 
perfecter earth, 
Come, let us go,—to a land wherein gods 
of the old time wandered, 
Where every breath even now changes 
to ether divine. 
Come let us go; though withal a voice 
whisper, ** The world that we live in, 
Whithersoever we turn, stillis the same 
narrow eridb ; 
‘Tis but to prove limitation, and measure 
a cord, that we travel ; 


1Clough’s long poem in hexameters, The 
Bothie of Tober-Na-Vuolich, interesting as it is, 
is of too little importance and poetic value in 
proportion to its length, to be included in these 
selections ; and no parts of it are detachable as 
extracts. Some examples of Clough’s use of 
hexameters (and elegiacs) may however be taken 
from his other long poem, the Amours de Voy- 
age, which suffer comparatively little in being 
separated from their context, and are equally 
characteristic of some of Clough’s moods. They 
are also interesting as a contrast to Byron’s 
verses on Rome, in Childe Harold and elsewhere. 
On the Amours de Voyage, see especially Bage- 
hot’s Essay on Clough. 


692 


BRITISH POETS 





Let who would ‘scape and be free go to 
his chamber and think ; 
*Tis but to change idle fancies for 
memories wilfully falser ; 
’Tis but to go and have been.”—Come, 
little bark! let us go. 


ROME 


ROME disappoints me still; but I shrink 
and adapt myself to it. 

Somehow a tyrannous sense of a super- 
incumbent oppression 

Still, wherever I go, accompanies ever, 
and makes me 

Feel like a tree (shall I say?) buried 
under a ruin of brickwork 

Rome, believe me, my friend, is like its 
own Monte Testaceo, 

Merely a marvelous mass of broken and 
castaway wine-pots. 

Ye gods! what do I want with this rub- 
bish of ages departed, 

Things that Nature abhors, the experi- 
ments that she has failed in ? 

What dol find in the Forum? Anarch- 
way and two or three pillars. 

Well, but St. Peter’s? Alas, Bernini 
has filled it with sculpture ! 

No one can cavil, I grant, at the size of 
the great Coliseum. 

Doubtless the notion of grand and capa- 
cious and massive amusement, 

This the old Romans had; but tell me, 
is this an idea? 

Yet of solidity much, but of splendor 
little is extant : 

‘* Brickwork I found thee, and marble I 
left thee !” their Emperor vaunted ; 

‘* Marble I thought thee, and brickwork 
I find thee!” the Tourist may answer. 


THE PANTHEON 


No, great Dome of Agrippa, thou art not 
Christian ! canst not, 

Strip and replaster and daub and do 
what they will with thee, be so! 

Here underneath the great porch of 
colossal Corinthian columns, 

Here as I walk, do 1 dream of the Chris- 
tian belfries above them? 

Or, on a benchas I sit and abide for long 
hours, till thy whole vast 

Round grows dim as in dreams to my 
eyes, I repeople thy niches, 

Not with the Martyrs, and Saints, and 
Confessors, and Virgins, and children, 

But with the mightier forms of an older, 
austerer worship ; 


And I recite to myself, how 
Kager for battle here 
Stood Vulcan, here matronal Juno, 
And with the bow to his shoulder 
faithful 
He, who with pure dew laveth of Castaly 
His flowing locks, who holdeth of Lycia 
The oak forest and the wood that bore 
him, 
Delos’ and Patara’s own Apollo. 


ON MONTORIO’S HEIGHT 


TIBUR is beautiful, too, and the orchard 
slopes, and the Anio 

Falling, falling yet, to the ancient lyri- 
cal cadence ; 

Tibur and Anio’s tide; and cool from 
Lucretilis ever, 

With the Digentian stream, and with 
the Bandusian fountain, 

Folded in Sabine recesses, the valley and 
villa of Horace :— . 

So not seeing I sang; so seeing and lis- 
tening say I, 

Here as I sit by the stream, as I gaze at 
the cell of the Sibyl, 

Here with Albunea’s homeand the grove 
of Tiburnus beside me; 

Tivoli beautiful is,and musical, O Tev- 
erone, 

Dashing from mountain to plain, thy 
parted impetuous waters, 

Tivoli’s waters and rocks; and fair unto 
Monte Gennaro 

(Haunt, even yet, I must think, as I 
wander and gaze, of the shadows, 

Faded and pale, yetimmortal, of Faunus, 
the Nymphs, and the Graces), 

Fair in itself, and yet fairer with human 
completing creations, 

Folded in Sabine recesses the valley and 
villa of Horace :— 

So not seeing I sang; so now—Nor see- 
ing, nor hearing, 

Neither by waterfall lulled, nor folded 
in sylvan embraces, 

Neither by cell of the Sibyl, nor stepping 
the Monte Gennaro, 

Seated on Anio’s bank, nor sipping 
Bandusian waters, 

But on Montorio’s height, looking down 
on the tile-clad streets, the 

Cupolas, crosses, and domes, the bushes 
and kitchen-gardens, 

Which, by the grace of the Tibur, pro- 
claim themselves Rome of the 
Romans,— 

But on Montorio’s height, looking forth 
to the vapory mountains, 


CLOUGH 


Cheating the prisoner Hope with illu- 
sions of vision and fancy,— 

But on Montorio’s height, with these 
weary soldiers by me, 

Waiting till Oudinot enter, to reinstate 
Pope and Tourist. 


THE REAL QUESTION 


Action will furnish belief,—but will that 


belief be the true, one? 

This is the point, you know. 
it doesn’t much matter. 

What one wants, I suppose, is to prede- 
termine the action, 

So as to make it entail, not a chance be- 
lef, but the true one. 

Out of the question, you say; if a thing 
isn’t wrong we may do it. 

Ah! but this wrong, you see—but I do 
not know that it matters... . 


However, 


SCEPTIC MOODS 


Rok is fallen, I hear, the gallant Medi- 
ci taken, 

Noble Manara slain, and Garibaldi has 
lost 71 Moro ;— 

Rome is fallen ; and fallen, or falling, 
heroical Venice. 

I, meanwhile, for the loss of a single 
small chit of a girl, sit 

Moping and mourning here,—for her, 
and myself much smaller. 

Whither depart the souls of the brave 

that die in the battle, 

Die in the lost, lost fight, for the cause 
that perishes with them ? 

Are they upborne from the field on the 
slumberous pinions of angels 

Unto a far-off home, where the weary 
rest from their labor, 
And the deep wounds are healed, and 
the bitter and burning moisture 
Wiped from the generous eyes? or do 
they linger, unhappy, 

Pining, and haunting the grave of their 
by-gone hope and endeavor ? 

All declamation, alas! though I talk, 

I care not for Rome nor 

Italy ; feebly and faintly, and but with 
the lips, can lament the 

Wreck of the Lombard youth, and the 
victory of the oppressor. 

Whither depart the brave !—God knows ; 
I certainly do not. 


ENVOI 


So go forth to the world, to the good re- 
port and the evil ! 


693 


Go, little book ! thy tale, is it not evil 
and good ? 
Go, and if strangers revile, pass quietly 
by without answer. 
Go, and if curious friends ask of thy 
rearing and age, 
Say, ‘I am flitting about many years 
from brain unto brain of 
Feeble and restless youths born to in- 
glorious days : 
But,” so finish the word, ** [was writ ina 
Roman chamber, 
When from Janiculan heights thun- 
dered the cannon of France.” 
| 1848-1849. 1858. 
PESCHIERA 


WHAT voice did on my spirit fall, 
Peschiera, when thy bridge | crost ? 
**°Tis better to have fought and lost, 
Than never to have fought at all.” 


The tricolor—a trampled rag— 

Lies, dirt and dust; the lines I track 
By sentry boxes yellow-black, 

Lead up to no Italian flag. 


I see the Croat soldier stand 

Upon the grass of your redoubts ; 
The eagle with his black wings flouts 
The breadth and beauty of your land. 


Yet not in vain, although in vain, 
O men of Brescia, on the day 

Of loss past hope, I heard you say 
Your welcome to the noble pain. 


You say, ‘Since so it is,—good-bye 
Sweet life, high hope; but whatsoe’er 
May be, or must, no tongue shall dare 
To tell, ‘ The Lombard feared to die !’” 


You said (there shall be answer fit), 
‘¢ And if our children must obey, 
They must: but thinking on this day 
’T will less debase them to submit.” 


You said (Oh not in vain you said), 

‘¢ Haste, brothers, haste, while yet we 
may ; 

The hours ebb fast of this one day 

When blood may yet be nobly shed.” 


Ah! not for idle hatred, not 

For honor, fame, nor self-applause, 
But for the glory of the cause, 
You did, what will not be forgot. 


And though the stranger stand, ’tis true, 
By force and fortune’s right he stands ; 


694 


By fortune, which is in God’s hands, 
And strength, which yet shall spring in 
you. 


This voice did on my spirit fall, 
Peschiera, when thy bridge I crost, 
“°Tis better to have fought and lost, 
Than never to have fought at all.” 
1849, 1862. 


ALTERAM PARTEM 


OR shall I say, Vain word, false thought, 
Since Prudence hath her martyrs too, 
And Wisdom dictates not to do. 

Till doing shall be not for nought? 


Not ours to give or lose is life : 

Will Nature, when her brave ones fall, 
Remake her work? or songs recall 
Death’s victim slain in useless strife ? 


That rivers flow into the sea 

Is loss and waste, the foolish say, 

Nor know that back they find their way, 
Unseen, to where they wont to be. 


Showers fall upon the hills, springs flow, 
The river runneth still at hand, 

Brave men are born into the land, 

And whence the foolish do not know. 


No! no vain voice did on me fall, 
Peschiera, when thy bridge I crost, 
‘«°T' is better to have fought and lost, 
Than never to have fought at all.” 
1849. 1862. 


IN THE DEPTHS 


IT is not sweet content, be sure, 
That moves the nobler Muse to song, 
Yet when could truth come whole and 
pure 
From hearts that inly writhe with 
wrong ? 


"T is not the calm and peaceful breast 
That sees or reads the problem true ; 

They only know, on whom ’t has prest 
Too hard to hope to solve it too. 


Our ills are worse than at their ease 
These blameless happy souls suspect, 

They only study the disease, 
Alas, who live not to detect. 1862. 


THE LATEST DECALOGUE 


THOU shalt have one God only ; who 
Would be at the expense of two? 


BRITISH POETS 


No graven images may be 
Worshipped, except the currency : 
Swear not at all; for, for thy curse 
Thine enemy is none the worse: 
At church on Sunday to attend 
Will serve to keep the world thy friend : 
Honor thy parents : that is, all 
From whom advancement may befall ; 
Thou shalt not kill; but need’st not 

strive 
Officiously to keep alive: 
Do not adultery commit ; 
Advantage rarely comes of it: 
Thou shalt not steal; an empty feat, 
When it ’s so lucrative to cheat : 
Bear not false witness ; let the lie 
Have time on its own wings to fly : 
Thou shalt not covet, but tradition 
Approves ali forms of competition. 

1 


FROM DIPSYCHUS 


‘* THERE is no God,” the wicked saith, 
‘* And truly it ’s a blessing, 

For what He might have done with us 
It ’s better only guessing.” 


‘* There is no God,” a youngster thinks, 
‘‘Or really, if there may be, 

He surely did not mean a man 
Always to be a baby.” 


‘*There is no God, or if there is,” 

The tradesman thinks, ‘* ’*t were funny 
If He should take it ill in me 

To make a little money.” 


‘* Whether there be,” the rich man says. 
‘* It matters very little, 

For I and mine, thank somebody, 
Are not in want of victual.” 


Some others, also, to themselves. 
Who scarce so much as doubt it, 
Think there is none, when they are well 
And do not think about it. 


But country folks who live beneath 
The shadow of the steeple ; 

The parson and the parson’s wife, 
And mostly married people ; 


Youths green and happy in first love, 
So thankful for illusion ; 

And men caught out in what the world 
Calls guilt, in first confusion ; 


And almost every one when age, 
Disease, or sorrows strike him, 


CLOUGH 


Inclines to think there is a God, 
Or something very like Him. 


1849. 1862. 





Our gaieties, our luxuries, 
Our pleasures and our glee, 
Mere insolence and wantonness, 
Alas ! they feel to me. 


How shall I laugh and sing and dance? 
My very heart recoils, 

While here to give my mirth a chance 
A hungry brother toils. 


The joy that does not spring from joy 
Which I in others see, 
How can I venture to employ, 


Or find it joy forme? 849, 1869, 


This world is very odd we see, 
We do not comprehend it ; 
But in one fact we all agree, 
God won’t, and we can’t mend it. 


Being common sense, it can’t be sin 
To take it as I find it ; 

The pleasure to take pleasure in ; 
The pain, try not to mind it. 


These juicy meats, this flashing wine, 
' May be an unreal mere appearance ; 
Only—for my inside, in fine, 

They have a singular coherence. 


Oh yes, my pensive youth, abstain ; 
And any empty sick sensation, 
Remember, anything like pain 
Is only your imagination. 


Trust me, I’ve read your German sage 
To far more purpose e’er than you did ; 
You find it in his wisest page, 
Whom God deludes is well deluded. 
1849. 1869. 





Where are the great, whom thou 
would’st wish to praise thee ? 
Where are the pure, whom thou would’st 
choose to love thee ? 
Where are the brave, to stand supreme 
above thee, 
Whose high commands would cheer, 
whose chiding raise thee? 
Seek, seeker, in thyself ; submit to 
find 


695 


In the stones, bread, and life in the 
blank mind. IS49, 1862. 


When the enemy is near thee, 
Call on us ! 
In our hands we will upbear thee, 
He shall neither scathe nor scare thee, 
He shall fly thee, and shall fear thee. 
Call on us! 
Call when all good friends have left thee, 
Of all good sights and sounds bereft thee ; 
Call when hope and heart are sinking, 
And the brain is sick with thinking, 
Help, O help! 
Call, and following close behind thee 
There shall haste, and there shall find 
thee, 
Help, sure help. 


When the panic comes upon thee, 

When necessity seems on thee, 

Hope and choice have all forgone thee, 

Fate and force are closing o’er thee, 

And but one way stands before thee— 
Call on us! 

Oh, and if thou dost not call, 

Be but faithful, that is all. 

Go right on, and close behind thee 

There shall follow still and find thee, 
Help, sure help. 

1849. 1862. 


SAY NOT THE STRUGGLE NOUGHT 
AV AILETH 


Say not the struggle nought availeth, 
The labor and the wounds are vain, 
The enemy faints not, nor faileth, 
And as things have been they remain. 


If hopes were dupes, fears may be lars; 
It may be, in yon smoke concealed, 
Your comrades chase e’en now the fliers, 
And, but for you, possess the field. 


For while the tired waves, vainly break- 
ing, 
Seem here no painful inch to gain, 
Far back, through creeks and inlets 
making, 
Comes silent, flooding in, the main. 


And not by eastern windows only, 
When daylight comes, comes in the 
light, [slowly, 
In front, the sun climbs slow, how 
But westward, look, the land is bright. 
1849. 1862, 


696 


BRITISH POETS 





EASTER DAY 
NAPLES, 1849 


THROUGH the great sinful streets of 
Naples as I passed, 
With fiercer heat than flamed above 
my head 
My oars was hot within me; till at 
ast 
My brain was lightened when my 
tongue had said— 
Christ is not risen ! 
Christ is not risen, no—— 
He lies and moulders low ; 
Christ is not risen ! 


What though the stone were rolled 
away, and though 
The grave found empty there ?— 
If not there, then elsewhere ; 
If not where Joseph laid Him first, why 
then 
Where other men 
Translaid Him after, 
clay. 
Long ere to-day 
Corruption that sad perfect work hath 
done, 
Which here she scarcely, ey had 
begun : 
The foul engendered worm 
Feeds on the flesh of the life- -giving 
form 
Of our most Holy and Anointed One. 
He is not risen, no— 
He lies and moulders low ; 
Christ is not risen ! 


in some humbler 


What if the women, ere the dawn was 
gray, 

Saw one or more great angels, as they 
say 

(Angels, or Him himself) ? Yet neither 
there, nor then, 

Nor afterwards, nor elsewhere, nor at 
all, 

Hath He appeared to Peter or the Ten ; 

Nor save in thunderous terror, to blind 
Saul ; 

Save in an after Gospel and late Creed, 

He is not risen, indeed,— 
Christ is not risen! 


Or, what if e’en, as runs a tale, the Ten 
Saw, heard, and touched, again and yet 
again ? 
What if at Emmaiis’ inn, and by Caper- 
naum’s Lake, 
Came One, the bread that brake— 


Came One that spake as never mortal 
spake, 
And with them ate, and drank, and 
stood, and walked about ? 
Ah? ‘* some ” did well to ‘‘ doubt !” 
Ah! the true Christ, while these things 
came to pass, 
Nor heard, nor spake, nor walked, nor 
lived, alas! 
He was not risen, no— 
He Jay and mouldered low, 
Christ was not risen ! 


As circulates in some great city crowd 
A rumor changeful, vague, impor- 
tunate, and loud, 


-From no determined centre or of fact ~ 


Or authorship exact, 
Which no man can deny 

Nor verify ; 
So spread the wondrous fame ; 
He all the same 
Lay senseless, mouldering, low: 
He was not risen, no— 

Christ was not risen ! 


Ashes to ashes, dust to dust ; 

As of the unjust, also of the just— 
Yea, of that Just One, too! 

This is the one sad Gospel that is true-- 
Christ is not risen ! 


Is He not risen, and shall we not rise ? 
Oh, we unwise ! 
What did we dream, what wake \ we to 
discover ? 
Ye hills, fall on us, and ye mountains, 
cover! 
In darkness and great gloom 
Come ere we thought it is owr day of 
doom ; 
From the cursed world, which is one 
tomb, 
Christ is not risen! - 


Eat, drink, and play, and think that this 
is bliss : 
There is no heaven but this ; 
There is no hell, 
Save earth, which serves the purpose 
doubly well, 
Seeing it visits still 
With equalest apportionment of ill 
Both good and bad alike, and brings to 
one same dust 
The unjust and the just 
With Christ, who is not risen. 


Eat, drink, and die, for we are souls be- 
reaved : 


CLOUGH 


Of all the creatures under heaven’s 
wide cope 
We are most hopeless, who had once 
most hope, [ lieved. 
And most beliefless, that had most be- 
Ashes to ashes, dust to dust ; 
As of the unjust, also of the just— 
Yea, of that Just One too! 
It is the one sad Gospel that is true— 
Christ is not risen ! 


Weep not beside the tomb, 
Ye women, unto whom [Eharn : 
He was great solace while ye tended 
Ye who with napkin o’er the head 
And folds of linen round each wounded 
limb 
Laid out the Sacred Dead ; 
And thou that bar’st Him in thy won- 
dering womb ; 
Yea, Daughters of Jerusalem, depart, 
Bind up as best ye may your own sad 
bleeding heart: 


Go to your homes, your living children 
tend, 
Your earthly spouses love ; 
Set your affections not on things 
above, 
Which moth and rust corrupt, which 
quickliest come to end : 
Or pray, if pray ye must, and pray, if 
pray ye can, 
For death ; since dead is He whom ye 
deemed more than man, 
Who is not risen: no 
But lies and moulders low— 
Who is not risen ! 





Ye men of Galilee ! 
Why stand ye looking up to heaven, 
where Him ye ne’er may see, 
Neither ascending hence, nor returning 
hither again? 
Ye ignorant and idle fishermen ! 
Hence to your huts, and boats, and in- 
land native shore, 

And catch not men, but fish; 
Whate’er things ye might wish, 
Him neither here nor there ye e’er shall 

meet with more. 
‘Ye poor deluded youths, go home, 
Mend the old nets ye left to roam, 
Tie the split oar, patch the torn sail : 
It was indeed an ‘‘ idle tale ”— 
He was not risen ! 
And, oh, good men of ages yet to be, 
Who shall believe because ye did not 
see— 


697 


Oh, be ye warned, be wise! 

Nor more with pleading eyes, 

And sobs of strong desire, 

Unto the empty vacant void aspire, 
Seeking another and impossible birth 
Thatis not of your own, and only mother 

earth. 
But if there is no other life for you, 
Sit down and be content, since this must 
even do; 
He is not risen! 
One look, and then depart, 
Ye humble and ye holy men of 
heart ; 
And ye! ye ministers and stewards of a 
Word j 
Which ye would preach, because another 
heard— 

Ye worshippers of that ye do not 

know, 

Take these things hence and go :— 

He is not risen ! 


Here, on our Easter Day 
We rise, we come, and lo! we find Him 
not, . 
Gardener nor other, on the sacred spot : 
Where they have laid Him there is none 
to say ; 


-No sound, nor in, nor out—no word 


Of where to seek the dead or meet the 
living Lord. 

There is no glistering of an angel’s 
wings, 


There is no voice of heavenly clear be- 
hest : 

Let us go hence, and think upon these 
things 


In silence, which is best. 

Is He not risen? No— 

But lies and moulders low ? 
Christ is not risen ? 


EASTER DAY 


Il 


So in the sinful streets, abstracted and 
alone, 

I with my secret self held communing 
of mine own. 

So in the southern city 

tongue 

Of one that somewhat overwildly sung, 

But in a later hour I sat and heard 

Another voice that spake—another 
graver word. 

Weep not, it bade, whatever hath been 
said, 

Though He be dead, He is not dead. 


spake the 


698 


In the true creed 
He is yet risen indeed ; 
Christ is yet risen. 


Weep not beside His Tomb, 
Ye women unto whom 
He was great comfort and yet greater 


grief ; 
Nor ye, ye faithful few that wont with 
Him to roam, 


Seek sadly what for Him ye left, go 


hopeless to your home ; 
Nor ye despair, ye sharers yet to be of 

their belief ; 

Though He be dead, He is not dead, 

Nor gone, though fled, 

Not lost, though vanished ; 

Though He return not, though 

He lies and moulders low ; 

In the true creed 

He is yet risen indeed ; 
Christ is yet risen. 


Sit if ye will, sit down upon the ground, 
Yet not to weep and wail, but calmly 
look around. 
Whate’er befell, 
Earth is not hell; 
Now, too, as when it first began, 
Life is yet life, and man is man. 
For all that breathe beneath the heaven’s 
high cope, 
Joy with grief mixes, with despondence 
hope. 
Hope conquers cowardice, joy grief ; 
Or at least, faith unbelief. 
Though dead, not dead ; 
Not gone, though fled ; 
Not lost, though vanished. 
In the great gospel and true creed, 
He is yet risen indeed ; 
Christ is yetrisen. 1849. 1869. 
HOPE EVERMORE AND BELIEVE! 


HOPE evermore and believe, O man, for 
e’en as thy thought 
So are the things that thou see’st ; 
e’en as thy hope and belief. 
Cowardly art thou and timid? they rise 
to provoke thee against them ; 
Hast thou courage? enough, see them 
exulting to yield. 
Yea, the rough rock, the dull earth, the 
wild sea’s furying waters 
(Violent say’st thou and hard, mighty 
thou think’st to destroy), 
All with ineffable longing are waiting 
their Invader, 


BRITISH POETS 


All, with one varying voice, call to 
him, Come and subdue ; 
Still for their Conqueror call, and, but= 
for the joy of being conquered 
(Rapture they will not forego), dare 
to resist and rebel; 
Still, when resisting and raging, in soft 
undervoice say unto him, . 
Fear not, retire not, O man; hope 
evermore and believe. 
Go from the east to the west, as the sun 
and the stars direct thee, 
Go with the girdle of man, go and 
encompass the earth. 
Not for the gain of the gold; for the 
getting, the hoarding, the having, 
But for the joy of the deed; but for 
the Duty to do. 
Go with the spiritual life, the higher 
volition and action, 
With the great girdle of God, go and 
encompass the earth. 


Go; say not in thy heart, And what 
then were it accomplished, 
Were the wild impulse allayed, what 
were the use or the good ! 
Go, when the instinct is stilled, and 
when the deed is accomplished, 
What thou hast done and shalt do, 
shall be declared to thee then. 
Go with the sun and the stars, and yet 
evermore in thy spirit 
Say to thyself: It is good: yet is there 
better than it. 
This that I see is not all, and this that I 
do is but little ; 
Nevertheless it is good, though there 
is better than it. 1862. 


QUI LABORAT, ORAT 


O ONLY Source of all our light and life, 
Whom as our truth, our strength, we 
see and feel, 
But whom the hours of mortal moral 
strife 
Alone aright reveal ! 


Mine inmost soul, before 
brought, 
Thy presence owns ineffable, divine ; 
Chastised each rebel self-encentered 
thought, 
My will adoreth Thine. 


Thee inly 


With eye down-dropped, if then this 
earthly mind 


CLOUGH 


699 





Speechless remain, or speechless e’en - 


depart ; 
Nor seek to see—for whatof earthly 
kind 
Can see Thee as Thou art ?— 


If well-assured ’tis but profanely bold 
In thought’s abstractest forms to seem 
to see, 
It dare not dare the dread communion 
hold 
In ways unworthy Thee, 


O not unowned, thou shalt unnamed 
forgive, 
In worldly walks the prayerless heart 
prepare ; 
And if in work its life it seem to live, 
Shalt make that work be prayer. 


Nor times shall lack, when while the 
work it plies, 
Unsummoned powers the blinding film 
shall part, 
And scarce by happy tears made dim, 
the eyes 
In recognition start. 


But, asthou willest, give or e’en forbear 
The beatific supersensual sight, 
So, with Thy blessing blessed, that 
humbler prayer 
Approach Thee morn and night. 
1862. 


TS ” 
DPLYOS GAVILYUS 


O THOU whose image in the shrine 

Of human spirits dwells divine ; 

Which from that precinct once con- 
veyed, 

To be to outer day displayed, 

Doth vanish, part, and leave behind 

Mere blank and void of empty mind, 

Which wilful fancy seeks in vain 

With casual shapes to fill again ! 


O Thou that in our bosom’s shrine 

Dost dwell, unknown because divine ! 

I thought to speak, I thought to say, 

‘*The light is here,” ‘‘ behold the way,” 

‘*The voice was thus,” and ‘‘ thus the 
word,” 

And ‘‘ thus I saw,” and “ that I heard,.”— 

But from the lips that half essayed 

The imperfect utterance fell unmade. 


O Thou, in that mysterious shrine 
Enthroned, as I must say, divine ! 

T will not frame one thought of what 
Thou mayest either be or not. 


I will not prate of ** thus” and ‘*‘so,” 
And be profane with ‘** yes” and ‘*‘ no,” 
Enough thatin our soul and heart 
Thou, whatsoe’er Thou may’st be, art. 


Unseen, secure in that high shrine 
Acknowledged present and divine, 

I will not ask some upper air, 

Some future day to place Thee there ; 
Nor say, nor yet deny, such men 

And women saw Thee thus and then: 
Thy name was such, and there or here 


| To him or her Thou didst appear. 


Do only Thou in that dim shrine, 
Unknown or known, remain, divine ; 
There, or if not, at least in eyes 

That scan the fact that round them lies, 
The hand to sway,the judgment guide, 
In sight and sense Thyself divide : 

Be Thou but there,—in soul and heart, 
I will not ask to feel Thou art. 1862. 


‘THROUGH A GLASS DARKLY ” 


WHAT we, when face to face we see 
The Father of our souls, shall be, 
John tells us, doth not yet appear ; 
Ah! did he tell what we are here! 


A mind for thoughts to pass into, 
A heart for loves to travel through, 
Five senses to detect things near, 
Is this the whole that we are here ? 


Rules baffle instincts—instincts rules, 
Wise men are bad—and good are fools, 
Facts evil—wishes vain appear, 

We cannot go, why are we here ? 


O may we for assurance’ sake, 
Some arbitrary judgment take, 
And wilfully pronounce it clear, 
For this or that ’tis we are here ? 


Or is it right, and will it do, 

To pace the sad confusion through, 
And say :—It doth not yet appear, 
What we shall be, what we are here? 


Ab yet, when all is thought and said, 
The heart still overrules the head ; 
Still what we hope we must believe, 
And what is given us receive ; 


Must still believe, for still we hope 
That ina world of larger scope, 
What here is faithfully beguu 
Will be completed, not undone. 


700 





My child, we still must think, when we 
That ampler life together see, 
Some true result will yet appear 
Of what we are, together, here. 1862. 
AH! YET CONSIDER IT AGAIN! 


** OLD things need not be therefore true,” 
O brother men, nor yet the new ; 

Ah! still awhile the old thought retain, 
And yet consider it again ! 


The souls of now two thousand years 
Have laid up here their toils and fears, 
And all the earnings of their pain,— 
Ah, yet consider it again! 


We! what do we see? each a space 

Of some few yards before his face ; 

Does that the whole wide plan explain ? 
Ah, yet consider it again ! 


Alas! the great world goes its way, 
And takes its truth from each new day ; 
They do not quit, nor can retain, 
Far less consider it again. 1851. 1862. 
SONGS IN ABSENCE 


ComME home, come home! and where is 
home for me, [sea ? 
Whose ship is driving o’er the trackless 
To the frail bark here plunging on its 
way, 
To the wild waters, shall I turn and say 
To the plunging bark, or to. the salt sea 
foam, 
You are my home? 


Yields once I walked in, faces once I 
knew, 

Familar things so old my heart believed 
them true, 

These far, far back, behind me lie, be- 
fore 

The dark clouds mutter, and the deep 
seas roar, 

And speak to them that neath and o’er 
them roam 

No words of home. 


Beyond the clouds, beyond the waves 
that roar, 
There may indeed, or may not be a shore, 
Where fields as green, and hands and 
hearts as true, 
The old forgotten semblance may renew, 
And offer exiles driven far o’er the salt 
sea foam 
Another home. 


BRITISH POETS 


. But toil and pain must wear out many a 


day, 

And days bear weeks, and weeks bear 
months away, 

Ere, if at all, the weary traveller hear, 

With accents whispered in his wayworn 
ear, 

A voice he dares to listen to, say, Come 

To thy true home. — 


Come home, come home! and where a 
home hath he [sea ? 
Whose ship is driving o’er the driving 
Through clouds that mutter, and o’er 
waves that roar, [shore 
Say, shall we find, or shall we not, a 
That is, as is not ship or ocean foam, 
Indeed our home? 1852. 1862. 


GREEN fields of England ! wheresoe’er 
Across this watery waste we fare, 
Your image at our hearts we bear, 
Green fields of England, everywhere, 


Sweet eyes in England, I must flee 
Past where the waves’ last confines be, 
Ere your loved smile I cease to see, 
Sweet eyes in England, dear to me. 


Dear home in England, safe and fast 

If but in thee my lot he cast, 

The past shall seem a nothing past 

To thee, dear home, if won at last ; 

Dear home in England, won at last. 
1852. 1862. 


CoME back, come back! behold with 
straining mast 

And swelling sail, behold her steaming 
fast; 

With one new sun to see her voyage oer, 

With morning light to touch her native 
shore. 

Come back ! come back. 


Come back, come back! while westward 
laboring by, 

With sailless yards, a bare black hulk 
we fly. 

See how the gale we fight with sweeps 
her back, 

To our lost home, on our forsaken track. 

Come back, come back. 


Come back, come back! across the fly 
ing foam, 
We hear faint far-off voices call us home : 


CLOUGH 





Come back, ye seem to say; ye seek in 
vain ; 
We went, we sought,:and homeward 
turned again. 
Come back, come back. 


Come back, come back; and whither 
back or why ? ; 

To fan quenched hopes, forsaken schemes 
to try ; 

Walk the old fields; pace the familiar 
street ; 

Dream with the idlers, with the bards 
compete. 

Come back, come back. 


Come back, come back; and whither 
and for what ? 

To finger idly some old Gordian knot, 
Unskilled to sunder, and too weak to 
cleave, 

And with much 
believe. 
Come back, come back. 


toil attain to half- 


Come back, come back; yea back, in- 
deed, do go 

Sighs panting thick, and tears that want 
to flow ; 

Fond fluttering hopes upraise their use- 
less wings, 

And wishes idly struggle in the strings ; 

Come back, come back. 


Come back, come back, more eager than 
the breeze, 
The flying fancies sweep across the seas, 
And lighter far than ocean’s flying foam, 
The heart’s fond message hurries to its 
home. 
Come back, come back. 


Come back, come back! 

Back flies the foam; the hoisted flag 
streams back ; 

The long smoke wavers on the home- 
ward track, 

Back fly with winds things which the 
winds obey, 

The strong ship follows its appointed 
way. 1852. 1862. 


Some future day when what is now is 
not, [ got, 

When all old faults and follies are for- 

And thoughts of difference passed like 
dreams away, 

We'll meet again, upon some future 


day. 


701 


When all that hindered, all that vexed 
_our love, 
As tall rank weeds will climb the blade 
above, 
When all but it has yielded to decay, 
We'll meet again upon some future day. 


When we have proved, each on his 
course alone, 

The wider world, and learned what’s 
now unknown, 

Have made life clear, and worked out 
each a way, 

We'll meet again,—we shall have much 


to say. 
With happier mood, and feelings born 
f anew, 
Our boyhood’s bygone fancies we’ll re- 
view, [play, 


Talk o’er old talks, play as we used to 
And meet again, on many a future day. 


Some day, which oft our hearts shall 
yearn to see, [| be, 
In some far year, though-distant yet to 
Shall we indeed,—ye winds and waters, 
say !— 
Meet yet again, upon some future day ? 
isGe, L502: 





WHERE lies the land to which the ship 
would go? 

Far, far ahead, is all her seamen know. 

And where the land she travels from? 
Away, 

Far, far behind, is all that they can say. 


On sunny noons upon the deck’s smooth 
face, 

Linked arm in arm, how pleasant here 
to pace ; 

Or, o’er the stern reclining, watch below 

The foaming wake far widening as we go. 


On stormy nights when wild north- 
westers rave, 

How proud a thing to fight with wind 
and wave ! 

The dripping sailor on the reeling mast 

Exults to bear, and scorns to wish it past. 


Where lies the land to which the ship 
would go ? 
Far, far ahead, is all her seamen know. 
And where the land she travels from ? 
Away, 
Far, far behind, is all that they can say. 
1852, 1862. 


702 


WERE you with me, or I with you, 

There’s nought, methinks, I might not 
do; 

Could venture here, and venture there, 

And never fear, nor ever care. 


To things before, and things behind, 

Could turn my thoughts, and turn my 
mind, 

On this and that, day after day, 

Could dare to throw myself away. 


Secure, when all was o’er, to find 

My proper thought, my perfect mind, 

And unimpaired receive anew 

My own and better self in you. 
1858, 1862. 


—_——_ 


O SHIP, ship, ship, 
That travellest over the sea, 
What are the tidings, I pray thee, 
Thou bearest hither to me ? 


Are they tidings of comfort and joy, 
That shall make me seem to see 
The sweet lips softly moving 
And whispering love to me? 


Or are they of trouble and grief, 
Kstrangement,. sorrow, and doubt, 
To turn into torture my hopes, 
And drive me from Paradise out ? 


O ship, ship, ship, 
That comest over the sea, 
Whatever it be thou bringest, 
Come quickly with it to me. 
1853, 1869. 


THE STREAM OF LIFE 


O STREAM descending to the sea, 
Thy mossy banks between, 

The flow’rets blow, the grasses grow, 
The leafy trees are green. 


In garden plots the children play, 
The fields the laborers till, 

And houses stand on either hand, 
And thou descendest still. 


O life descending into death, 
Our waking eyes behold, 

Parent and friend thy lapse attend, 
Companions young and old. 


Strong purposes our mind possess, 
Our hearts affections fill, 

We toil and earn, we seek and learn, 
And thou descendest still. 


BRITISH POETS 


O end to which our currents tend, 
Inevitable sea, 

To which we flow, what do we know, 
What shall we guess of thee ? 


A roar we hear upon thy shore, 
As we our course fulfil ; 

Scarce we divine a sun will shine 
And be above us still. 1862, 


‘WITH WHOM IS NO VARIABLE- 
NESS, NEITHER SHADOW OF 
TURNING 


It fortifies my soul to know 

That, though I perish, Truth is so: 
That, howsoe’er I stray and range, 
Whate’er I do, Thou dost not change. 
I steadier step when I recall 

That, if I slip, Thou dost not fall. 1862. 


ITE .DOMUM SATURA, VENIT 
HESPERUS 


THE skies have sunk, and hid the upper 
snow 

(Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
La Palie), 

The rainy clouds are filing fast below, 

And wet will be the path, and wet shall 
we. 

Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
La Palie. 


Ah dear, and where is he, a year agone, 

Who stepped beside and cheered us on 
and on? 

My sweetheart wanders far away from 
me, 

In foreign land or on a foreign sea. 

Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
La Palie. 


The lightning zigzags shoot across the 
sky 

(Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
La Palie), 

And through the vale the rains go 
sweeping by ; 

Ah me, and when in shelter shall we be ? 

Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
La Pale. 


Cold, dreary cold, the stormy winds feel 
they 

O’er foreign lands and foreign seas that 
stray 

(Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
La Palie). 


CLOUGH 


And doth hee’er, I wonder, bring to 


mind 

The pleasant huts and herds he left be- 
hind ? 

And doth he sometimes in his slumbering 
see 

The feeding kine, and doth he think of 
me, 

My sweetheart wandering whereso’er it 
be? 

Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
La Palie. 

The thunder bellows far from snow to 
snow 

(Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
‘La Palie), 

And Joud and louder roars the flood be- 
low. 


Heigho! but soon in shelter shall we be: 
Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
La Palie), 


Or shall he find before his term be sped, 

Some comelier maid that he shall wish 
to wed ? 

(Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
La Palie.) 

For weary is work, and weary day by day 

To have your comfort miles on miles 
away. 

Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
La Palie. 


Or may it be that I shall find my mate, 
And he returning see himself too late ? 
For work we must, and what we see, we 


see, 
And God he knows, and what must be, 


must be 

When sweethearts wander far away 
from me. 

Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
La Palie. 


The sky behind is brightening up anew 
(Home, Rose, and home, Provence and 
La Palie), 
The rain is ending, and our journey too: 
Heigho ! aha! for here at home are we :— 
In, Rose, and in, Provenceand La Palie. 
1862. 


CURRENTE CALAMO 


QUICK, painter, quick, the moment seize 
Amid the snowy Pyrenees ; 

More evanescent than the snow, 

The pictures come, are seen, and go: 
Quick, quick, currente calamo. 


793 


L. 


I do not ask the tints that fill 
The gate of day ’twixt hill and hill ; 
IT ask not for the hues that fleet 
Above the distant peaks ; my feet 
Are on a poplar-bordered road, 
Where with a saddle and a load 
A donkey, old and ashen-gray, 
Reluctant works his dusty way. 
Before him, still with might and main 
Pulling his rope, the rustic rein, 
A girl: before both him and me, 
Frequent she turns and lets me see, 
Unconscious, lets ine scan and trace 
The sunny darkness of her face 
And outlines full of southern grace. 
Following I notice, yet and yet, 
Her olive skin, dark eyes deep set, 
And black, and blacker e’en than jet, 
The escaping hair that scantly showed, 
Since o’er it in the country mode, 
For winter warmth and summer shade, 
The lap of scarlet cloth is laid. 
And then, back-falling from the head, 
A crimson kerchief overspread 
Her jacket blue; thence passing down, 
A skirt of darkest yellow-brown, 
Coarse stuff, allowing to the view 
The smooth limb to the woollen shoe. 
But who—here ’s some one following 
too,-- 
A priest, and reading at his book! 
Read on, O priest, and do not look ; 
Consider,—she is but a child,— 
Yet might your fancy be beguiled. 
Read on, O priest, and pass and go! 
But see, succeeding in a row, 
Two, three, and four, a motley train, 
Musicians wandering back to Spain ; 
With fiddle and with tambourine, 
A man with women following seen. 
What dresses, ribbon ends, and flowers! 
And,— sight to wonder at for hours,—- 
The man,---to Phillip has he sat ?— 
With butterfly-like velvet hat ; 
One dame his big bassoon conveys, 
On one his gentle arm he lays; 
They stop, and look, and something say, 
And to ‘** Espafia” ask the way. 
But while I speak, and point them 
on, 
Alas! my dearer friends are gone ; 
The dark-eyed maiden and the ass 
Have had the time the bridge to pass. 
Vainly, beyond it far descried, 
Adieu, and peace with you abide, 
Gray donkey, and your beauteous guide. 
The pictures come, the pictures go, 
Quick, quick, currente calamo. 
From Mari Magno, 1862. 


Loa 


BRITISH VEOETS 





COME, POET, COME! 


ComE, Poet, come ! 

A thousand laborers ply their task, 
And what it tends to scarcely ask, 
And trembling thinkers on the brink 
Shiver, and know not how to think. 
To tell the purport of their pain, 
And what our silly joys contain ; 

In lasting lineaments portray 

The substance of the shadowy day ; 
Our real and inner deeds rehearse, 
And make our meaning clear in verse: 
Come, Poet, come! for but in vain 
We do the work or feel the pain, 
And gather up the seeming gain, 
Unless before the end thou come 

To take, ere they are lost, their sum. 


Come, Poet, come ! 

To give an utterance to the dumb, 

And make vain babblers silent, come ; 

A thousand dupes point. here and there, 

Bewildered by the show and glare ; 

And wise men half have learned to 
doubt 

Whether we are not best without. 

Come, Poet; both but wait to see 

Their error proved to them in thee. 


Come, Poet, come! 
In vain I seem to call. And yet 
Think not the living times forget. 
Ages of heroes fought and fell 
That Homer in the end might tell ; 
O’er grovelling generations past 
Upstood the Doric fane at last ; 
And countless hearts on countless years 
Had wasted thoughts, and hopes, and 

fears, 
Rude laughter and unmeaning tears, 
Ere England Shakespeare saw, or Rome 
The pure perfection of her dome. 
Others, I doubt not, if not we, 
The issue of our toils shall see ; 
Young children gather as their own 
The harvest that the dead had sown, 
The dead forgotten and unknown. 

1862. 


THE HIDDEN LOVE 


O LET me love my love unto myself alone, 

And know my knowledge to the world 
unknown ; 

No witness to my vision call, 

Beholding. unbeheld of all ; 

And worship Thee, with Thee with- 
drawn apart, 


Whoe’er, Whate’er Thou art, 
Within the closest veil of mine own in- 
most heart. 


What is it then to me 

If others are inquisitive to see ? 

Why souie I quit my place to go and 
as 

If other men are working at their task? | 

Leave my own buried roots to go 

And see that brother plants shall grow ; 

And turn away from Thee, O Thou most 
Holy Light 

To look if other orbs their orbits keep 
aright, ; 

Around their proper sun, 

Deserting Thee, and being undone. 


O let me love my love unto myself alone, 

And know my knowledge to the world 
unknown ; 

And worship Thee, O hid One, O much 
sought, 

As but man can or ought, 

Within the abstracted’st shrine of my 
least breathed on thought. 


Better it were, thou sayest, to consent ; 

Feast while we may, and live ere life be 
spent ; 

Close up clear eyes, and call the un- 
stable sure, 

The unlovely lovely, and the filthy pure ; 

In self-belyings, self-deceivings roll, 

And lose in Action, Passion, Talk, the 
soul. 


Nay, better far tomark off thus much 
air, 
And call it Heaven: place bliss and 
glory there ; [sky, 
Fix perfect homes in the unsubstantial 
And say, what is not, will be by-and-bye. 
1869. 


PERCHE PENSA? PENSANDO 9’ IN- 
VECCHIA 


To spend uncounted years of pain, 
Again, again, and yet again, 
In working out in heart and brain 
The problem of our being here ; 
To gather facts from far and near, 
Upon the mind to hold them clear, 
And, knowing more may yet appear, 
Unto one’s latest breath to fear, 
The premature result to draw— 
Is this the object, end and law, 
And purpose of our being here ? 
1869, 


CLOUGH 





LIFE IS STRUGGLE 


To wear out heart, and nerves, and 
brain, 

And give oneself a world of pain ; 
Be eager, angry, fierce, and hot, 
Imperious, supple—God knows what, 
For what’s all one to have or not ; » 
O false, unwise, absurd, and vain ! 
For ’tis not joy, it is not gain, 
It is not in itself a bliss, 
Only it is precisely this 

That keeps us all alive. 


To say we truly feel the pain, 
And quite are sinking with the strain ;— 
Entirely, simply, undeceived, 
Believe, and say we ne’er believed 
The object, e’en were it achieved, 
A thing we e’er had cared to keep ; 
With heart and soul to hold it cheap, | 
And then to go and try it again ; 
O false, unwise, absurd, and vain ! 
O, ’tis not joy, and ’tis not bliss, 
Only it is precisely this 

That keeps us still alive. 1869. 


SONNETS ON THE THOUGHT OF 
DEATH 


Ir it is thou whose casual hand with- 
draws 

What it at first as casually did make, 

Say what amount of ages it will take 

With tardy rare concurrences of laws, 

And subtle multiplicities of cause, 

The thing they once had made us to re- 
make ; [awake, 

May hopes dead slumbering dare to re- 

F’en after utmost interval of pause, 

What revolutions must have passed, be- 
fore 

The great celestial cycles shall restore 

The starry sign whose present hour is 


one ; 
What Satse than dubious chances inter- 
pose, [ pose 
With cloud and sunny gleam to recom- 
The skiey picture we had gazed upon. 





Bot if as not by that the soul desired 
Swayed in the judgment, wisest men 
have thought 
And furnishing the evidence it sought, 
Man’s heart hath ever fervently required, 
And story, for that reason deemed in- 
spired, 
45 


eo 


To every clime, in every age, hath 
taught ; 

If in this human complex there be aught 

Not lost in death, as not in birth acquired, 

O then, though cold the lips that did 
convey 

Rich freights of meaning, dead each liv- 
ing sphere 

Where thought abode, and fancy loved 
to play, 

Thou yet, we think, somewhere somehow 
still art, 

And satisfied with that the patient heart 

The where and how doth not desire to 
hear. 1869. 


IN A LONDON SQUARE 


Put forth thy leaf, thou lofty plane,, 
East wind and frost are safely gone ; 
With zephyr mild and balmy rain 
The summer comes serenely on ; 
Earth, air, and sun and skies combine 
To promise all that’s kind and fair :— 
But thou, O human heart of mine, 
Be still, contain thyself, and bear. 


December days were brief and chill, 
The winds of March were wild and 
drear, 
And, nearing and receding still, 
Spring never would, we thought, be 
here. 
The leaves that burst, the suns that shine, 
Had, not theless, theircertain date :— 
And thou, O human heart of mine, 


Be still, refrain thyself, and wait. 
1869, 
ALL IS WELL 
WHATE’ER you dream, with doubt 


_ possessed, 
Keep, keep it snug within your breast. 
And lay you down and take your rest ; 
Forget in sleep the doubt and pain, 
And when you wake, to work again, 
The wind it blows, the vessel goes, 
And where and whither, no one knows, 


*T will all be well: no need of care ; 

Though how it will, and when, and 
where, 

We cannot see, and can’t declare. 

In spite of dreams, in spite of thought, 

’Tis not in vain, and not for nought, 

The wind it blows, the ship it goes, 

Though where and whither, no one 
knows. 1869, 


ARNOLD 
LIST OF REFERENCES 
EpiIrions | 


Complete Works, 14 volumes; Poetical Works, 3 volumes; Poetical 
Works, Globe Edition, 1 volume; Selected Poems ‘(Golden Treasury 
Series), The Macmillan Co. Letters, 2 volumes, see below. 


BroGRAPHY 


* Letters of Matthew Arnold, edited by G. W. E. Russell, 2 volumes, 
1899. Firen (Joshua), Thomas and Matthew Arnold (Great Educators 
Series). THorne (W. H.), Life of Matthew Arnold, 1887. *GaRnerr 
(R.), Arnold, in the Dictionary of National Biography. Sarnrssury 
(George), Life of Matthew Arnold (Modern English Writers), 1899. Pau 
(1. W.), Matthew Arnold (English Men of Letters Series), 1902. RussELu 
(G. W. E.), Matthew Arnold (Literary Lives), 1904. 


REMINISCENCES AND EARLY CRITICISM 


Farrar (F. W.), Men I Have Known. Crovenu (A. H.), Prose Remains 
(originally in the North American Review, July, 1853). * Roscoz (W.O), 
Poems and Essays, Vol. IT; The Classical School of English Poetry, Mat- 
thew Arnold, 1859. * Swrysurng, Essaysand Studies: Matthew Arnold’s 
New Poems (Originally in the Fortnightly Review, October, 1867). For- 
MAN (II. B.), Our Living Poets: Matthew Arnold (Originally in Tinsley’s 
Magazine, September, 1868). Austin (Alfred), The Poetry of the Period 
(Originally in Temple Bar, August and September, 1869). WouippPLE 
(EK. P.), Recollections : Matthew Arnold, 1887. 


LATER CRITICISM 


Brrrety (Augustine), Res Judicate; Papers and Essays. Burroueus 
(John), The Light of Day: Spiritual Insight of Matthew Arnold. Dow- 
DEN (Edward), Transcripts and Studies. Garnerrr (Richard), Essays of 
an Ex-Librarian. *Gares (L. E.), Three Studies in Literature. GatTEs 
(1. E.), Studies and Appreciations: The Return of Conventional Life. 
Harrison (Frederic), The Choice of Books. Harrison (Frederic), 

706 


- 


~ARNOLD 707 


Tennyson, Ruskin, Mill, and Other Literary Estimates. HErniry 
(W. E.), Views and Reviews. Hupson (W. H.), Studies in Inter- 
pretation. * Hurron (R. H.), Literary Essays. Modern Guides of Eng- 
lish Thought in Matters of Faith. Musrarp (W. P.), Homeric Echoes 
in Matthew Arnold’s Balder. Nerncroni (E.), Letteratura Inglese.  OLr- 
PHANT (Margaret), Victorian Age of English Literature. Pau. (IH. W.), 
Men and Letters: Matthew Arnold’s Letters. Sarnrspury (George), Cor- 
rected Impressions. *SrEpMAN (E.C.), Victorian Poets. SrEPHEN (Les- 
lie), Studies of a Biographer. Traini (H. D.), New Fiction and Other 
Essays on Literary Subjects. *Woopserry (G. E.), Makers of Literature. 

CuEney (J. V.) The Golden Guess. Dawson (W. H.), Matthew Arnold 
and His Relation to the Thought of Our Time. Dawson (W.J.), Makers 
of Modern English. Dixon (W.M.) English Poetry: Blake to Browning. 
Durr (M. E. G.), Out of the Past. Gatron (A.), Urbana Scripta. 
Gatton (A.), Two Essays on Matthew Arnold, with Some of His Letters 
to the Author. MacArruur (Henry), Realism and Romance. Napa 
(E. 8.) Essays at Home and Elsewhere. Srxkrirk (J. B.), Ethics and s- 
thetics of Modern Poetry: Modern Creeds and Modern Poetry. Suarp 
(Amy), Victorian Poets. Srearns (F. P.), Sketches from Concord and 
Appledore. Swanwick (A.), Poets the Interpreters of Their Age. WALKER 
(Hugh), The Great Victorian Poets. 


TRIBUTES IN VERSE 


Bovurpition (F. W.), Sursum Corda: To Matthew Arnold in America. 
‘Suairp (J. C.), Glen d’Esseray and Other Poems: Balliol Scholars, 1840- 
1843; A Remembrance. Truman (Joseph), Afterthoughts: Laleham, a 
Poem. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 


* Smarr (Thomas B.), The Bibliography of Matthew Arnold. 


PC NED 


QUIET WORK 


ONE lesson, Nature, let me learn of thee, 

One lesson which in every wind is 
blown, 

One lesson of two duties kept at one 

Though the loud world proclaim their 
enmity— 

Of toil unsever’d from tranquillity ! 

Of labor, that in lasting fruit outgrows 

Far noisier schemes, accomplish’d in 
repose, 

Too great for haste, too high for rivalry ! 

Yes, while on earth a thousand discords 
ring, 

Man’s fitful uproar mingling with his 
toil, 

Still do thy sleepless ministers move on, 

Their glorious tasks in silence perfect- 


ing ; 

Still working, blaming still our vain 
turmoil, 

Laborers that shall not fail, when man 
is gone. 1849, 


TO A FRIEND 


WHO prop, thou ask’st, in these bad 
days, my mind ?— 

He much, the old man, who, clearest- 
soul’d of men, 

Saw The Wide Prospect, and the Asian 


Fen, 

And Tmolus hill, and Smyrna bay, 
though blind. 

Much he, whose friendship I not long 
since won, ° ° 

That halting slave, who in Nicopolis 

Taught Arrian, when Vespasian’s brutal 
son 

Clear’d Rome of what most shamed him. 
But be his 

My special thanks, whose even-balanced 
soul, 

From first youth tested up to extreme 
old age, 


Business could not make dull, nor pas- 
sion wild ; 
Who saw life steadily, and saw it whole ; 
The mellow glory of the Attic stage, 
Singer of sweet Colonus, and its child. 
* 1849. 


SHAKESPEARE 
OTHERS abide our question. Thou art 
We Sorat ask—Thou smilest and art 
ouetheer knowledge. For the lofti- 
est hill, 


Who to the stars uncrowns his majesty, 
Planting his steadfast footsteps in the 
sea, 

Making the heaven of heavens his dwell- 
ing-place, 
Spares but the cloudy border of his base 

To the foil’d searching of mortality ; 

And thou, who didst the stars and sun- 
beams know, 

Self-school’d, self-scann’d, self-honor’d, 
self-secure, 

Didst tread on earth unguess’d at.— 
Better so! 

All pains the immortal spirit must 
endure, 

All weakness which impairs, all griefs 
which bow, 

Find their sole speech in that victorious 
brow. 1849. 


THE FORSAKEN MERMAN 


ComE, dear children, let us away ; 
Down and away below! 

Now my brothers call from the bay, 
Now the great winds shoreward blow, 
Now the salt tides seaward flow ; 

Now the wild white horses play, 
Champ and chafe and toss in the spray. 
Children dear, let us away ! 

This way, this way ! 


708 


ARNOLD 


Call her once before you go— 

Call once yet ! 

In a voice that she will know: 
‘‘Margaret! Margaret!” 
Children’s voices should be dear 
(Call once more) to a mother’s ear ; 
Children’s voices, wild with pain— 
Surely she will come again ! 

Call her once and come away ; 
This way. this way! 

‘‘Mother dear, we cannot stay ! 
The wild white horses foam and fret.” 
Margaret ! Margaret ! 


Come, dear children, come away down ; 

Call no more! 

One last look at the white-wall’d town, 

And the little gray church on the windy 
shore, 

Then come down! 

She will not come though you call all 
day ; 

Come away, come away ! 


Children dear, was it yesterday 

We heard the sweet bells over the 
bay ? 

In the caverns where we lay, 

Through the surf and through the swell, 

The far-off sound of a silver bell? 

Sand-strewn caverns, cool and deep, 

Where the winds are all asleep ; 

Where the spent lights quiver and 
gleam, 

Where the salt weed sways in 
stream, 

Where the sea-beasts, ranged all round, 

Feed in the ooze of their pasture- 
ground ; 

Where the sea-snakes coil and twine, 

Dry their mail and bask in the brine ; 

Where great whales come sailing by, 

Sail and sail, with unshut eye, 

Round the world for ever and aye? 

When did music come this way ? 

Children dear, was it yesterday ? 


the 


Children dear, was it yesterday 

(Call yet once) that she went away ? 

Once she sate with you and me, 

On ared gold throne in the heart of the 
sea, 

And the youngest sate on her knee. 

She comb’d its bright hair, and she 
tended it well, 

When down swung the sound of a far-off 
bell. 

She sigh’d, she look’d up through the 
clear green sea ; 


709 
She said: ‘“‘I must go, for my kinsfolk 


pray 
In the sie gray church on the shore to- 
ay. 
’°T will be Easter-time in the world—ah 
me! 
And I lose my poor soul, Merman! here 
with thee.” 
I said: ‘‘Go up, dear heart, through the 
Waves ; 
Say thy prayer, and come back to the 
kind sea-caves !” 
She smiled, she went up through the 
surf in the bay. 
Children dear, was it yesterday ? 


Children dear, were we long alone ? 

‘*The sea grows stormy, the little ones 
moan ; 

Long prayers,’ I said, ‘‘in the world 
they say ; 

Come!” Isaid; and we rose through the 
surf in the bay. 

We went up the beach, by the sandy 
down 

Where the sea-stocks bloom, 
white-wall’d town ; 

Through the narrow paved streets, where 
all was still, 

To the little gray church on the windy 
hill. 

From the church came a murmur of 
folk at their prayers, 

But we stood without in the cold blow- 
ing airs. 

We climb’d on the graves, on the stones 
worn with rains, 

And we gazed up the aisle through the 
small leaded panes. 

She sate by the pillar; we saw her clear : 

‘*Margaret, hist! come quick, we are 
here! 

Dear heart,” I said, ‘‘ we are long alone ; 

The sea grows stormy, the little ones 
moan.” 

But, ah, she gave me never a look, 

For her eyes were seal’d to the holy 
book ! 

Loud prays the priest; shut stands the 
door. 

Come away, children, call no more ! 

Come away, come down, call no more! 


to the 


Down, down, down ! 
Down to the depths of the sea! 
She sits at her wheel in the humming 
town, 
Singing most joyfully. 
Hark what she sings: ‘‘ O joy, O joy, 


710 


BRITISH 


POETS 





For the humming street, and the child 
with its toy ! well ; 

For the priest and the bell, and the holy 

For the wheel where I spun, 

And the blessed light of the sun!” 

And so she sings her fill, 

Singing most joyfully, 

Till the spindle drops from her hand, 

And the whizzing wheel stands still. 

She steals to the window, and looks at 
the sand, : 

And over the sand at the sea ; 

And her eyes are set in a stare ; 

And anon there breaks a sigh, 

And anon there drops a tear, 

’ From a sorrow-clouded eye, 

And a heart sorrow-laden, 

A long, long sigh ; 

For the cold strange eyes of a little Mer- 
maiden 

And the gleam of her golden hair. 


Come away, away children ; 
Come children, come down ! 
The hoarse wind blows coldly ; 
Lights shine in the town. 

She will start from her slumber 
When gusts shake the door ; 

She will hear the winds howling, 
Will hear the waves roar. 

We shall see, while above us 
The waves roar and whirl, 

A ceiling of amber, 

A pavement of pearl. 

Singing: ‘‘ Here came a mortal, 
But faithless was she! 

And alone dwell for ever 

The kings of the sea.” 


But, children, at midnight, 
When soft the winds blow, 

When clear falls the moonlight, 
When spring tides are low ; 
When sweet airs come seaward 
From heaths starr’d with broom, 
And high rocks throw mildly 

On the blanch’d sands a gloom ; 
Up the still, glistening beaches, 
Up the creeks we will hie, 

Over banks of bright seaweed 
The ebb-tide leaves dry. 

We will gaze, from the sand-hills, 
At the white, sleeping town ; 

At the church on the hill-side— 
And then come back down. 
Singing: ‘‘ There dwells a loved one, 
But cruel is she! 

She left lonely for ever 


The kings of the sea,” 1849, 


———— need 


THE STRAYED REVELLER 


THE PORTICO OF CIRCE’S PALACE 
EVENING 


A Youth. Circe 


The Youth 


FASTER, faster, 

O Circe, Goddess, 

Let the wild, thronging train, 
The bright procession 

Of eddying forms, 

Sweep through my soul! 


Thou standest, smiling 

Down on me! thy right arm, 
Lean’d up against the column there, 
Props thy soft cheek ; 

Thy left holds, hanging loosely, 
The deep cup, ivy-cinctured, 

IT held but now. 


Is it, then, evening 

So soon? I see, the night-dews, 
Cluster’d in thick beads, dim 
The agate brooch-stones 

On thy white shoulder ; 

The cool night-wind, too, 
Blows through the portico, 
Stirs thy hair, Goddess, 

Waves thy white robe! 


Circe 
Whence art thou, sleeper ? 


The Youth 


When the white dawn first 
Through the rough fir-planks 

Of my hut, by the chestnuts, 

Up at the valley-head, 

Came breaking, Goddess ! 

I sprang up, I threw round me — 
My dappled fawn-skin ; 

Passing out, from the wet turf, 
Where they lay, by the hut door, 
Isnatch’d up my vine-crown, my fir-staff, 
All drench’d in dew— 

Came swift down to join 

The rout early gather’d 

In the town, round the temple, 
Iacchus’ white fane 

On yonder hill. 


Quick I pass’d, following 

The wood-cutters’ cart-track 
Down the dark valley ;—I saw 
On my left, through the beeches, 


ARNOLD 


Thy palace, Goddess, 
Smokeless, empty ! 
Trembling, I enter’d ; beheld 
The court all silent, 
The lions sleeping, 
On the altar this bowl. 
I drank, Goddess! 
And sank down here, sleeping, 
On the steps of thy portico. 
Circe 
Foolish boy! Why tremblest thou ? 
Thou lovest it, then, my wine? 
Wouldst more of it? See, how glows, 
Through the delicate, flush’d marble, 
The red, creaming liquor, 
Strown with dark seeds! 
Drink, then! I chide thee not, 
Deny thee not my bowl. 
Come, stretch forth thy hand, then—so ! 
Drink—drink again! 


The Youth 


Thanks, gracious one ! 

Ah, the sweet fumes again ! 
More soft, ah me, 

More subtle-winding 

Than Pan’s flute-music ! 
Faint—-faint! Ah me, 
Again the sweet sleep ! 


Circe 


Hist ! Thou—-within there! 
Come forth, Ulysses! 

Art tired with hunting ? 
While we range the woodland, 
See what the day brings. 


Ulysses 


Ever new magic ! 

Hast thou then lured hither, 

Wonderful Goddess, by thy art, 

The young, languid-eyed Ampelus, 

Iacchus’ darling— 

Or some youth beloved of Pan, 

Of Pan and the Nymphs? 

That he sits, bending downward 

His white, delicate neck 

To the ivy-wreathed marge 

Of thy cup; the bright, glancing vine- 
leaves 

That crown his hair, 

Falling forward, mingling 

With the dark ivy-plants— 

His fawn-skin, half untied, 

Smear’d with red wine-stains? Who is 
he, 

That he sits, overweigh’d 


711 


By fumes of wine and sleep, 

So late, in thy portico? 

What youth, Goddess,—what guest 
Of Gods or mortals? 


Circe 


Hist ! he wakes! 
I lured him not hither, Ulysses. 
Nay, ask him ! 


The Youth 


Who speaks? Ah, who comes forth 

To thy side, Goddess, from within ? 

How shall I name him ? 

This spare, dark-featured, 

Quick-eyed stranger ? 

Ah, and I see too 

His sailor’s bonnet, 

His short coat, travel-tarnish’d, 

With one arm bare !— 

Art thou not he, whom fame 

This long time rumors 

The favor’d guest of Circe, brought by 
the waves? 

Art thou he, stranger ? 

The wise Ulysses, 

Laertes’ son? 


Ulysses 


Iam Ulysses. 

And thou, too, sleeper ? 

Thy voice is sweet. 

It may be thou hast follow’d 

Through the islands some divine bard, 
By age taught many things, 

Age and the Muses ; 

And heard him delighting 

The chiefs and people 

In the banquet, and-learn’d his songs, 
Of Gods and Heroes, 

Of war and arts, 

And peopled cities, 

Inland, or built 

By the gray sea.—If so, then hail! 

I honor and welcome thee. 


The Youth 


The Gods are happy. 
They turn on all sides 
Their shining eyes, 
And see below them 
The earth and men. 


They see Tiresias 
Sitting, staff in hand, 
On the warm, grassy 
Asopus bank, 

His robe drawn over 


712 


His old, sightless head, 
Revolving inly 
The doom of Thebes. 


They see the Centaurs 

In the upper glens 

Of Pelion, in the streams, 

Where red-berried ashes fringe 
The clear-brown shallow pools, 
With streaming flanks, and heads 
Rear’d proudly, snuffing 

The mountain wind. 


They see the Indian 

Drifting, knife in hand, 

His frail boat moor’d to 

A floating isle thick-matted 

With large-leaved, low-creeping melon- 
plants, 

And the dark cucumber. 

He reaps, and stows them, 

Drifting—drifting ;—round him, 

Round his green harvest-plot, 

Flow the cool lake-waves, 

The mountains ring them. 


They see the Scythian 

On the wide stepp, unharnessing 

His wheel’d house at noon. 

He tethers his beast down, and makes 
his meal— 

Mares’ milk, and bread 

Baked on the embers ;—all around 

The boundless, waving grass-plains 
stretch, thick-starr’d 

With saffron and the yellow hollyhock 

And flag-leaved iris-flowers. 

Sitting in his cart [ miles, 

He makes his meal; before him, for long 

Alive with bright green lizards, 

And the springing bustard-fowl, 

The track, a straight black line, 

Furrows the rich soil; here and there 

Clusters of lonely mounds 

Topp’d with rough-hewn, 

Gray, rain-blear’d statues, overpeer 

The sunny waste. 


They see the ferry 

On the broad, clay-laden 

Lone Chorasmian stream ; thereon, 

With snort and strain, 

Two horses, strongly swimming, tow 

The ferry-boat, with woven ropes 

To either bow 

Firm harness’d by the mane ; a chief 

With shout and shaken spear, 

Stands at the prow, and guides them ; 
but astern 


BRITISH POETS 


The cowering merchants, in long robes, 
Sit pale beside their wealth 

Of silk-bales and of balsam-drops, 

Of gold and ivory, 

Of turquoise-earth and amethyst, 
Jasper and chalcedony, } 

And milk-barr’d onyx-stones. 

The loaded boat swings groaning 

In the yellow eddies ; 

The Gods behold them. 


They see the Heroes 

Sitting in the dark ship 

On the foamless, long-heaving 
Violet sea, 

At sunset nearing . 
The Happy Islands. 


These things, Ulysses, 
The wise bards also 
Behold and sing. 

But oh, what labor ! 
O prince, what pain ! 


They too can see 

Tiresias ;—but the Gods, 
Who give them vision, 
Added this law : 

That they should bear too ° 
His groping blindness, 
His dark foreboding, 

His scorn’d white hairs ; 
Bear Hera’s anger 
Through a life lengthen’d 
To seven ages. 


They see the Centaurs 

On Pelion ;—then they feel, 

They too, the maddening wine 

Swell their large veins to bursting; in 
wild pain 

They feel the biting spears 

Of the grim Lapithe, and Theseus, drive, 

Drive crashing through their bones; 
they feel 

High on a jutting rock in the red stream 

Alcmena’s dreadful son 

Ply his bow ; such a price 

The Gods exact for song : 

To become what we sing. 


They see the Indian 

On his mountain lake ; but squalls 
Make their skiff reel, and worms 

In the unkind spring have gnawn 

Their melon-harvest to the heart.—They 


see 
The Scythian ; but long frosts 
Parch them in winter-time on the bare 
stepp, 


ARNOLD 


Till they too fade like grass ; they crawl 
Like shadows forth in spring. 


They see the merchants 

On the Oxus stream ;—but care 

Must visit first them too, and make 
them pale. 

Whether, through whirling sand, 

A cloud of desert robber-horse have 
burst 

Upon their caravan ; or greedy kings, 

In the wall’d cities the way passes 
through, 

Crush’d them with tolls ; or fever-airs, 

On some great river’s marge, 

Mown them down, far from home. 


They see the Heroes 

Near harbor ;—but they share 

Their lives, and former violent toil in 
Thebes, 

Seven-gated Thebes, or Troy ; 

Or where the echoing oars 

Of Argo first 

Startled the unknown sea. 


The old Silenus 

Came, lolling in the sunshine, 
From the dewy forest-coverts, 
This way at noon. 

Sitting by me, while his Fauns 
Down at the water-side 
Sprinkled and smoothed 

His drooping garland, 

He told me these things. 


But I, Ulysses, 

Sitting on the warm steps, 
Looking over the valley, 

All day long, have seen, 

Without pain, without labor, 
Sometimes a wild-hair’d Mzenad— 
Sometimes a Faun with torches— 
And sometimes, for a moment, 
Passing through the dark stems 
Flowing-robed, the beloved, 

The desire, the divine, 

Beloved Tacchus. 


Ah, cool night-wind, tremulous stars ! 

Ah, glimmering water, 

Fitful earth-murmur, 

Dreaming woods! 

Ah, golden-haired, 
Goddess, 

And thou, proved, much enduring, 

Wave- toss’d Wanderer ! 

Who can stand still ? 

Ye fade, ye swim, ye waver before me— 

The cup again ! 


strangely smiling 


(75 


Faster, faster, 

O Circe, Goddess. 

Let the wild, thronging tr ain, 
The bright procession 

Of eddying forms, 

Sweep through my soul! 1849, 
MEMORIAL VERSES 


APRIL, 1850 


GOETHE in Weimar sleeps, and Greece, 
Long since, saw Byron’s struggle cease. 
But one such death remain’d to come ; 
The last poetic voice is dumb— 

We stand to-day by Wordsworth’s tomb. 


When Byron’s eyes were shut in death, 
We bow’d our head and held our breath. 
He taught us little ; but our soul 

Had felt him like the thunder’s roll. 
With shivering heart the strife we saw 
Of passion with eternal law ; 

And yet with reverential awe 

We watch’d the fount of fiery life 
Which served for that Titanic strife. 


When Goethe’s death was told, we 

said * 

Sunk, then, is Europe’s sagest head. 

Physician of the iron age, 

Goethe has done his pilgrimage. 

He took the suffering human race, 

He read each wound, each weakness 
clear ; 

And struck his finger on the place, 

And said: Thow ailest here, and here! 

He look’d on Europe’s dying hour 

Of fitful dream and feverish power ; 

His eye plunged down the weltering 
strife, 

The turmoil of expiring life— 

He said: The end is everywhere, 

Art still has truth, take refuge there ! 

And he was happy, if to know 

Causes of things, and far below 

His feet to see the lurid flow 

Of terror, and insane distress, 

And headlong fate, be happiness. 


And Wordsworth !—Ah, 
rejoice ! 

For never has such soothing voice 

Been to your shadowy world convey’d, 

Since erst, at morn, some wandering 


pale ghosts, 


shade 
Heard the clear song of Orpheus come 
Through Hades, and the mournful 
gloom. 


714 


Wordsworth has gone from us—and ye, 
Ah, may ye feel his voice as we! 

He too upon a wintry clime 

Had fallen—on this iron time 

Of doubts, disputes, distractions, fears. 
He found us when the age had bound 
Our souls in its benumbing round ; 

He spoke, and loosed our heart in tears. 
He laid us as we lay at birth 

On the cool flowery lap of earth, 

Smiles broke from us and we had ease ; 
The hills were round us, and the breeze 
Went o’er the sun-lit fields again ; 

Our foreheads felt the wind and rain. 
Our youth returned ; for there was shed 
On spirits that had long been dead, 
Spirits dried up and closely furl’d, 

The freshness of the early world. 


Ah! since dark days still bring to light 

Man’s prudence and man’s fiery might, 

Time may restore us in his course 

Goethe’s sage mind and Byron’s force ; 

But where will Europe’s latter hour 

Again find Wordsworth’s healing 
power ? 

Others will teach us how to dare, 

And against fear our breast to steel : 

Others will strengthen us to bear— 

But who, ah! who, will make us feel ? 

The cloud of mortal destiny, 

Others will front it fearlessly — 

But who, like him, will put it by? 


Keep fresh the grass upon his grave 

O Rotha, with thy living wave! 

Sing him thy best! for few or none 

Hears thy voice right, now he is gone. 
1850. 


. SELF-DECEPTION 


Say, what blinds us, that we claim the 
glory 

Of possessing powers not our share ? 

—Since man woke on earth, he knows 
his story, 

But, before we woke on earth, we were. 


Long, long since, undower’d yet, our 
spirit 

Roam’d, ere birth, the treasuries of God ; 

Saw the gifts, the powers it might in- 
herit, 

Ask’d an outfit for its earthly road. 


Then, as now, this tremulous, eager 


being 
Strain’d and long’d and grasp’d each gift 
it saw ; 


BRITISH SPORTS 


<a 





Then, as now, a Power beyond our see- 
ing, é 

Staved us back, and gave our choice the 
law. 


Ah, whose hand that day through 
Heaven guided 

Man’s new spirit, since it was not we? 

Ah, who swayed our choice and who de- 
cided 

What our gifts, and what our wants 
should be? 


For, alas! he left us each retaining 

Shreds of gifts which he refused in full. 

Still these waste us with their hopeless 
straining, 

Still the attempt to use them proves 
them null, 


And on earth we wander, groping, reel- 
ing ; 

Powers stir in us, stir and disappear. 

Ah! and he, who placed our master- 
feeling, 

Fail’d to place that master-feeling clear. 


We but dream we have our wish’d-for 
powers, 
Ends we seek we never shall attain. 
Ah! some power exists there, which is 
ours ? 
Some end is there, we indeed may gain? 
1852. 


THE SECOND BEST 


MODERATE tasks and moderate leisure, 

Quiet living, strict-kept measure 

Both in suffering and in pleasure— 
Tis for this thy nature yearns. 


But so many books thou readest, 
But so many schemes thou breedest, 


| But so many wishes feedest, 


That thy poor head almost turns. 


And (the world ’s so madly jangled, 

Human things so fast entangled) 

Nature’s wish must now be strangled 
For that best which she discerns. 


So it must be! yet, while leading 

A strain’d life, while overfeeding, 

Like the rest, his wit with reading, 
No small profit that man earns, . 


Who through all he meets can steer him, 

Can reject what cannot clear him, 

Cling to what can truly cheer him ; 
Who each day more surely learns 


That an impulse, from the distance 
Of his deepest, best existence, 
To the words, ‘‘ Hope, Light, Persist- 
ence,” 
Strongly sets and truly burns. 
1852. 


LYRIC STANZAS OF EMPEDOCLES 


THE out-spread world to span 
A cord the Gods first slung, 
And then the soul of man 
There, like a mirror, hung, 
And bade the winds through space im- 
pel the gusty toy. 


Hither and thither spins 
The wind-borne, mirroring soul, 
A thousand glimpses wins, 
And never sees a whole ; 
Looks once, and drives elsewhere, and 
leaves its last employ. 


The Gods laugh in their sleeve 
To watch man doubt and fear 
Who knows not what to believe 
Since he sees nothing clear, 
And dares stamp nothing false where 
he finds nothing sure. 


Is this, Pausanias, so? 
And can our souls not strive, 
But with the winds must go, 
And hurry where they drive ? 
Is fate indeed so strong, man’s strength 
indeed so poor ? 


I will not judge. That man, 
Howbeit, I judge as lost, 
Whose mind allows a plan, 
Which would degrade it most ; 
And he treats doubt the best who tries 
to see least ill. 


Be not, then, fear’s blind slave! 
Thou art my friend; to thee, 
All knowledge that I have, 
All skill I wield, are free. 
Ask not the latest news of the last mir- 
acle, 


Ask not what days and nights 
In trance Pantheia lay, ; 
But ask how thou such sights 
May’st see without dismay ; 
Ask what most helps when known, thou 
son of Anchitus ! 


What ? hate, and awe, and shame 
Fill thee to see our time ; 


ARNOLD 


Thou feelest thy soul’s frame 
Shaken and out of chime? 
What? life and chance go hard with thee 
too, as with us; 


Thy citizens, ’tis said, 
Envy thee and oppress, 
Thy goodness no men aid, 
All strive to make it less ; 
Tyranny, pride, and lust, fill Sicily’s 
abodes ; 


Heaven is with earth at strife, 
Signs make thy soul afraid, 
The dead return to life, 
Rivers are dried, winds stay’d ; 
Scarce can one think in calm, so threat- 
ening are the Gods ; 


And we feel, day and night, 
The burden of ourselves— 
Well, then, the wiser wight 
In his own bosom delves, 
And asks what ails him so, and gets 
what cure he can. — 


The sophist sneers: Fool, take 
Thy pleasure, right or wrong. 
The pious wail: Forsake 
A world these sophists throng. 
Be neither saint nor sophist-led, but be a 
man ! 


These hundred doctors try 
To preach thee to their school. 
We have the truth! they cry ; 
And yet their oracle, 
Trumpet it as they will, is but the same 
as thine. 


Once read thy own breast right, 
And thou hast done with fears ; 
Man gets no other light, 
‘Search he a thousand years. 
Sink in thyself ! there ask what ails thee, 
at that shrine! 


What makes thee struggle and rave ? 
Why are men ill at ease ?— 
’Tis that the lot they have 
Fails their own will to please ; 
For man would make no murmuring, 
were his will obey’d. 


And why is it, that still 
Man with his lot thus fights ?— 
"Tis that he makes this will 
The measure of his rights, 
And believes Nature outraged if his will’s 
gainsaid, 


716 


Couldst thou, Pausanias, learn 
How deep a fault is this ; 
Couldst thou but once discern 
Thou hast no right to bliss, 
No title from the Gods to welfare and 
repose ; 


Then thou wouldst look less mazed 
Whene’er of bliss debarr’d, 
Nor think the Gods were crazed 
When thy own lot went hard. 
But we are all the same—the fools of our 
own woes ! 


For, from the first faint morn 
Of life, the thirst for bliss 
Deep in man’s heart is born ; 
And, sceptic as he is, 
He fails not to judge clear if this be 
quench’d or no. 


Nor is the thirst to blame. 
Man errs not that he deems 
His welfare his true aim, 
He errs because he dreams 
The world does but exist that welfare to 
bestow. 


We mortals are no kings 
For each of whom to sway 
A new-made world up-springs, 
Meant merely for his play ; 
No, weare strangers here; the world is 
from of old. 


In vain our pent wills fret, 
And would the world subdue. 
Limits we did not set 
Condition all we do; 
Born into life we are, and life must be 
our mould. 


Born into life !—man grows 
Forth from his parents’ stem, 
And blends their bloods, as those 
Of theirs are blent in them ; 
So each new man strikes root into a far 
fore-time. 


Born into life !—we bring 
A bias with us here, 
And, when here, each new thing 
Affects us we come near ; 
To tunes we did not call our being must 
keep chime. 


Born into life !—in vain, 
Opinions, those or these, 
Unalter’d to retain 


BRITISH POETS 


The obstinate mind decrees ; 
Experience, like a sea, soaks all-effacing 
in. 


Born into life !—who lists 
May what is false hold dear, 

And for himself make mists 
Through which to see less clear ; 
The world is what it is, for all our dust 

and din. | 


Born into life !—’tis we, 
And not the world, are new ; 
Our cry for bliss, our plea, 
Others have urged it too— 
Our wants have all been felt, our errors 
; made before. 


No eye could be too sound 
To observe a world so vast, 
No patience too profound 
To sort what’s here amass’d ; 
How man may here best live no care 
too great to explore. 


But we—as some rude guest 
Would change, where’er he roam, 
The manners there profess’d 

To those he brings from home— 


“We mark not the world’s course, but 


would have it take ours. 


The world’s course proves the terms 
On which man wins content ; 
Reason the proof confirms— 
We spurn it, and invent 
A false course for the world, and for 
ourselves, false powers. 


Riches we wish to get, 
Yet remain spendthrifts still; 
We would have health, and yet 
Still use our bodies ill ; 
Bafflers of our own prayers, from youth 
to life’s last scenes. 


We would have inward peace, 
Yet will not look within ; 
We would have misery cease, 
Yet will not cease from sin ; 
We want all pleasant ends, but will use 
no harsh means ; 


We do not what we ought, 
What we ought not, we do, 
And lean upon the thought 
That chance will bring us through ; 
But our own acts, for good or ill, are 
mightier powers. 


ARNOLD 


Yet, even when man forsakes 
All sin,—is just, is pure, 
Abandons all which makes 
His welfare insecure,— 
Other existences there are, that clash 
with ours. 


Like us, the lightning-fires 
Love to have scope and play ; 
The stream, like us, desires 
An unimpeded way ; 
Like us, the Libyan wind delights to 
roam at large. 


Streams will not curb their pride 
The just man not to entomb, 
Nor lightnings go aside 
To give his virtues room ; 
Nor is that wind less rough which blows 
a good man’s barge. 


Nature, with equal mind, 
Sees all her sons at play ; 
Sees man control the wind, 
The wind sweep man away ; 
Allows the proudly-riding and _ the 
foundering bark. 


And, lastly, though of ours 
No weakness spoil our lot, 
Though the non-human powers 
Of Nature harm us not, 
The ill deeds of other men make often 
our life dark. 


What were the wise man’s plan ?— 
Through this sharp, toil-set life, 
To work as best he can, 
And win what’s won by strife.— 
But we an easier way to cheat our pains 
have found. 


Scratch’d by a fall, with moans 
As children of weak age 
Lend life to the dumb stones 
Whereon to vent their rage, 
And bend their little fists, and rate the 
senseless ground ; 


So, loath to suffer mute, 
We, peopling the void air, 
Make Gods to whom to impute 
The ills we ought to bear ; 
With God and Fate to rail at, suffering 
easily. 


Yet grant—-as sense long miss’d 
Things that are now perceived, 
And much may still exist 


TET 





Which is not yet believed— 
Grant that the world were full of Gods 
we Cannot see ; 


All things the world which fill 
Of but one stuff are spun, 
That we who rail are still, 
With what we rail at, one; 
One with the o’erlabored Power that 
through the breadth and length 


Of earth, and air, and sea, 
In men, and plants, and stones, 
Hath toil perpetually, 
And travails, pants, and moans; 
Fain would do all things well, but some- 
times fails in strength. 


And patiently exact 
This universal God 
Alike to any act 
Proceeds at any nod, 
And quietly declaims the cursings of 
himself. 


This is not what man hates, 
Yet he can curse but this, 
Harsh Gods and hostile Fates 
Are dreams! this only 7s 
Is everywhere ; sustains the wise, the 
foolish elf. 


Not only, in the intent 
To attach blame elsewhere, 
Do we at will invent 
Stern Powers who make their care 
To embitter human life, malignant 
Deities ; 


But, next, we would reverse 
The scheme ourselves have spun, 
And what we made to curse 
We now would lean upon, 
And feign kind Gods who perfect what 
man vainly tries. 


Look, the world tempts our eye, 
And we would know it all! 
We map the starry sky, 
We mine this earthen ball, 
We measure the sea-tides, we number 
the sea-sands ; 


We scrutinise the dates 
Of long-past human things, 
The bounds of effaced states, 
The lines of deceased kings ; 
We search out dead men’s words, 
works of dead men’s hands ; 


and 


718 


BRITAISHAROETS 





We shut our eyes, and muse 
How our own minds are made, 
What springs of thought they use, 
How righten’d, how betray’d— 
And spend our wit to name what most 
employ unnamed, 


But still, as we proceed 

The mass swells more and more 

Of volumes yet to read, 

Of secrets yet to explore. 
hair grows gray, our eyes are 
dimm’d, our heat is tamed ; 


Our 


We rest our faculties, 
And thus address the Gods: 
‘True science if there is, 
It stays in your abodes! 
Man’s measures cannot mete the im- 
measurable All. 


‘You only can take in 
The world’s immense design. 
Our desperate search was sin, 
Which henceforth we resign, 
Sure only that your mind sees all things 
which befall.” 


Fools! That in man’s brief term 
He cannot all things view, 
Affords no ground to affirm 
That there are Gods who do; 
Nor does being weary prove that he has 
where to rest. 


Again.—Our youthful blood 
Claims rapture as its right ; 
The world, a rolling flood 
Of newness and delight, 
Draws in the enamor’d gazer 
shining breast ; 


to its 


Pleasure, to our hot grasp, 
Gives flowers after flowers ; 
With passionate warmth we clasp 
Hand after hand in ours; 
Now do we soon perceive how fast our 
youth is spent. 


At once our eyes grow clear! 
We see, in blank dismay, 
Year posting after year, 
Sense after sense decay ; 
Our shivering heart is mined by secret 
discontent ; 


Yet still, in spite of truth, 
In spite of hopes entomb’d, 
That longing of our youth 


Burns ever unconsumed, 
Still hungrier for delight as delights 
grow more rare. 


We pause ; we hush our heart, 
And thus address the Gods: ~ 
‘*The world hath fail’d to impart 
The joy our youth forebodes, 
Fail’d to fill up the void which in our 
breasts we bear. 


‘“‘ Changeful till now, we still — 
Look’d on to something new ; 
Let us, with changeless will, 
Henceforth look on to you, 
To find with you the joy we in vain here 
require !” 
Fools! That so often here 
Happiness mock’d our prayer, 
I think, might make us fear 
A like event elsewhere ; 
Make us, not fly to dreams, but Middernes 
desire. 


And yet, for those who know 
Themselves, who wisely take 
Their way through life, and bow 
To what they cannot break, 
Why should Isay that life need yield 
but moderate bliss ? 


Shall we, with temper spoil’d, 
Health sapp’d by living ill, 
And judgment all embroil’d 
By sadness and self-will, 
Shall we judge what for man is not true 
bliss or is ? 


Is it so small a thing 
To have enjoy’d the sun, 
To have lived light in the spring, 
To have loved, to have thought, to 
have done ; 
To have advanced true friends, and beat 
down baffling foes— 


That we must feign a bliss 
Of doubtful future date, 
And, while we dream on this, 
Lose all our present state, 
And relegate to worlds yet distant our 
repose ? 


Not much, I know, you prize 
What pleasures may be had, 
Who look on life with eyes 
Estranged, like mine, and sad ; 
And yet the village-churl feels the truth 
more than you, 


ARNOLD 


Who’s loath to leave this life 
Which to him little yields— 
His hard-task’d sunburnt wife, 
His often-labor’d fields, 
The boors with whom he talk’ d, the 
country-spots he knew. 


But thou, because thou hear’st 
Men scoff at Heaven and Fate, 
Because the Gods thou fear’st 
Fail to make blest thy state, 
Tremblest, and wilt not dare to trust 
the joys there are ! 


I say: Fear not! Life still 
Leaves human effort scope. 
But, since life teems with ill, 
Nurse no extravagant hope ; 
Because thou must not dream, thou 
need’st not then despair! 1852. 


CALLICLES’ SONG 
FROM EMPEDOCLES ON ETNA 


THROUGH the black, rushing smoke- 
bursts, 

Thick breaks the red flame ; 

All Etna heaves fiercely 

Her forest-clothed frame. 


Not here, O Apollo ! 

Are haunts meet for thee. 

But, where Helicon breaks down 
In cliff to the sea, 


“Where the moon-silver’d inlets 
Send far their light voice 

Up the still vale of Thisbe, 

O speed, and rejoice ! 


On the sward at the cliff-top 
Lie strewn the white flocks, 
On the cliff-side the pigeons 
Roost deep in the rocks. 


In the moonlight the shepherds, 
Soft lull’d by the rills, 

Lie wrapped in their blankets 
Asleep on the hills. 


—What forms are these coming 
So white through the gloom? 
What garments out-glistening 
The gold-flower’d broom ? 


What sweet-breathing presence 
Out-perfumes the thyme ? 
What voices enrapture 

The night’s balmy prime ?— 


io 


"Tis Apollo comes leading 
His choir, the Nine. 
-—The leader is fairest, 
But all are divine. 


They are lost in the hollows! 
They stream up again! 
What seeks on this mountain 
The glorified train ?-— 


They bathe on this mountain, 
In the spring by their road ; 
Then on to Olympus, 

Their endless abode. 


—Whose praise do they mention ? 
Of what is it told ?— 

What will be for ever ; 

What was from of old. 


First hymn they the Father 
Of all things; and then, 
The rest of immortals, 

The action of men ; 


The day in his hotness, 
The strife with the palm ; 
The night in her silence, 
The stars in their calm. 1852. 
THE YOUTH OF NATURE 


RAISED are the dripping oars, 

Silent the boat! the lake, 

Lovely and soft as a dream, 

Swims in the sheen of the moon. 
The mountains stand at its head 
Clear in the pure June-night, 

But the valleys are flooded with haze. 
Rydal and Fairfield are there ; 

In the shadow Wordsworth lies dead. 
So it is, so it will be for aye. 

Nature is fresh as of old, 

Is lovely ; a mortal is dead. 


The spots which recall him survive, 
For he lent a new life to these hills. 
The Pillar still broods o’er the fields 
Which border Ennerdale Lake, 
And Egremont sleeps by the sea. 
The gleam of The Evening Star 
Twinkles on Grasmere no more, 
But ruin’d and solemn and gray 
The sheepfold of Michael survives ; 
And, far to the south, the heath 
Still blows in the Quantock coombs 
By the favorite waters of Ruth. 
These survive !—yet not without pain, 
Pain and dejection to-night, 

Can I feel that their poet is gone, 


720 


BRITTSii 2 OES 





He grew old in an age he condemn’d. 

He look’d on the rushing decay 

Of the times which had shelter’d his 
youth, 

Felt the dissolving throes 

Of a social order he loved ; 

Outlived his brethren, his peers ; 

And, like the Theban seer, 

Died in his enemies’ day. 


Cold bubbled the spring of Tilphusa, 
Copais lay bright in the moon, 
Helicon glass’d in the lake 

Its firs, and afar rose the peaks 
Of Parnassus, snowily clear ; 
Thebes was behind him in flames, 
And the clang of arms in his ear, 
When his awe-struck captors led 
The Theban seer to the spring. 
Tiresias drank and died, 

Nor did reviving Thebes 

See such a prophet again. 


Well may we mourn, when the head 

Of a sacred poet lies low 

In an age which can rear them no more! 

The complaining millions of men 

Darken in labor and pain ; 

But he was a priest to us all 

Of the wonder and bloom of the world, 

Which we saw with his eyes, and were 
glad. 

He is dead, and the fruit-bearing day 

Of his race is past on the earth ; 

And darkness returns to our eyes. 


For, oh! is it you, is it you, 

Moonlight, and shadow, and lake, 

And mountains, that fill us with joy, 
Or the poet who sings you so well ? 

Is it you, O beauty, O grace, 

O charm, O romance, that we feel, 

Or the voice which reveals what you are ? 
Are ye, like daylight and sun, 

Shared and rejoiced in by all? 

Or are ye immersed in the mass 

Of matter, and hard to extract. 

Or sunk at the core of the world 

Too deep for the most to discern ? 

Like stars in the deep of the sky, 
Which arise on the glass of the sage, 
But are lost when their watcher is gone. 


‘* They are here ”—I heard, as men heard 
In Mysian Ida the voice 

Of the Mighty Mother, or Crete, 

The murmur of Nature reply — 

‘* Loveliness, magic, and grace, 

They are here! they are set in the world, 
They abide; and the finest of souls 


$$ $$$ 


Hath not been thrill’d by them all, 

Nor the dullest been dead to them quite. 
The poet who sings them may die, 

But they are immortal and live, 

For they are the life of the world. 

Will ye not learn it, and know, 

When ye mourn that a poet is dead, 
That the singer was less than his themes, 
Life, and emotion, and I? 


‘* More than the singer are these. 
Weak is the tremor of pain 

That thrills in his mournfullest chord 
To that which once ran through his soul. 
Cold the elation of joy 

In his gladdest, airiest song, 

To that which of old in his youth 
Fill’d him and made him divine. 
Hardly his voice at its best 

Gives us a sense of the awe, 

The vastness, the grandeur, the gloom 
Of the unlit gulf of himself. 


* Ye know not yourselves; and your 
bards—- 

The clearest, the best, who have read 

Most in themselves—have beheld 

Less than they left unreveal’d. 

Ye express not yourselves ;—can psi 
make 

With marble, with color, with word, 

What charm’d you in others re-live? 

Can thy pencil, O artist ! restore 

The figure, the bloom of thy love, 

As she was in her morning of spr ing? 

Canst thou paint the ineffable smnile 

Of her eyes as they rested on thine ? 

Can the image of life have the glow, 

The motion of life itself? 


** Yourselves and your fellows ye know 
not ; and me, 

The mateless, the one, will ye know ? 

Will ye scan me, and read me, and tell 

Of the thoughts that ferment in my 
breast, 

My longing, my sadness, my joy ? 

Will ye claim for your great ones the 

ift 

To are render’d the gleam of my skies, 

To have echoed the moan of my seas, 

Utter’d the voice of my hills ? 

When your great ones depart, will ye 
say : 

All things have suffer’d a loss, 

Nature is hid in their grave ? 


‘*Race after race, man after man, 
Have thought that my secret was theirs, 
Have dream’d that I lived but for them, 


ARNOLD 


That they were my glory and joy. 

—They are dust, they are changed, they 
are gone ! 

I remain.” 1852. 


SELF-DEPEN DENCE 


WEARY of myself, and sick of asking 

What Iam, and what I ought to be, 

At this vessel’s prow I stand, which bears 
me 

Forwards, forwards, o’er the starlit sea. 


And a look of passionate desire 

O’er the sea and to the stars I send : 

‘Ye who from my childhood up have 
calm’d me, 

Calm me, ah, compose me to the end! 


‘* Ah, once more,” I cried, ‘‘ ye stars, ye 
waters, 

On my heart your mighty charm renew ; 

Still, still let me, as I gaze upon you, 

Feel my soul becoming vast like you!” 


From the intense, clear, star-sown vault 
of heaven, 

Over the lit sea’s unquiet way, 

In the rustling night-air came the an- 
swer : [they. 

*¢Wouldst thou be as theseare? Live as 


‘*Unaffrighted by the silence round 
them, 

Undistracted by the sights they see, 

These demand not that the things with- 
out them 

Yield them love, amusement, sympathy. 


«And with joy the stars perform their 
shining, 

And the sea its long moon-silver’d roll ; 

For self-poised they live, nor pine with 
notin 

All the fever of some differing soul. 


‘‘ Bounded by themselves, and unregard- 
ful 

In what state God’s other works may be, 

In their own tasks all their powers 
pouring, 

These attain the mighty life you see.” 


O air-born voice! long since, severely 


clear, 
A cry like thine in mine own heart I 
hear : [he, 


‘* Resolve to be thyself; and know that 
Who finds himself, loses his misery !” 
1852. 


46 


721 


MORALITY 


WE cannot kindle when we will 
The fire which in the heart resides ; 
The spirit bloweth and is still, 
In mystery our soul abides. 
But tasks in hours of insight will’d 
Can be through hours of gloom fulfill’d. 


With aching hands and bleeding feet 
We dig and heap, lay stone on stone ; 
We bear the burden and the heat 
Of the long day, and wish ’t were done. 
Not till the hours of light return, 
All we have built do we discern. 


Then, when the clouds are off the soul, 
When thou dost bask in Nature’s eye, 
Ask, how she view’d thy self-control, 
Thy struggling, task’d morality— 
Nature, whose free, light, cheerful air, 
Oft made thee, in thy gloom, despair. 


And she, whose censure thou dost dread, 
Whose eye thou wast afraid to seek, 
See, on her face a glow is spread, 
A strong emotion on her cheek ! 
“Ah, child!” she cries, ‘‘ that strife 
divine, 
Whence was it, for it is not mine? 


“There is no effort on my brow— 
I do not strive, I do not weep ; 
IT rush with the swift spheres and glow 
In joy, and when I will, I sleep. 
Yet that severe, that earnest air, 
I saw, I felt it once—-but where? 


‘‘T knew not yet the gauge of time, 
Nor wore the manacles of space ; 
I felt it in some other clime, 
I saw it in some other place. 
’T was when the heavenly house [ trod, 
And lay upon the breast of God.” 
1852. 
A SUMMER NIGHT 
IN the deserted, moon-blanch’d street, 
How lonely rings the echo of my feet ! 
Those windows, which I gaze at, frown, 
Silent and white, unopening down, 
Repellant as the world ;—but see, 
A break between the housetops shows 
The moon! and, lost behind her, fading 
dim 
Into the dewy dark obscurity 
Down at the far horizon’s rim, 
Doth a whole tract of heaven disclose ! 


722 


BRITISH POETS 





And to my mind the thought 

Is on a sudden brought 

Of a past night, and a far different scene. 

Headlands stood out into the moonlit 
deep 

As clearly as at noon ; 

The spring-tide’s brimming flow 

Heaved dazzlingly between ; 


Houses, with long white sweep, 

Girdled the glistening bay ; 

Behind, through the soft air, 

The blue haze-cradled mountains spread 
away, 

The night was far more fair— 

But the same restless pacings to and fro, 

And the same vainly throbbing heart 
was there, 

And the same bright, calm moon. 


And the calm moonlight seems to say : 

Hast thou then still the old unquiet breast, 

Which neither deadens into rest, 

Nor ever feels the fiery glow 

That whirls the spirit from itself away, 

But fluctuates to and fro, 

Never by passion quite possess’d 

And never quite benumb’d by the world’s 
sway ?— 

And I, I know not if to pray 

Still to be what I am, or yield and be 

Like all the other men I see. 


For most men in a brazen prison live, 

Where, in the sun’s hot eye, 

With heads bent o’er their toil, they 
languidly 

Their lives to some unmeaning taskwork 
give, 

Dreaming of nought beyond their prison 
wall. : 

And as, year after year, 

Fresh products of their barren labor fall 

From their tired hands, and rest 

Never yet comes more near, 

tloom settles slowly down over their 
breast ; 

And while they try to stem 

The waves of mournful thought by 
which they are pressed, 

Death in their prison reaches them, 

Unfreed, having seen nothing, still un- 
blest. 


And the rest, a few, 

Escape their prison and depart 

On the wide ocean of life anew. 

There the freed prisoner, where’er his 
heart 


Listeth, will sail ; 

Nor doth he know how there prevail, 

Despotic on that sea, 

Trade-winds which cross it from eternity. 

Awhile he holds some false way, unde- 
barr’d 

By thwarting signs, and braves 

The freshening wind and blackening 
waves 

And then the tempest strikes him ; and 
between 

The lightning-bursts is seen 

Only a driving wreck, 

And the pale master on his spar-strewn 
deck . 

With anguish’d face and flying hair 

Grasping the rudder hard, 

Still bent to make some port he knows 
not where, 

Still standing for some false, impossible 
shore. 

And sterner comes the roar 

Of sea and wind, and through the deep- 
ening gloom 

Fainter and fainter wreck and helmsman 
loom, 

And he too disappears, and comes no 
more. 


Is there no life, but these alone ? 
Madman or slave, must man be one? 


Plainness and clearness without shadow 
of stain ! 

Clearness divine ! 

Ye heavens, whose pure dark regions 
have no sign 

Of languor, though so calm, and, though 
so great, 

Are yet untroubled and unpassionate ; , 

Who, though so noble, share in the 
world’s toil, 

And, though so task’d, keep free from 
dust and soil! 

I will not say that your mild deeps retain 

A tinge, it may be, of their silent pain 

Who have long’d deeply once, and long’d 
in vain— 

But I will rather say that you remain 

A world above man’s head, to let him 
see 

How boundless might his soul’s horizons 
be, 

How vast, yet of what clear trans- 
parency ! 

How it were good to abide there, and 
breathe free ; 

How fair a lot to fill 


Is left to each man still! 1852. 


ARNOLD 


THE BURIED LIFE 


LiGHT flows our war of mocking words, 
and yet, 

Behold, with tears mine eyes are wet ! 

I feel a nameless sadness o’er me roll, 

Yes, yes, we know that we can jest, 

We know, we know that we can smile! 

But there’s a something in this breast, 

To which thy light words bring no rest. 

And thy gay smiles no anodyne. 

Give me thy hand, and hush awhile, 

And turn those limpid eyes on mine, 

And let me read there, love ! thy inmost 
soul. 


Alas! is even love too weak 

To unlock the heart, and let it speak ? 

Are even lovers powerless to reveal 

To one another what indeed they feel ? 

I knew the mass of men conceal’d 

Their thoughts, for fear that if reveal’d 

They would by other men be met 

With blank indifference, or with blame 
reproved ; 

I knew they lived and moved 

Trick’d in disguises, alien to the rest 

Of men, and alien to themselves—and 


yet 
The same heart beats in every human 


breast ! 

But we, my love !—doth a like spell be- 
numb 

Our hearts, our voices ?—must we too be 
dumb ? 


Ah! well for us, if even we, 

Even for a moment, can get free 

Our heart, and have our lips unchain’d ; 

For that which seals them hath been 
deep-ordain’d ! 


Fate, which foresaw 

How frivolous a baby man would be— 

By what distractions he would be pos- 
sess’d, 

How he would pour himself in every 
strife, 

And well-nigh change his own identity— 

That it might keep from his capricious 
play 

His genuine self, and force him to obey 

Even in his own despite his being’s law. 

Bade through the deep recesses of our 
breast 

The unregarded river of our life 

Pursue with indiscernible flow its way ; 

And that we should not see 

The buried stream, and seem to be 


Ba 
Eddying at large in blind uncertainty, 
Though driving on with it eternally. 


But often, in the world’s most crowded 
streets, 

But often, in the din of strife, 

There rises an unspeakable desire 

After the knowledge of our buried life; 

A thirst to spend our fire and restless 
force 

In tracking out our 
course ; 

A longing to inquire 

Into the mystery of this heart which 
beats 

So wild, so deep in us—to know 

Whence our lives come and where they 
go. 

And many a man in his own breast then 
delves, 

But deep enough, alas! none ever mines. 

And we have been on many thousand 
lines, 

And we have shown, on each, spirit and 

ower ; 
But hardly have we, for one little hour, 
Been on our own line, have we been 


true, original 


ourselves— 
Hardly had skill to utter one of all 
The nameless feelings that course 


through our breast, 
But they course on for ever unexpress’d. 
And long we try in vain to speak and act 
Our hidden self, and what we say and do 
Is eloquent, is well—but ’tis not true! 
And then we will no more be rack’d 
With inward striving, and demand 
Of all the thousand nothings of the hour 
Their stupefying power ; 
Ah yes, and they benumb us at our call! 
Yet still, from time to time, vague and 
forlorn, 
From the soul’s subterranean depth up- 
borne 
As from an infinitely distant land, 
Come airs, and floating echoes, and con- 
vey 
A melancholy into all our day. 


Only—but this is rare-— 

When a beloved hand is laid in ours, 

When, jaded with the rush and glare 

Of the interminable hours, 

Our eyes can in another’s eyes read clear, 

When our world-deafen’d ear 

Is by the tones of a loved voice caress’d—- 

A bolt is shot back somewhere in our 
breast, 

And a lost pulse of feeling stirs again. 


724 





The eye sinks inward, and the heart lies 
plain, 

And what we mean, we say, and what 
we would, we know. 

A man becomes aware of his life’s flow, 

And hears its winding murmur; and he 
sees 

The meadows where it glides, the sun, 
the breeze. 


And there arrives a lull in the hot race 

Wherein he doth for ever chase 

That flying and elusive shadow, rest. 

An air of coolness plays upon his face, 

And an unwonted calm pervades his 
breast. 

And then he thinks he knows 

The hills where his life rose, 

And the sea where it goes. 


LINES 


WRITTEN IN KENSINGTON GARDENS 


1852. 


IN this lone, open glade I lie, 

Screen’d by deep boughs on either hand ; 

And at its end, to stay the eye, 

Those black-crown’d, red-boled pine- 
trees stand ! 


Birds here make song, each bird has his, 

Across the girdling city’s hum. 

How green under the boughs it is! 

How thick the tremulous sheep-cries 
come ! 


Sometimes a child will cross the glade 
To take his nurse his broken toy ; 
Sometimes a thrush flit overhead 
Deep in her unknown day’s employ. 


Here at my feet what wonders pass, 
What endless, active life is here! 
What blowing daisies, fragrant grass! 
An air-stirr’d forest, fresh and clear. 


Scarce fresher is the mountain-sod 

Where the tired angler lies, stretch’d 
out, 

And, eased of basket and of rod, 

Counts his day’s spoil, the spotted trout. 


In the huge world, which roars hard by, 
Be others happy if they can ! 

But in my helpless cradle I 

Was breathed on by the rural Pan. 


I, on men’s impious uproar hurl’d, 
Think often, as I hear them rave, 
That peace has left the upper world 
And now keeps only in the grave. 


BRITISH POETS 


Yet here is peace for ever new! 

When I who watch them am away, 
Still all things in this glade go through 
The changes of their quiet day. 


Then to their happy rest they pass! 
The flowers upclose, the birds are fed, 
The night comes down upon the grass, 
The child sleeps warmly in his bed. 


Calm soul of all things! make it mine 
To feel, amid the city’s jar, 

That there abides a peace of thine, 
Man did not make, and cannot mar, 


The will to neither strive nor cry, 
The power to feel with others give! 
Calm, calm me more! nor let me die 
Before I have begun to live. 1852. 


THE FUTURE 


A WANDERER is man from his birth. 

He was born in a ship 

On the breast of the river of Time ; 

Brimming with wonder and joy 

He spreads out his arms to the light, 

Rivets his gaze on the banks of the 
stream. 


As what he sees is, so have his thoughts 
been. 

Whether he wakes . 

Where the snowy mountainous pass, 

Echoing the screams of the eagles, 

Hems in its gorges the bed 

Of the new-born clear-flowing stream ; 

Whether he first sees light 

Where the river in gleaming rings 

Sluggishly winds through the plain ; 

Whether in sound of the swallowing sea-— 

As is the world on the banks, 

So is the mind of the man. 


Vainly does each, as he glides, 
Fable and dream ' 
Of the lands which the river of Time 
Had left ere he woke on its breast, 
Or shall reach when his eyes have been 
closed. 
Only the tract where he sails 
He wots of ; only the thoughts, 
Raised by the objects he passes, are his. 


Who can see the green earth any more 
As she was by the sources of Time? 
Who imagines her fields as they lay 

In the sunshine, unworn by the plough? 
Who thinks as they thought, [ breast, 
The tribes who then roam’d on her 
Her vigorous, primitive sons ? 


ARNOLD 





What gitl 

Now reads in her bosom as clear 

As Rebekah read, when she sate 
At eve by the palm-shaded well ? 
Who guards in her breast 

As deep, as pellucid a spring 

Of feeling, as tranquil, as sure? 


What bard, 
At the height of his vision, can deem 
Of God, of the world, of the soul, 
With a plainness as near, 
As flashing as Moses felt 
When he lay in the night by his flock 
On the starlit Arabian waste ? 
Can rise and obey 
The beck of the Spirit like him ? 


This tract which the river of Time 

Now flows through with us, is the plain. 

Gone is the calm of its earlier shore. 

Border’d by cities and hoarse 

With a thousand cries is its stream. 

And we on its breast, our minds 

Are confused as the cries which we hear, 

Changing and shot as the sights which 
we see. | 


And we say that repose has fled 

For ever the course of the river of Time. 
That cities will crowd to its edge 

In a blacker, incessanter line ; 

That the din will be more on its banks, 
Denser the trade on its stream, 

Flatter the plain where it flows, 
Fiercer the sun overhead. 

That never will those on its breast 

See an ennobling sight, 

Drink of the feeling of quiet again. 


But what was before us we know not, 
And we know not what shall succeed. 


Haply, the river of Time— 

As it grows, as the towns on its marge 
Fling their wavering lights 

On a wider, statelier stream-— 

May acquire, if not the calm 

Of its early mountainous shore, 

Yet aesolemn peace of its own. 


And the width of the waters, the hush 

Of the gray expanse where he floats, 

Freshening its current and spotted with 
foam 

As it draws to the Ocean, may strike 

Peace to the soul of the man on its 
breast— 

As the pale waste widens around him, 

As the banks fade dimmer away, 


los 


As the stars come out, and the night- 
wind 
Brings up the stream 
Murmurs and scents of the infinite sea. 
1852. 


STANZAS IN MEMORY OF THE 
AUTHOR OF “OBERMANN”! 


IN front the awful Alpine track 

Crawls up its rocky stair ; 

The autumn storm-winds drive the rack, 
Close o’er it, in the air. 


1The author of Obermann, Etienne Pivert de 
Senancour, has little celebrity in France, his own 
country; andout of France he is almost un- 
known. But the profound inwardness, the aus- 
tere sincerity, of his principal work, Obermann, 
the delicate feeling for nature which it exhibits, 
and the melancholy eloquence of many passages 
of it, have attracted and charmed some of the 
most remarkable spirits of this century, such as 
George Sand and Sainte-Beuve, and will probably 
always find a certain number of spirits whom 
they touch and interest. 

Senancour was born in 1770. He was educated 
for the priesthood, and passed some time in the 
seminary of St. Sulpice ; broke away from the 
Seminary and from France itself, and passed 
some years in Switzerland, where he married; 
returned to France in middle life, and followed 
thenceforward the career of a man of letters, but 
with hardly any fame or success. He diedan old 
man in 1846, desiring that on his grave might be 
aon these words only: Eternité, deviens mon 
asile! 

The influence of Rousseau, and certain affini- 
ties with more famous and fortunate authors of 
his own day,—Chateaubriand and Madame de 
Staél_—are everywhere visible in Senancour. 
But though, like these eminent personages, he 
may be called a sentimental writer, and though 
Obermann, a collection of letters from Switzer- 
land treating almost entirely of nature and of 
the human soul, may be called a work of senti- 
ment, Senancour has a gravity and severity 
which distinguish him from all other writers of 
the sentimental school. The worldis with him in 
his solitude far less than itis with them ; of all 
writers he is the most perfectly isolated and the 
least attitudinizing. His chief work, too, has a 
value and power of its own, apart from these 
merits of its author. The stir of all the main 
forces, by which modern life is and has been im- 
pelled, lives in the letters of Obermann ; the dis- 
solving agencies of the eighteenth century, the 
fiery storm of the French Revolution, the first 
faint promise and dawn of that new world which 
our own time is but more fully bringing to light, 
—all these are to be felt, almost to be touched, 
there. To me, indeed, it will always seem that 
the impressiveness of this production can hardly 
be rated too high. 

Beside Obermann there is one other of Se- 
nancour’s works which, for those spirits who 
feel his attraction, is very interesting ; its title 
is, Libres Méditations dun Solitaire Inconnu. 
(Arnold’s note. The passage of George Sand 
alluded to may be found in her Questions d’ Art 
etde Littérature. Sainte-Beuve has several times 
written of Senancour : especially in his Portraizts 
Contemporains, Vol. I, and in Chateaubriand et 
son Groupe littéraire, Chap. 14.) 


726 
Behind are the abandon’d baths 1! 
Mute in their meadows lone; 

The leaves are on the valley-paths, 
The mists are on the Rhone— 


The white mists rolling like a sea! 

I hear the torrents roar. 

—Yes, Obermann, all speaks of thee ; 
I feel thee near once more! 


I turn thy leaves! I feel their breath 
Once more upon me roll ; 

That air of languor, cold, and death, 
Which brooded o’er thy soul. 


Fly hence, poor wretch, whoe’er thou art, 
Condemn'd to cast about, 

All shipwreck in thy own weak heart, 
For comfort from without ! 


A fever in these pages burns 
Beneath the calm they feign ; 
A wounded human spirit turns, 
Here, on its bed of pain. 


Yes. though the virgin mountain-air 
Fresh through these pages blows ; 
Though to these leaves the glaciers spare 
The soul of their white snows ; 


Though here a mountain-murmur swells 
Of many a dark-bough’d pine ; 

Though, as you read, you hear the bells 
Of the high-pasturing kine— 


Yet, through the hum of torrent lone, 
And brooding mountain-bee, 

There sobs I know not what ground-tone 
Of human agony. 


Is it for this, because the sound 

Is fraught too deep with pain, 

That, Obermann! the world around 
So little loves thy strain ? 


Some secrets may the poet tell, 
For the world loves new ways ; 
To tell too deep ones is not well— 
It knows not what he says. 


Yet, of the spirits who have reign’d 
In this our troubled day, 

I know but two, who have attain’d 
Save thee, to see their way. 


1The Baths of Leuk. This poem was con- 
ceived, and partly composed, in the valley going 
down from the foot of the Gemmi Pass towards 
the Rhone. (Arnold.) 


BRITISH POETS 





By England’s lakes, in gray old age, 

His quiet home one keeps ; 
And one, the strong much-toiling sage, 
In German Weimar sleeps. 


But Wordsworth’s eyes avert their ken 
From half of human fate ; 

And Goethe's course few sons of men 
May think to emulate. 


For he pursued a lonely road, 

His eyes on Nature’s plan ; 

Neither made man too much a God, 
Nor God too much a man. 


Strong was he, with a spirit free 

From mists, and sane, and clear; 
Clearer, how much ! than ours—yet we 
Have a worse course to steer. 


For though his manhood bore the blast 
Of a tremendous time, 

Yet in a tranquil world was pass’d 

His tenderer youthful prime. 


But we, brought forth and rear’d in hours 
Of change, alarm, surprise— 

What shelter to grow ripe is ours ? 
What leisure to grow wise? 


Like children bathing on the shore, 
Buried a wave beneath, 

The second wave succeeds, before 
We have had time to breathe. 


Too fast we live, too much are tried, 

Too harass’d, to attain 

Wordsworth’s sweet calm, or Goethe’s 
wide 

And luminous view to gain. 


And then we turn, thou sadder sage, 
To thee! we feel thy spell! 

—The hopeless tangle of our age, 
Thou too hast scann’d it well! 


Immoveable thou sittest, still 
As death, composed to bear ! 
Thy head is clear, thy feeling chill, 
And icy thy despair. . 


Yes, as the son of Thetis said, 

I hear thee saying now : 

Greater by far than thou are dead ; 
Strive not ! die also thou ! 


Ah ! two desires toss about 

The poet’s feverish blood. 

One drives him to the world without, 
And one to solitude. 


ARNOLD 


The glow, he cries, the thrill of life, 
Where, where do these abound ?— 
Not in the world, not in the strife 

Of men, shall they be found. 


He who hath watch’d, not shared, the 
strife, 

Knows how the day hath gone. 

He only lives with the world’s life, 

Who hath renounced his own. 


To thee we come, then! Clouds are roll’d 
Where thou, O seer ! art set ; 

Thy realm of thought is drear and cold— 
The world is colder yet ! 


And thou hast pleasures, too, to share 
With those who come to thee— 
Balms floating on thy mountain-air, 
And healing sights to see. 


How often, where the slopes are green 
On Jaman, hast thou sate 

By some high chalet-door, and seen 
The summer-day grow late ; 


And darkness steal o’er the wet grass 

With the pale crocus starr’d, 

And reach that glimmering sheet of 
glass ‘ 

Beneath the piny sward, 


Lake Leman’s waters, far below ! 
And watch’d the rosy light 

Fade from the distant peaks of snow ; 
And on the air of night 


Heard accents of the eternal tongue 
Through the pine branches play— 
Listen’d, and felt thyself grow young! 
Listen’d and wept Away! 





Away the dreams that but deceive 
And thou, sad guide, adieu! 

I go, fate drives me ; but I leave 
Half of my life with you. 


We, in some unknown Power’s employ, 
Move on a rigorous line ; 

Can neither, when we will, enjoy, 

Nor, when we will, resign. 


I in the world must live; but thou, 
Thou melancholy shade ! 

Wilt not, if thou canst see me now, 
Condemn me, nor upbraid. 


For thou art gone away from earth, 
And place with those dost claim, 
The Children of the Second Birth, 
Whom the world could not tame; 


{4h 


And with that small, transfigured band, 
Whom many a different way 
Conducted to their common land, 

Thou learn’st to think as they. 


Christian and pagan, king and slave, 
Soldier and anchorite, 

Distinctions we esteem so grave, 
Are nothing in their sight. 


They do not ask, who pined unseen, 
Who was on action hurl’d, 

Whose one bond is, that all have been 
Unspotted by the world. 


There without anger thou wilt see 
Him who obeys thy spell 

No more, so he but rest, like thee, 
Unsoil’d !—and so, farewell. 


Farewell !—Whether thou now liest near 
That much-loved inland sea, 

The ripples of whose blue waves cheer 
Vevey and Meillerie : 


And in that gracious region bland, 
Where with clear-rustling wave 
The scented pines of Switzerland 
Stand dark round thy green grave, 


Between the dusty vineyard-walls 
Issuing on that green place 

The early peasant still recalls 

The pensive stranger’s face, 


And stoops to clear thy moss-grown date 
Ere he plods on again 3-- 

Or whether, by maligner fate, 

Among the swarms of men, 


Where between granite terraces 
The blue Seine rolls her wave, 
The Capital of Pleasure sees 
The hardly-heard-of grave ;— 


Farewell! Under the sky we part, 
In the stern Alpine dell. 

O unstrung will! O broken heart ! 
A last, a last farewell! 1852. 


REQUIESCAT 


STREW on her roses, roses, 
And never a spray of yew! 
In quiet she reposes ; 
Ah, would that I did too! 


Her mirth the world required ; 
She bathed it in smiles of glee. 

But her heart was tired, tired, 
And now they let her be. 


728 


Her life was turning, turning, 
In mazes of heat and sound. 

But for peace her soul was yearning, 
And now peace laps her round. 


Her cabin’d, ample spirit, 
It flutter’d and fail’d for breath. 
To-night it doth inherit 
The vasty hall of death. 1858. 
SOHRAB AND RUSTUM 


' AND the first gray of morning fill’d the 

east, 

And the fog rose out of the Oxus stream. 

But all the Tartar camp along the stream 

Was hush’d, and still the men were 
plunged in sleep ; 

Sohrab alone, he slept not ; allnight long 

He had lain wakeful, tossing on his bed ; 

But when the gray dawn stole into his 
tent, 

He rose, and clad himself, and girt his 
sword, 

And took his horseman’s cloak, and left 
his tent; 

And went abroad into the cold wet fog, 

Through the dim camp to Peran-Wisa’s 
tent. 

Through the black Tartar tents he 

pass’d, which stood 

Clustering like beehives on the low flat 
strand 

Of Oxus, where, the summer-floods o’er- 
flow 

When the sun melts the snows in high 
Pamere ; 

Through the black tents he pass’d, o’er 
that low strand, 

And to a hillock came, a little back 

From the stream’s brink—the spot where 

first a boat, 

Crossing the stream in summer, scrapes 
thé land. 

The men of former times had crown’d 
the top 

With a clay fort; but that was fall’n, 
and now 

The Tartars built there Peran-Wisa’s tent, 

A dome of laths, and o’er it felts were 
spread. 

And Sohrab came there, and went in, and 
stood 

Upon the thick piled carpets in the tent, 

And found the old man sleeping on his 


bed 
Of rugs and felts, and near him lay his 
arms, [step 


And Peran-Wisa heard him, though the 


BRITISH POETS 


Was dull’d; for he slept light, an old 
man’s sleep ; 
And he es quickly on one arm, and 
said :— 
‘“Who art thou? for it isnot yet clear 
dawn. 
Speak! is there news, 
alarm ? ” 
But Seay came to the bedside, and. 
said :— 
‘Thou know’st me, Peran-Wisa! it is I. 
The sun is not yet risen, and the foe 
Sleep; but I sleep not; all night long 
I lie 
Tossing and wakeful, and I come to thee. 
For so did King Afrasiab bid me seek 
Thy counsel, and to heed thee as thy son, 
In Samarcand, before thearmy march’d; 
And I will tell thee what my heart 
desires. 
Thou SON. if, since from Ader-baijan 
rst 
I came among the Tartars and bore arms, 
I have still served Afrasiab well, and 
shown, 
At my boy’s years, the courage ofa man. 
This too thou know’st, that while I still 
bear on 
The conquering Tartar ensigns through 
the world, 
And beat the Persians back on every 
field, 
Iseek one man, one man,and one alone— 
Rustum, my father ; whol hoped should 
ereet, 
Should one day greet, upon some well- 
fought field, 
His not unworthy, not inglorious son. 
So I long hoped, but him I never find. 
Come then, hear now, and grant me 
what I ask. 
Let the two armies rest to-day ; but I 
Will challenge forth the bravest Per- 
sian lords 
To meet me, man to man; if I prevail, 
Rustum will surely hear it; if I fall— 
Old man, the dead need no one, claim no 
kin, 
Dim is the rumor of a common fight, 
Where host meets host, and many names 
are sunk ; 
But of a single combat fame speaks 
clear.” 
He spoke; and Peran-Wisa took the 
hand 
Of the young man in his, and sigh’d, and 
said :— 
“QO Sohrab,oan 
thine ! 


or any night 


unquiet heart is 


ARNOLD 


Canst thou not rest among the Tartar 
chiefs, 

And share the battle’s common chance 
with us 

Who love thee, but must press for ever 
first, 

In single fight incurring single risk, 

To find a father thou hast never seen ? 

That were far best, my son, to stay with 
us 

Unmurmuring; in our tents, while it is 
war, 

And when ’t is truce, then in Afrasiab’s 
towns. 

But, if this one desire indeed rules all, 

To seek out Rustum—seek him not 
through fight ! 

Seek him in peace, and carry to his 
arms, 

O Sohrab, carry an unwounded son! 

But far hence seek him, for he is not 
here. 

For now it is not as when I was young, 

When Rustum was in front of every 
fray ; 

But now he keeps apart, and sits at 
home, 

In Seistan, with Zal, his father old. 

Whether that his own mighty strength 
at last 


Feels the abhorr’d approaches of old age,” 


Or in some quarrel with the Persian 
King. 

There go!—Thou wilt not? Yet my 
heart forebodes 

Danger or death awaits thee on this 
field. 

Fain would I know thee safe and well, 
though lost 

To us; fain therefore send thee hence, 


in peace 
To seek thy father, not seek single 
“fights 
In vain ;—but who can keep the lion’s 
cub 


From ravening, and who govern Rus- 
tum’s son? 

Go, I will grant thee what thy heart 
desires.” 

So said he, and dropp’d Sohrab’s hand, 

and left 

His bed, and the warm rugs whereon he 

And o’er his chilly limbs his woollen 
coat 

He pass’d, and tied his sandals on his 
feet, 

And threw a white cloak round him, and 
he took 


In his right hand a ruler’s staff, no 
sword ; 
And on his head he set his sheep-skin 


Cap, 

Black, glossy, curl’d, the fleece of Kara- 
Kail 

And raised the curtain of his tent, and 
call’d 

His herald to his side, and went abroad. 

The sun by this had risen, and clear’d 

the fog 

From the broad Oxus and the glittering 
sands. 

And from their tents the Tartar horse- 
men filed 

Into the open plain ; so Haman bade— 

Haman, who next to Peran-Wisa ruled 

The host, and still was in his lusty 
prime. ¢ 

From their black tents, long files of 
horse, they stream’d ; 

As when some gray November morn the 
files, vy 

In marching order spread, of long-neck’d 
cranes 

Stream over Casbin and the southern 
slopes 

Of Elburz, from the Aralian estuaries, 

Or some frore Caspian reed-bed, south- 
ward bound 

For the warm Persian sea-board—so they 


stream’d. 
The Tartars of the Oxus, the King’s 
uard 


> 

First, with black sheep-skin caps and 
with long spears ; 

Large men, large steeds ; who from Bok- 
hara come 

And Khiva, and ferment the milk of 
mares. 

Next, the more temperate Toorkmuns of 
the south, 

The Tukas, and the lances of Salore, 

And those from Attruck and the Cas- 
pian sands ; 

Light men and on light steeds, who only 
drink 

The acrid milk of camels, and their 
wells. 

And then a swarm of wandering horse, - 
who came 

From far, and a more doubtful service 
own’d ; 

The Tartars of Ferghana, from the 
banks 

Of the Jaxartes, men with scanty beards 

And _ close-set skull-caps; and those 
wilder hordes [ern waste, 

Who roam o’er Kipchak and the north- 


Kalmucks and unkempt Kuzzaks, tribes 
who stray 
Nearest the Pole, and wandering Kir- 
ghizzes, 
Who come on shaggy ponies from Pa- 
mere ; 
These all filed out from camp into the 
plain. 
-And on the other 
form’d ;— 
First a light cloud of horse, Tartars they 
seem’d, 
The Ilyats of Khorassan ; and behind, 
The royal troops of Persia, horse and 
foot, 
Marshall’d battalions bright in burnish’d 
steel. 
But Peran-Wisa with his herald came, 
Threading the Tartar squadrons to the 
front, 
And with his staff kept back the fore- 
most ranks. 
And when Ferood, who led the Persians, 
saw 
That Peran-Wisa kept the Tartars back, 
He took his spear, and to the front he 
came, 
And check’d his ranks, and fix’d them 
where they stood. 
And the old Tartar came upon the sand 
Betwixt the silent hosts, and spake, and 
said ; 
‘« Ferood, and ye, Persians and Tartars, 
hear ! 
Let there be truce between the hosts to- 
day. 
But choose a champion from the Persian 
lords 
To fight our champion Sohrab, man to 
man.” 
As, in the country, on a morn in June, 
When the dew glistens on the pearled 
ears, 
A shiver runs through the deep corn for 
JOYS 
So, when they heard what Peran-Wisa 
said, 
A thrill through all the Tartar squad- 
rons ran 
Of pride and hope for Sohrab, whom 
they loved. 
But as a troop of pedlars, from Ca- 
bool, 
Cross underneath the Indian Caucasus, 
That vast sky-neighboring mountain of 
milk snow ; 
Crossing so high, that, as they mount, 
they pass [the snow, 
Long flocks of travelling birds dead on 


side the Persians 


BRITISH POETS 





Choked by the air, and scarce can they 
themselves 

Slake their parch’d throats with sugar’d 
mulberries— 

In single file they move, and: stop their 
breath, 

For fear they should dislodge the o’er- 
hanging snows— 

So the pale Persians held their breath 
with fear. 

And to Ferood his brother chiefs came 

up 

To counsel : Gudurz and Zoarrah came, 

And Feraburz, who ruled the Persian 
host 

Second, and was the uncle of the King ; 

These came and counsell’d, and then 
Gudurz said :— 

‘* Ferood, shame bids us take their 

challenge up, 

Yet champion have we none to match 
this youth, 

He has the wild stag’s foot, the lion’s 


heart; 

But Rustum came last night; aloof he 
sits 

And sullen, and has pitch’d his tents 
apart. 


Him will I seek, and carry to his ear 

The Tartar challenge, and this young 
man’s name. 

Haply he will forget his wrath, and fight. 

Stand forth the while, and take their 
challenge up.” 

So spake he; and Ferood stood forth 

and cried :— 

‘Old man, be it agreed as thou hast 
said ! 

Let Sohrab arm, and we will find a 
man.” 

He spake: and Peran-Wisa turn’d, 

and strode 

Back through the opening squadrons to 
his tent. 

But through the anxious Persians Gud- 
urz ran, 

And cross’d the camp which lay behind, 
and reach’d, 

Out on the sands beyond it, Rustum’s 
tents. . 

Of scarlet cloth they were, and glitter- 
ing gay, 

Just pitch’d ; the high pavilion in the 
midst 

Was Rustum’s, and his men lay camp’d 
around. 

And Gudurz enter’d Rustum’s tent, and 
found [but still 

Rustum; his morning meal was done, 


ARNOLD 


The table stood before him, charged 
with food—- 

A side of roasted sheep, and cakes of 
bread, 

And dark green melons; and there Rus- 
tum sate 

Listless, and held a falcon on his wrist, 

And play’d with it; but Gudurz came 
and stood 

Before him ; and he look’d, and saw him 
stand, 

And with acry sprang up and dropp’d 
the bird, 

And greeted Gudurz with both hands, 
and said :— 

‘*Welcome! these eyes could see no 

better sight. 

What news? but sit down first, and eat 
and drink.” 

But Gudurz stood in the tent door, 

and said :— 

**Not now ! a time will come to eat and 
drink, 

But not to-day ; to-day has other needs. 

The armies are drawn out, and stand at 


gaze ; 

For from the Tartars is a challenge 
brought 

To pick a champion from the Persian 
lords 

To fight their champion—and thou 


know’st his name— 
Sohrab men call him, but his birth is 


hid. 

O Rustum, like thy might is this young 
man’s! 

He hasthe wild stag’s foot, the lion’s 
heart ; 

And he is young, and Iran’s chiefs are 
old, 

Or else too weak; and all eyes turn to 
thee. 

Come down and help us, Rustum, or we 
lose ! 

He spoke ; but Rustum answer’d itt 

a smile :— 


Go to! if Iran’s chiefs are old, then I 


Am older ;if the young are weak, the 
Kin 

Errs strangely ; for the King, for Kai 
Khosroo, 

Himself is young, and honors younger 
men, 

And lets the aged moulder to their 
graves. 

Rustum he loves no more, but loves the 
young-—- 

The young may rise at Sohr ab’s vaunts, 
not I. 


Fae 


For what carelI, though all 
Sohrab’s fame ? 

For would that I myself had such a son, 

And not that one slight helpless girl I 
have— 

A son so famed, so brave, tosend to war, 

And I to tarry with the snow-hair’d Zal, 

My father, whom the robber Afghans 


speak 


vex, 
And clip his borders short, and drive 
his herds, 
And he has none to guard his weak old 
age. 
There would I go, and hang my armor 
up, 
And with my great name fence that 
weak old man, 
And spend the goodly treasures I have 
got, 
And rest my age, and hear of Sohrab’s 
fame, 
And leave to death the hosts of thank- 
less kings, 
And with these slaughterous hands draw 
sword no more.” 
He spoke and smiled ; 
made reply :-- 
‘What then, O Rustum, 
say to this, 
When Sohrab dares our bravest forth, 
and seeks 
Thee most of all, and thou, whom most 
he seeks, 
Hidest thy face? 
should say: 
Like some old miser, 
fame, 
And shuns to peril it with younger men.” 
And greatly moved, then Rustum 
made reply 
*“O Gudurz, wherefore dost thou say 
such words? 
Thou knowest better words than this to 
say. 
What is one more, one less, obscure or 
famed, 
Valiant or craven, young or old, to me ? 
Are not they mortal, am not I myself? 
But who for men of nought would do 
great deeds? 
thou shalt see how 
hoards his fame! 
But I will fight unknown, and in plain 
arms ; 
Let not men say of Rustum, 
match’d 
In single fight with any mortal man.” 
He spoke, and frown’d ; and Gudurz 
turn’d, and ran - 


and Gudurz 


will men 


Take heed ase men 


Rustum hoards his 


Come. Rustum 


he was 





13? 

Back quickly through the camp in fear 
and joy 

Fear at his wrath, but joy that Rustum 
came. 

But Rustum strode to his tent-door, and 
call’d 


His followers in, and bade them bring 
his arms, 

And clad himself in steel; the arms he 
chose 

Were plain, and on his shield was no 
device, 

Only his helm was rich, inlaid with gold, 

And, from the fluted spine atop, a plume 

Of horsehair waved, a scarlet horsehair 
plume. 

So arm’d, he issued forth; and Ruksh, 
his horse, 

Follow’d him like a faithful hound at 
heel— 

Ruksh, whose renown was 
through all the earth, 

The horse, whom Rustum on a foray 
once 

Did in Bokhara by the river find 

A colt beneath its dam, and drove him 
home, 

And rear’d him; a bright bay, with 
lofty crest, 

Dight with a saddle-cloth of broider’d 
green 

Crusted with gold, and on the ground 
were work’d 

All beasts of chase, all beasts which 
hunters know. 

So follow’d, Rustum left his tents, and 
cross’d 

The camp, and to the Persian host ap- 
pear’d. 

And all the Persians knew him, and 
with shouts 

Hail’d; but the Tartars knew not who 
he was. 

And dear as the wet diver to the eyes 

Of his pale wife who waits and weeps 
on shore, 

By sandy Bahrein, in the Persian Gulf, 

Plunging all day in the blue waves, at 


noised 


night, 
Having made up his tale of precious 
pearls, 


Rejoins her in their hut upon the sands— 
So dear to the pale Persians Rustum 


came. 
And Rustum to the Persian front ad- 
vanced, 
And Sohrab arm’d in Haman’s tent, and 
came. 


And as afield the reapers cut a swath 


BRITISH POETS 


| Down through the middle of a rich 


man’s corn, 

And on each side are squares of stand- 
ing corn, ‘ 

And in the midst a stubble, short and 
bare— 

So on each side were squares of men, 
with spears 

Bristling, and in the midst, the open 
sand. 

And Rustum came upon the sand, and 
cast 

His eyes toward the Tartar tents, and 
saw 

Sohrab come forth, and eyed him as he 
came. 

As some rich woman, on a winter's 

morn, 

Eyes through her silken curtains the 
poor drudge 

Who with numb blacken’d fingers makes 
her fire— 

At cock-crow, on astarlit winter’s morn, 

When the frost flowers the whiten’d 
window-panes— 

And wonders how she lives, and what 
the thoughts 

Of that poor drudge may be; so Rus- 
tum eyed 

The unknown adventurous youth, who 
from afar 

Came seeking Rustum, and defying forth 

All the most valiant chiefs; long he 


perused 

His spirited air, and wonder’d who he 
was. 

For very young he seem’d, tenderly 
rear’d ; 


Like some young cypress, tall, and dark, 
and straight, 

Which in a queen’s secluded garden 
throws | 

Its sight dark shadow on the moonlit 
turf, 

By midnight, to a bubbling fountain’s 
sound— 

So slender Sohrab seem’d, so softly 
rear’d. 

And a deep pity enter’d Rustum’s soul 

As he beheld him coming ; and he stood, 

And beckon’d to him with his hand, and 
said :— 

‘*O thou young man, the air of Heaven 

is soft, 

And warm, and pleasant ; but the grave 
is cold! 

Heaven’s air is better than the cold dead 
grave. 

Behold me! I am vast, and clad in iron, 


ARNOLD 





And tried ; and I have stood on many a 
field 

Of Ero and I have fought with many 
a foe— 

Never was that field lost, or that foe 
saved. 

O Sohrab, wherefore wilt thou rush on 
death ? 

Be-govern’d ! quit the Tartar host, and 
come 

To Iran, and be as my son to me, 

And fight beneath my banner till I die! 

There are no youths in Iran brave as 
thou.” 

So he spake, mildly ; Sohrab heard his 

voice, 

The mighty voice of Rustum, and he saw 

His giant figure planted on the sand, 

Sole, like some single tower, which a 


chief 

Hath builded on the waste in former 
years 

Against the robbers; and he saw that 
head, 


Streak’d with its first gray hairs ;—hope 
filled his soul, 
And he ran forward and embraced his 
knees, 
And clasp’d his hand within his own,’and 
said :— 
‘**O, by thy father’s head! by thine 
own soul! 
Art thou not Rustum? speak! art thou 
not he?” 
But Rustum eyed askance the kneel- 
ing youth, 
And turn’d away, and spake to his own 
soul :— 
‘** Ah me, I muse what this young fox 
may mean ! 
False, wily, boastful, are these Tartar 
boys. 
For if I now confess this thing he asks. 
And hide it not, but say : Rustum is here ! 
He will not yield indeed, nor quit our 
foes, 
But he will find some pretext not to fight, 
And praise my fame, and proffer court- 
eous gifts 
A belt or sword perhaps, and go his way. 
And on a feast-tide, in Afrasiab’s hall, 
In Samarcand, he will arise and cry: 
‘I challenged once, when the two 
armies camp’d 
Beside the Oxus, all the Persian lords 
To cope with me in single fight ; but they 
Shrank, only Rustum dared; then he 
and I [away.’ 
Changed gifts, and went on equal terms 


733 


So will he speak, perhaps, while men 
applaud ; 

Then were the chiefs of Iran shamed 
through me.” 

And then he turn’d, and sternly spake 

aloud :-- 

‘* Rise! wherefore dost thou 
question thus 

Of Rustum ? I am here, whom thou 
hast call’d 

By challenge forth; make good thy 
vaunt, or yield! 

Is it with Rustum only thou wouldst 
fight ? 

Rash boy, men look on Rustum’s face 
and flee ! 

For well I know, that did great Rustum 
stand 

Before thy face this day, and were re- 
veal’d, 

There would be then no talk of fighting 
more. 

But being what I am, I tell thee this— 

Do thou record it in thine inmost soul : 

Either thou shalt renounce thy vaunt 
and yield, 

Or else thy bones shall strew this sand, 
till winds 

Bleach them, or Oxus with his summer- 
floods, 

Oxus in summer wash them all away.” 

He spoke; and Sohrab answer’d, on 

his feet :— 

‘*Art thou so fierce? Thou wilt not 
fright me so! 

Iam no girl, to be made pale by words. 

Yet this thou hast said well, did Rus- 
tum stand 

Here on this field, there were no fight- 
ing then. 

But Rustum is far hence, and we stand 
here. 

Begin! thou art more vast, more dread 
than I, 

And thou art proved, I know, and I am 
young— 

But yet success sways with the breath 
of Heaven. 

And though thou thinkest that thou 
knowest sure [know. 

Thy victory, yet thou canst not surely 

For we are all, like swimmers in the sea, 

Poised on the top of a huge wave of fate, 

Which hangs uncertain to which side to 
fall. 

And whether it will heave us up to land, 

Or whether it will roll us out to sea, 

Back out to sea, to the deep waves of 
death, 


vainly 


734 


We know not, and no search will make 
us know ; 
Only the event will teach us in its hour.”’ 
He spoke, and Rustum answer’d not, 
but hurl’d 
His spear; down from the _ shoulder, 
down it came, 
As on some partridgein the corn a hawk, 
That long has tower’din the airy clouds, 
Drops like a plummet; Sohrab saw it 


come, 
And sprang aside, quick as a flash ; the 
spear 
Hiss’d, and went quivering down into the 
sand, 


Which it sent flying wide ;—then Soh- 
rab threw 

In turn, and full struck Rustum’s shield ; 
sharp rang, 

The iron plates rang sharp, but turn’d 
the spear. 

And Rustum seized his club, which none 
but he 

Could wield ; an unlopp’d trunk it was, 
and huge, 

Still rough—like those which men in 
treeless plains 

To build them boats fish from the flooded 
rivers, 

Hyphasis or Hydaspes, when, high up 

By their dark springs, the wind in 
winter-time 

Hath madein Himalayan forests wrack, 

And ‘strewn the channels with torn 
boughs—so huge 

The club which Rustum lifted now, and 
struck 

One stroke; but again Sohrab sprang 
aside, 

Lithe as the glancing snake, and the 
club came 
Thundering to earth, 

Rustum’s hand. 
And Rustum follow’d his own blow, and 
fell 
To his knees, and with his fingers 
clutch’d the sand ; 
And now might Sohrab have unsheathed 
his sword, 
And pierced the mighty Rustum while 
he lay 
and on his knees, and choked 
with sand ; 
But he look’d on, and smiled, nor bared 
his sword, 
But courteously drew back, and spoke, 
and said :— 
“Thou strik’st too hard! that club of 
thine will float 


and leapt from 


Dizzy, 


BRITISH POETS 


Upon the simmespsieeae and not my 
bones. 

But rise, and be not wroth! not wroth 
am 1; 

No, when I see thee, wrath forsakes my 
soul. 

Thou say’st, thou art not Rustum ; be it 
so! 

Who art thou then, that canst so touch 
my soul? 

Boy as Iam, I have seen battles too— 

Have waded foremost in their bloody 
waves, 

And heard their hollow roar of dying 
men ; 

But never was my heart thus touch’d 
before. 

Are they from Heaven, these softenings 
of the heart? 


O thou old warrior, let us yield to 


Heaven ! 

Come, plant we here in earth our angry 
spears, 

And make a truce, and sit upon this 
sand, 

And pledge each other in red wine, like 
friends, 

And thou shalt talk to me of Rustum’s 
deeds. 

There are enough foes in the Persian 
host, 

Whom I may meet, and strike, and feel 
no pang ; 

Champions enough Afrasiab has, whom _ 
thou 


Mayst fight; fight them, when they con- 
front thy spear ! 

But oh, let there be peace ’twixt thee 
and me!” 

He ceased, but while he spake, Rus- 

tum had risen, 

And stood erect, trembling with rage ; 
his club 

He left to lie, but had regain’d his spear, 

Whose fiery point now in his mail’d 
right-hand 

Blazed bright and baleful, like that 
autumn-star, 

The baleful sign of fevers ; dust had soil’d 

His stately crest, and dimm/’d his glit- 
tering arms. 

His breast heaved, his lips foam’d, and 
twice his voice 

Was choked with rage; at last these 
words broke way :— 

“Girl! nimble with thy feet, not with 
thy hands ! 
Curl’d minion, dancer, 

words ! 


coiner of sweet 


ARNOLD 


Fight, let me hear thy hateful voice no 
more ! 

Thou art not in Afrasiab’s gardens now 

With Tartar girls, with whom thou art 
wont to dance ; 

But on the Oxus-sands, and in the dance 

Of battle, and with me, who make no 
play 

Of war; I fight it out, and hand to hand. 

Speak not to me of truce, and pledge, 
and wine! 

Remember all thy valor; try thy feints 

Andcunning! all the pity Thad is gone ; 

Because thou hast shamed me _ before 
both the hosts 

With thy light skipping tricks, and thy 
girl’s wiles.” 

He spoke, and Sohrab kindled at his 

taunts, 

And he too drew his sword ; 
they rush’d 

Together, as two eagles on one prey 

Come rushing down together from the 
clouds, 

One from the east, one from the west; 
their shields 

Dash’d with a clang together, and a din 

Rose, such as that the sinewy wood- 
cutters 

Make often in the forest’s heart at morn, 

Of hewing axes, crashing trees—-such 
blows 

Rustum and Sohrab on each other hail’d. 

And you would say that sun and stars 
took part 

In that unnatural conflict; for a cloud 

Grew suddenly in Heaven, and dark’d 
the sun 

Over the fighters’ heads; and a wind 
rose 


at once 


Under their feet, and moaning swept 


the plain, 

And ina sandy whirlwind wrapp’d the 
pair. 

In gloom they twain were wrapp’d, and 
they alone; 

For both the on-looking hosts on either 
hand 

Stood in broad daylight, and the sky 
was pure, 

And thesun sparkled on the Oxus stream. 

But in the gloom they fought, with 
bloodshot eyes 

And laboring breath ; 

struck the shield 

Which Sohrab held stiff out; the steel- 
spiked spear 

Rent the tough plates, but fail’d to reach 
the skin, 


first Rustum 


735 





And Rustum pluck’d it back with an- 
gry groan. 

Then Sohrab with his sword smote Rus- 
tum’s heli, 

Nor clove its steel quite through; but 
all the crest 

He shore away, and that proud horse- 
hair plume, 

Never till now defiled, sank to the dust ; 

And Rustum bow’d his head; but then 
the gloom 

Grew blacker, thunder rumbled in the 
air, 

And lightnings rent the cloud ; 
Ruksh, the horse, 

Who stood at hand, utter’'d a dreadful 
wy 

No horse’s cry was that, most like the 
roar 

Of some pain’d desert-lion, who all day 

Hath trail’d the hunter’s javelin in his 
side, _ 

And comes at night to die upon the 
sand, 

The two hosts heard that pty and 
quaked for fear, 

And Oxus curdled as it cross’d his 
stream. 

But Sohrab heard, and quail’d not, but 
rush’d on, 

And struck again ; 
bow’d 

His head; but this time all the blade, 
like glass, 

Sprang in a thousand shivers on the 
helm, 

And in the hand the hilt remain’d alone. 

Then Rustum raised his head ; his dread- 
ful eyes 

Glared, and he shook on high his menac- 
ing spear, 

And shouted: Rustum !—Sohrab heard 
that shout, 

And shrank amazed ; 
one step, 

And scann’d with blinking eyes the ad- 
vancing form ; 

And then he stood bewilder’d; and he 
dropp’d 

His covering shield, 
pierced his side. 

He reel’d, and staggering back, sank to 
the ground, 

And then the gloom dispersed, and the 
wind fell, 

And the bright sun broke forth, and 
melted all 

The cloud; and the two armies saw the 
pair— 


and 


and again Rustum 


back he recoil’d 


and the spear 


736 


Saw Rustum standing, safe upon his 
feet, ; 

And Sohrab, wounded, on the bloody 
sand. 

Then, with 

began :— 

‘* Sohrab, thou thoughtest in thy mind 
to kill 

A Persian lord this day, and strip his 
corpse, 

And bear thy trophies to Afrasiab’s tent. 

Or else that the great Rustum would 
come down 

Himself to fight, and that thy wiles 
would move 

His heart to take a gift, and let thee go. 

And then that all the Tartar host would 
praise 

Thy courage or thy craft, and spread 
thy fame, 

To glad thy father in his weak old age. 

Fool, thou art slain, and by an unknown 
man ! 

Dearer to the red jackals shalt thou be 

Than ig friends, and to thy father 
old.” 

And, with a fearless mien, Sohrab re- 

plied :— 

‘*Unknown thou art; yet thy fierce 
vaunt is vain. 

Thou dost not slay me, proud and boast- 
ful man! 

No! Rustum slays me, and this filial 
heart. 

For were I match’d with ten such men 
as thee, 

And I were that which till to-day I was, 

They should be lying here, I standing 


a bitter smile, Rustum 


there. 

But that beloved name unnerved my 
arm— 

That name, and something, I confess, in 
thee, 


Which troubles all my heart, and made 
my shield 

Fall; and thy spear transfix’d an un- 
arm’d foe. 

And now thou boastest, and insult’st my 
fate. 

But hear thou this, fierce man, tremble 
to hear 

The mighty Rustum shall avenge my 
death ! 

My father, whom I seek through all the 
world, 

He shall avenge my death, and punish 
thee!” 

As when some hunter in the spring 

hath found 





BRIEMSEVRQETS 


A breeding eagle sitting on her nest, 
Upon the craggy isle of a hill-lake, 
And pierced her with an arrow as she 


rose, 

And es her to find her where she 
fe 

Far off ;—anon her mate comes winging 
back 4 

From hunting, anda great way off de- 
scries , 

His huddling young left sole; at that, 
he checks 

His pinion, and 
sweeps 

Circles above his eyry, with loud screams 

Chiding his mate back to her nest ; but 
she 

Lies dying, with the arrow in her side, 

In some far stony gorge out of his ken, 

A heap of fluttering feathers — never 
more 

Shall the lake glass her, flying over it ; 

Never the black and dripping precipices 

Kcho her stormy scream as she sails by — 

As that poor bird flies home, nor knows 
his loss, 

So Rustum knew not his own loss, but 
stood 

Over his dying son, and knew him not. 

But, with a cold incredulous voice, he 

said :-- 

‘What prate is this of fathers and re- 
venge ? 

The mighty Rustum never had a son.” 

And, with a failing voice, Sohrab re- 

plied :— 

‘* Ah yes, he had ! and that lost son am I. 

Surely the news will one day reach his 
ear, 

Reach Rustum, where he sits, and tar- 
ries long, 


with short uneasy 


-Somewhere, I know not where, but far 


from here 

And pierce him like a stab, and make 
him leap 

To arms, and cry for vengeance upon 
thee. 

Fierce man, bethink thee, for an only 
son ! 

What will that grief, what will that 
vengeance be ? 

Oh, could I live, till I that grief had 
seen ! 

Yet him I pity not so much, but her, 

My mother, who in Ader-baijan dwells 

With that old king, her father, who 
grows gray 

With age, and rules over the valiant 
Koords. 


ARNOLD 


Her most I pity, who no more will see 

Sohrab returning from the Tartar camp, 

With spoils and honor, when the war is 
done. 

But a dark rumor will be bruited up, 

From tribe to tribe, until it reach her 


ear ; 
And then will that defenceless woman 
learn 
That Sohrab will rejoice her sight no 
more, 
But that in battle with a nameless foe, 
_ By the far-distant Oxus, he is slain.” 
He spoke ; and as he ceased, he wept 
aloud, 
Thinking of her he left, and his own 
death. 
He spoke; but Rustum listen’d, plunged 
in thought. 
Nor did he yet believe it was his son 
Who spoke, although he call’d back 
names he knew ; 
For he had had sure tidings that the 
babe, 
Which was in Ader-baijan born to him, 
Had been a puny girl, no boy at all— 
So that sad mother sent him word, for 
fear 
Rustum should seek the boy, to train in 
arms 
And so he deem’d that either Sohrab 
took, 
By a false boast, the style of Rustum’s 
son ; 
Or that men gave it him, to swell his 
fame. 
So deem’d he; yet he listen’d, plunged 
in thought 
And his soul set to grief, as the vast tide 
Of the bright rocking Ocean sets to 
shore 
At the full moon ; tears gather’d in his 
eyes ; 
For he remember’d his own early youth, 
And all its bounding rapture; as, at 
dawn, 
The shepherd from his mountain-lodge 
descries 
A far, bright city, smitten by the sun, 
Through many rolling clouds—so Rus- 
tum saw 
His youth ; saw Sohrab’s mother, in her 
bloom; 
And ag On king, her father, who loved 
we 
His wandering guest, and gave him his 
fair child 
With Joy ; and all the pleasant life they 
led, 


47 


13M 


They three, in that long-distant summer- 


time— 

The castle, and the dewy woods, and 
hunt 

And hound, and morn on those delight- 
ful hills 


In Ader-baijan. And he saw that Youth, 

Of age and looks to be his own dear 
son, 

Piteous and lovely, lying on the sand. 

Like some rich hyacinth which by the 
scythe 

Of an unskilful gardener has been cut, 

Mowing the garden grass-plots near its 


bed, 

And lies, a fragrant tower of purple 
bloom, 

On the mown, dying grass—so Sohrab 


lay, 

Lovely in death, upon the common sand. 

And Rustum gazed on him with grief, 
and said :— 

**O Sohrab, thou indeed art such a son 

Whom Rustum, wert thou his, might 
well have loved. 

Yet here thou errest, Sohrab, or else men 

Have told thee false—thou art not Rus- 
tum’s son. 

For Rustum had no son; one child he 


had— 

But one—a girl; who with her mother 
now 

Plies some light female task, nor dreams 
of us—— 


Of us she dreams not, nor of wounds, 
nor war.” 
But Sohrab answer’d him in wrath ; 
for now 
The anguish of the deep-fix’d spear grew 
fierce, 


‘And he desired to draw forth the steel, 


And let the blood flow free, and so to 
die— 

But first he would convince his stubborn 
foe ; 

And, rising sternly on one arm, he 
said :— 

‘*Man, who art thou who dost deny 

my words ? 

Truth sits upon the lips of dying men, 

And falsehood, while I lived, was far 
from mine. 

I tell thee, prick’d upon thisarm I bear 

That seal which Rustum to my mother 


gave, 
That she might prick it on the babe she 
bore. 
He spoke; and all the blood left Rus- 
tum’s cheeks, 


738 

And his knees totter’d, and hesmote his 
hand 

Against his breast, his heavy mailed 
hand, 


That the hard iron corslet clank’d aloud ; 
And to his heart he press’d the other 
hand, 
And in a hollow voice he spake, and 
said :— 
‘“Sohrab, that were a proof which 
could not lie! 
If thou show this, then art thou Rus- 
tum’s son.” 
Then, with weak hasty fingers, Sobrab 
loosed 
His belt, and near the shoulder bared 
his arm, 
And show’d a sign in faint vermilion 
points 
Prick’d; as a cunning workman, in 
Pekin, 
Pricks with vermilion some clear porce- 
lain vase, 
An emperor’s gift-—-at early morn he 
paints, 
And all day long, and, when night 
comes, the lamp 
Lights up his studious forehead and thin 
hands— 
So delicately prick’d the sign appear’d 
On Sohrab’s arm, the sign of Rustum’s 
seal. 
It was that griffin, which of old rear’d 
Zal, 
Rustum’s great father, whom they left 
to die, 
A helpless babe, among the mountain- 
rocks ; 
Him that kind creature found, and 
rear’d, and loved— 
Then Rustum took it for his glorious 
sign. 
And Sohrab bared “that image on his 
arm, 
And himself scann’d it long with mourn- 
ful eyes, 
And then he touch’d it with his hand 
and said :— 
‘‘How say’st thou? 
proper sign 
Of Rustum’s son, or 
man ’s?” 
He spoke; but Rustum gazed, and 
gazed, and stood 
Speechless; and then he _ utter’d one 
sharp cry: 
O boy—thy father !—and his voice choked 
there. [eyes, 
And then a dark cloud pass’d before his 


Is that sign the 


of some other 


BRITISH POETS 


And his head swam, and he sank down 
to earth. 

But Sohrab crawl’d to where he lay, and 
cast 

His arms about his neck, and kiss’d his 
lips, 

And with fond faltering fingers stroked 
his cheeks, 

Trying to call him back to life; and life 

Came back to Rustum, and he oped his 
eyes, 

And they stood wide with horror; and 
he seized 

In both his hands the dust which lay 
around, 

And threw it on his head, and smirch’d 
his hair,— 

His hair, and face, and’ beard, and glit- 
tering arms ; 


_And strong convulsive groanings shook 


his breast, 

And his sobs choked him ; 
clutch’d his sword, 

To draw it, and for ever let life out. 

But Sohrab saw his thought, and held 
his hands, 

And pe a soothing voice he spake, and 
said :— 

‘* Father, forbear! for I but meet to- 

day 

The doom which at my birth was writ- 
ten down 

In Heaven, and thou art Heaven’s un- 
conscious hand. 

Surely my heart cried out that it was 
thou, 

When first I saw thee; and thy heart 
spoke too, 

I know it! but fate trod those prompt- 
ings down 

Under its iron heel; fate, fate engaged 

The strife, and hurl’d me on my father’s 
spear. 

But let us speak no more of this! I find 

My father; let me feel that I have 
found ! 

Come, sit beside me on this sand, and 
take 

My head betwixt thy hands, and kiss my 
cheeks, 

And wash them with thy tears, and say: 
My son! 

Quick! quick! for number’d are my 
sands of life, 

And swift ; for like the lightning to this 
field 

I came, and like the wind I go away— 

Sudden, and swift, and like a passing 
wind. 


and he 


ARNOLD 


739 





But it was writ in Heaven that this 
should be.” 
So said he, and his voice released the 
heart 
Of Rustum, and his tears broke forth ; 
he cast 
His arms round his son’s neck, and wept 
aloud, 
And kiss’d him. 
the hosts, 
When they saw Rustum’s grief ; 
Ruksh, the horse, 
With his head bowing to the ground 
and mane 
Sweeping the dust, came near, 
mute woe 
First tothe one, then to the other moved 
His head, as if inquiring what their 
grief 
Might mean; and from his dark, com- 
passionate eyes, 
The big warm tears roll’d down, and 
caked the sand. 
But Rustum chid him with stern voice, 
and said :— 
‘* Ruksh, now thou grievest ; but, O 
Ruksh ; thy feet 
Should first have rotted on their nimble 
joints, 
Or ere they brought thy master to this 
field !”’ 
But Sohrab look’d upon the horse and 
said ;— 
“Ts this, then, Ruksh ? 
A past days, 
My mother told me of thee, thou brave 
steed, 
My terrible father’s terrible horse! and 
said, 
That I should one day find thy lord and 
thee. 
Come, let me lay my hand upon thy 
mane ! 
O Ruksh, thouart more fortunate than I; 
For thou hast gone where I shall never 


And awe fell on both 


and 


and in 


How often, in 


89, 
And snuff’d the breezes of my father’s 


home, 

And thou hast trod the sands of Seis- 
tan, 

And seen the River of Helmund, and the 
Lake 

Of Zirrah; and the aged Zal himself 


Has often stroked thy neck, and given 
thee food, 

Corn in e golden platter soak’d with 
win 

And said ; “0 Ruksh ! bear Rustum well! 
—but I 


Have never known my grandsire’s fur- 
row’d face, 

Nor seen his lofty house in Seistan, 

Nor slaked my thirst at the clear Hel- 
mund stream ; 

But lodged among my father’s foes, and 
seen 

Afrasiab’s cities only, Samarcand, 

Bokhara, and lone Khiva in the waste, 

And the black Toorkmun tents; and 
only drunk 

The desert rivers, Moorghab and Tejend, 

Kohik, and where the Kalmuks’ feed 
their sheep, 

The northern Sir; and this great Oxus 
stream, 

The yellow Oxus, by whose brink I die.” 

Then, with a heavy groan, Rustum be- 

wail’d:— 

‘*Oh, that its waves were flowing over 
me ! 

Oh, that I saw its grains of yellow silt 

Roll tumbling in the current o’er my 
head!” 

But, with a grave mild voice, Sohrab 

replied :— 

** Desire not that, my father! thou must 


live. 

For some are born to do great deeds, and 
live, 

As some are born to be obscured, and 
die. 


Do thou the deeds I die too young to do, 

And reap a second glory in thine age ; 

Thou art my father, and thy gain is mine. 

But come! thou seest this great host of 
men 

Which follow me; I pray thee, 
not these ! 

Let me entreat for them ; what have 
they done ? 

They follow’d me, my hope, my fame, 
my star. 

Let them all cross the Oxus back in 
peace. 

But me thou must bear hence, not send 
with them, 

But carry me with thee to Seistan, 

And place me on a bed, and mourn for 
me, 

Thou, and the snow-hair’d Zal, and all 
thy friends. 

And thou must lay me in that lovely 
earth, 

And heap a stately mound above my 
bones, 

And plant a far-seen pillar over all. 

That so the passing horseman on the 
waste 


slay 


740 


BRITISH POETS 





May see my tomb a great way off, and 
cry: 

Sohrab, the mighty Rustwm’s son, lies 
there, 

Whom his great father did tn ignorance 
kill! 

And I be not forgotten in my grave.” 

And, with a mournful voice, Rustum 

replied :— 

‘Fear not, as thou hast said, Sohrab, 
my son, 

So shall it be; for I will burn my tents, 

And quit the host, and bear thee hence 
with me, 

And carry thee away to Seistan, 

And place thee on a bed, and mourn for 
thee, 

With the snow-headed Zal, and all my 
friends, 

And I will lay thee in that lovely earth, 

And heap a stately mound above thy 
bones, : 

And plant a far-seen pillar over all, 

And men shall not forget thee in thy 
grave. 

And I will spare thy host; 
them go! 

Let them all cross the Oxus back in 
peace ! 

What should I do with slaying any 
more? 

For would that all that I have ever 
slain 

Might be once more alive; my bitterest 
foes, 

And they who were call’d champions in 
their time, 

And through whose death I won that 
fame I have— 

And I were nothing but acommon man, 

A poor, mean soldier, and without re- 
nown, 

So thou mightest live too, my son, my 
son ! 

Or rather would that I, even I myself, 

Might now be lying on this bloody sand, 

Near death, and by an ignorant stroke 
of thine, 

Not thou of mine! and I might die, not 
thou ; 

And I, not thou, be borne to Seistan ; 

And Zal might weep above my grave, 
not thine ; 

And say: O son I weep thee not too sore, 

For willingly, I know, thou met’st thine 
end ! 

But now in blood and battles was my 
youth, 

And full of blood and battles is my age, 


yea, let 


And I shall never end this life of blood.” 
Then, at the point of death, Sohrab 
replied : — 
‘* A life of blood indeed, thou dreadful 
man ! 
But thou shalt yet have peace; only not 


now, 
Not yet ! but thou shalt have it on that 


day, 

When thou shalt sail in a high-masted 
ship, 

Thou and the other peers of Kai Khos- 
roo, 

Returning home over the salt blue sea, 

From laying thy dear master in his 
grave.” 

And Rustum gazed in Sohrab’s face, 

and said :— 

“Soon be that day, my son, and deep 
that sea ! 

Till then, if fate so wills, let me endure.” 

He spoke; and Sohrab smiled on him, 

and took 

The spear, and drew it from his side, and 
eased 

His wound’s imperious anguish ; but the 
blood 

Came welling from the open gash, and 
life 

Flow’d with the stream ;—all down his 
cold white side 

The crimson torrent ran, dim now and 
soil’d, 

Like the soil’d tissue of white violets 

Left, freshly gather’d, on the native 
bank, . 

By children whom their nurses call with 
haste 

Indoors from the sun’s eye; his head 
droop’d low, 

His limbs grew slack ; motionless, white, 
he lay— 

White, with eyes closed ; 
heavy gasps, 

Deep heavy gasps quivering through all 
his frame, 


only when 


Convulsed him back to life, he open’d 


them, 

And fix’d them feebly on his father’s 
face ; 

Till now all strength was ebb’d, and 
from his limbs, 

Unwillingly the spirit fled away, 

Regretting the warm mansion which it 
left, 

And youth, and bloom, and this delight-. 
ful world. 

So, on the bloody sand, Sohrab lay ~ 

dead ; 


ARNOLD 


741 





And the great Rustum drew his horse- 
man’s cloak 

Down o’er his face, and sate by his dead 
son. 

As those black granite pillars, once 
high-rear’d 

By Jemshid in Persepolis, to bear 

His house, now ’mid their broken flights 
of steps” 

Lie prone, enormous, down the moun- 
tain side— 

So in the sand lay Rustum by his son. 

And night came down over the sol- 

emn waste, 

And the two gazing hosts, and that sole 


pair, 

And darken’d all; and a cold fog, with 
night, 

Crept from the Oxus. 
arose, 

As of a great assembly loosed, and fires 

Began to twinkle through the fog; for 
now 

Both armies moved to camp, and took 
their meal; 

The Persians took it on the open sands 

Southward, the Tartars by the river 
marge ; 

And Rustum and his son were left alone. 

But the majestic river floated on, 

Out of the mist and hum of that low 
land, 

Into the frosty starlight, and there 
moved, 

Rejoicing, through the hush’d Choras- 
mian waste, 

Under the solitary moon ;—he flow’d 

Right for the polar star, past Orgunjé, 

Brimming, and bright, and large; then 
sands began 

To hem his watery march, and dam his 
streams, 

And split his currents; that for many a 
league 

The shorn and parcell’d Oxus strains 
along 

Through beds of sand and matted rushy 
isles— 

Oxus, forgetting the bright speed he had 

In his high mountain-cradle in Pamere, 

A foil’d circuitous wanderer—till at last 

The long’d-for dash of waves is heard, 
and wide . 

His luminous home of waters opens, 
bright 

And tranquil, from whose floor the new- 
bathed stars 

Emerge, and shine upon the Aral Sea. 

1853, 


Soon a hum 


PHILOMELA 


Hark! ah, the nightingale— 

The tawny-throated ! 

Hark, from that moonlit cedar what a 
burst ! 

What triumph! hark !—what pain ! 


O wanderer from a Grecian shore, 

Still, after many years, in distant lands, 

Still nourishing in thy bewilder’d brain 

That wild, unquench’d, deep-sunken, 
old-world pain— 

Say, will it never heal? 

And can this fragrant lawn 

With its cool trees, and night, 

And the sweet, tranquil Thames, 

And moonshine, and the dew, 

To thy rack’d heart and brain 

Afford no balm ? 


Dost thou to-night behold, 

Here, through the moonlight on this 
English grass, 

The unfriendly palace in the Thracian 
wild? 

Dost thou again peruse 

With hot cheeks and sear’d eyes 

The too clear web, and thy dumb sister’s 
shame ? 

Dost thou once more assay 

Thy flight, and feel come over thee, 

Poor fugitive, the feathery change 

Once more, and once more seem to make 
resound 

With love and hate, triumph and agony, 

Lone Daulis, and the high Cephissian 
vale? 


‘Listen, Eugenia— 


How thick the bursts come crowding 
through the leaves ! 

Again—thou hearest ? 

Eternal passion ! 

Eternal pain ! 1853. 

THE SCHOLAR-GIPSY 


Go, for they call you, shepherd, from the 
Bills 
Go, shepherd, and untie the wattled 
cotes ! 
No longer leave thy wistful flock un- 
fed, 
Nor let thy bawling fellows rack their 
throats, 
Nor the cropp’d herbage shoot another 
head, 
But when the fields are still, 
And the tired men and dogs all gone to 
rest, 


742 


BRITISH POETS 





And only the white sheep are some- 
times seen 
Cross and recross the strips of moon- 
blanch’d green, 
Come, shepherd, and again begin the 


quest ! 
Here, where the reaper was at work of 
late—- 
In this high field’s dark corner, where he 
leaves 
His coat, his basket, and his earthen 
cruse, 
And in the sun all morning binds the 
sheaves, 


Then here, at noon, comes back his 
stores to use— 
Here will I sit and wait, 
While to my ear from uplands far away 
The bleating of the folded flocks is 
borne, 
With distant cries of reapers in the 
corn— 
All the live murmur of a summer’s day. 


Screen’d is this nook o’er the high, half- 
reap’d field, 
And here till sun-down, shepherd! will 
be. 
Through the thick corn the scarlet 
poppies peep, 
And round green roots and yellowing 
stalks I see 
Pale pink convolvulus in 
creep ; 
And air-swept lindens yield 
- Their scent, and rustle down their per- 
fumed showers 
Of bloom on the bent grass where Jam 
laid, 
And bower me from the August sun 
with shade ; 
And the eye travels down to Oxford’s 
towers. 


tendrils 


And near me on the grass lies Glanvil’s 
book—- 
Come, let me read the oft-read tale 
again ! 
The story of the Oxford scholar poor, 
Of pregnant parts and quick inventive 
brain, 
Who, tired of knocking at prefer- 
ment’s door, 
One summer-morn forsook 
His friends, and went to learn the gipsy- 
lore, 
And roam’d the world with that wild 
brotherhood, 





And came, as most men deem’d, to lit- 
tle good. 
But came to Oxford and his friends no 
more. 


But once, years after, in the country- 
lanes, 

Two scholars, whom at college erst he 
knew, 

Met him, and of his way of life en- 
quired ; 
Whereat he answer'd, that the gipsy- 

crew, 
His mates, had arts to rule as they de- 
sired 
The workings of men’s brains, 
And they can bind them to what thoughts 
they will. 
** And I,” he said, ‘‘ the secret of their 


art, 
When fully learn’d, will to the world 
impart ; 
But it needs heaven-sent moments for 
this skill.” 


This said, he left them, and return’d no 
more.—— 
But rumors hung about the country- 
side, 
That the lost Scholar long was seen to 
stray, 
Seen by rare glimpses, pensive and 
tongue-tied, 
In hat of antique shape, and cloak of 
gray, 
The same the gipsies wore. . 
Shepherds had met him on the Hurst in 
spring ; 
At some lone alehouse in the Berk- 
shire moors, 
On the warm ingle-bench, the smock- 
frock’d boors 
Had found him seated at their entering, 


But, ’mid their drink and clatter, he 
would fly. 
And I myself seem half to know thy 
looks, 
And put the shepherds, wanderer! on 
thy trace ; 
And boys who in lone wheatfields scare 
the rooks 
Task if thou hast pass’d their quiet 
place ; 
Or in my boat I le 
Moor’d to the cool bank in the summer- 
heats, 
*Mid wide grass meadows which the 
sunshine fills, 


ARNOLD 


And watch the warm, green-muffled 
Cumner hills, 
And wonder if thou haunt’st their shy 
retreats. 


For most, I know, thou lov’st retired 
ground ! 
Thee at the ferry Oxford riders blithe, 
Returning home on summer-nights, 
have met 
Crossing the stripling Thames at Bab- 
lock-hithe, 
Trailing in the cool stream thy fingers 
wet, 
As the punt’s rope chops round ; 
And leaning backward in a pensive 
dream, 
And fostering in thy lap a heap of 
flowers 
Pluck’d in shy fields and distant Wych- 
wood bowers, 
And thine eyes resting on the moonlit 
stream. 


And then they land, and thou art seen 
no more !— 
Maidens, who from the distant hamlets 
come 
To dance around the Fyfield elm in 


May, 
Oft through the darkening fields have 
seen thee roam, 
Or cross a stile into the public way. 
Oft thou hast given them store 
Of flowers—the frail-leaf’d, white anem- 
one, 
Dark bluebells drench’d with dews of 
summer eves, 


And purple orchises with spotted 
leaves— 
But none hath words she can report of 
thee. 


And, above Godstow Bridge, when hay- 
time ’s here 
In June, and many a scythe in sunshine 
flames, 
Men who through those wide fields of 
breezy grass 
Where black-wing’d swallows haunt the 
glittering 'Thames, 
To bathe in the abandon’d lasher pass, 
Have often pass’d thee near 
Sitting upon the river bank o’ergrown ; 
Mark’d thine outlandish garb, thy 
figure spare, ! 
Thy dark vague eyes, and soft ab- 
stracted air— [wast gone! 
But, when they came from bathing, thou 


743 


At some lone homestead in the Cumner 
hills, 
Where at her open door the housewife 
darns, 
Thou hast been seen, or hanging on a 
gate 
To watch the threshers in the mossy 
barns. 
Children, who early range these slopes 
and late 
For cresses from the rills, 
Have known thee eying, all an April- 
day, 
The springing pastures and the feeding 
kine ; 
And mark’d thee, when the stars come 
out and shine, 
Through the long dewy grass move slow 
away. 


In autumn, on the skirts of Bagley 
Wood— 
Where most the gipsies by the turf-edged 
. way 
Pitch their smoked tents, and every 
bush you see 
With scarlet patches tagg’d and shreds 
of gray, 
Above the forest-ground called Thes- 
saly— 
The blackbird, picking food, 
Sees thee, nor stops his meal, nor fears 
at all; 
So often has he known thee past him 
stray, 
Rapt, twirling in thy hand a wither’d 


spray, 
And waiting for the spark from heaven 
to fall. 


And once, in winter, on the causeway 
chill 
Where home through flooded fields foot- 
travellers go, 
Have I not pass’d thee on the wooden 
bridge, 
Wrapt in thy cloak and battling with 
the snow, 
Thy face tow’rd Hinksey and its win- 
try ridge? 
And thou hast climb’d the hill, 
And gain’d the white brow of the Cum- 
ner range ; 
Turn’d once to watch, while thick the 
snowflakes fall, 
The line of festal light in Christ-Church 
hall— 
Then sought thy straw in some seques- 
ter’d grange. 


744 


BRITISH#EGETS 





But what—I dream! Two hundred years 
are flown 
Since first thy story ran through Oxford 
halls, 
And the grave Glanvil did the tale in- 
scribe 
That thou wert wander’d from the stu- 
dious walls 
To learn strange arts, and join a gipsy- 
tribe ; 
And thou from earth art gone 
Long since, and in some quiet churchyard 
laid— 
Some country-nook, where o’er thy un- 
known grave 
Tall grasses and white flowering net- 
tles wave, 
Under a dark, 
shade. 


red-fruited yew-tree’s 


—No, no, thou hast not felt the lapse of 
hours ! 
For what wears out the life of mortal 
men ? 
‘Tis that from change to change their 
being rolls ; 
Tis that repeated shocks, again, again, 
Exhaust the energy of strongest souls 
And numb the elastic powers. 
Till having used our nerves with bliss 
and teen, 
And tired upon a thousand schemes 
our wit, 
To the just-pausing Genius we remit 
Our worn-out life, and are—what we 
have been. 





Thou hast not lived, why should’st thou 

perish, so? 

Thou hadst one aim, one business, one 

desire ; 
Else wert thou long since number’d 
with the dead ! 

Klse hadst thou spent, like other men, 

thy fire! © 
The generations of thy peers are fled, 
And we ourselves shall go ; 

But thou possessest an immortal lot, 
And we imagine thee exempt from age 
And living as thou liv’st on Glanvil’s 

page, 

Because thou hadst—what we, alas! 

have not. 


For early didst thou leave the world, 
with powers 
Fresh, undiverted to the world without, 
Firm to their mark, not spent on other 
things ; 


Free from the sick fatigue, the languid 
doubt, 
Which much to have tried, in much 
been baffied, brings. 
O life unlike to ours ! 
Who fluctuate idly without term or 
scope, 
Of whom each strives, nor knows for 
what he strives, 
And each half lives a hundred differ- 
ent lives; 
Who wait like thee, but not, like thee, 
in hope. 


Thou waitest for the spark from heaven ! 
and we, 
Light half-believers of our casual creeds, 
Who never deeply felt, nor clearly 
will’d, 
Whose insight never has borne fruit in 
deeds, 
Whose vague resolves never have been 
fulfill’d ; 
For whom each year we see 
Breeds new beginnings, disappointments 
new: 
Who hesitate and falter life away, 
And lose to-morrow the ground won 
to-day— 
Ah! do not we, wanderer! await it too ? 


Yes, we await it !—but it still delays, 
And then we suffer ! and amongst us one, 
Who most has suffer’d, takes dejectedly 
His seat upon the intellectual throne ; 
And all his store of sad experience he 
Lays bare of wretched days; - 
Tells us his misery’s birth and growth 
and signs, 
And how the dying spark of hope was 
fed, 
And how the breast was soothed, and 
how the head, 
And all his hourly varied anodynes. 


This for our wisest! and we others pine, 
And wish the long unhappy dream 
would end, 

And waive all claim to bliss, and try 


to bear ; 
With close-lipp’d patience for our only 
friend, 
Sad patience, too near neighbor to 
despair— 


But none has hope like thine! 
Thou through the fields and through the 
woods dost stray, 
Roaming the country-side, a truant 
boy, ; 


ARNOLD 


Nursing thy project in unclouded joy, 
And every doubt long blown by time 
away. 


O born in days when wits were fresh 
and clear, 
And life ran gaily as the sparkling 
Thames ; 
Before the strange disease of modern 
life, 
With its sick hurry, its divided aims, 
Its heads o’ertax’d, its palsied hearts, 
was rife— 
Fly hence, our contact fear ! 
Still fly, plunge deeper in the bowering 
wood ! 
Averse, as Dido did with gesture stern 
From her false friend’s approach in 
‘Hades turn, 
Wave us away and keep thy solitude ! 


Still nursing the unconquerable hope, 
Still clutching the inviolable shade, 
With a free onward impulse brushing 
through, 
By night, the silver’d branches of the 
glade— 
Far on the forest-skirts, where none 
pursue, 
On some mild pastoral slope 
Emerge, and resting on the moonlit pales 
Freshen thy flowers as in former years 
With dew, or listen with enchanted 
ears, 
From the dark dingles, to the nightin- 
gales ! 


But fly our paths, our feverish contact 


For strong the infection of our mental 
strife, 
Which, though it gives no bliss, yet 
spoils for rest ; 
And we should win thee from thy own 
fair life, 
Like us distracted, and like us unblest. 
Soon, soon thy cheer would die, 
Thy hopes grow timorous, and unfix’d 
thy powers, 
And thy clear aims be cross and shift- 
ing made ; 
And then thy glad perennial youth 
would fade, 
Fade and grow old at last, and die like 
ours. 


Then fly our greetings, fly our speech and 
smiles! 

—As some grave Tyrian trader, from the 
sea, 


1435 


Descried at sunrise an emerging prow 
Lifting the cool-hair’d creepersstealthily, 
The fringes of asouthward-facing brow 
Among the Aigzean Isles ; 
And saw the merry Grecian coaster come, 
Freighted with amber grapes, and 
Chian wine, 
Green, bursting figs, 
steep’d in brine— 
And knew the intruders on his ancient 
home, 


and tunnies 


The young light-hearted masters of the 
waves— 
And snatch’d his rudder, and shook out 
more sail ; 
And day and night held on indignantly 
O’er the Blue Midland waters with the 
gale, 
Betwixt the Syrtes and soft Sicily, 
To where the Atlantic raves 
Outside the western straits ; and unbent 
sails 
There, where down cloudy cliffs, 
through sheets of foam, 
Shy traffickers, the dark Iberians 
come ; 
And on the beach undid his corded bales. 
1853. 


FROM BALDER DEAD 
SECTION II 


THE Gods held talk together, group’d in 
knots, 


Round Balder’s corpse, which they had 


thither borne ; 

And Hermod came down tow’rds them 
from the gate. 

And Lok, the father of the serpent, first 

Beheld him come, and to his neighbor 
spake :— 

** See, here is 

single back 

From Hell; and shall I tell thee how he 
seems ? 

Like as a farmer, who hath lost his dog, 

Some morn, at market, in a crowded 
town— 

Through many streets the poor beast 
runs in vain, 

And follows this man after that, for 
hours ; 

And, late at evening, spent and panting, 
falls 

Before a stranger’s threshold, not his 
home, 

With flanks a-tremble, and his slender 
tongue 


Hermod, who comes 


746 


Hangs quivering out between his dust- 
smear’d jaws, 

And piteously he eyes the passers by ; 

But home his master comes to his own 
farm, 

Far in the country, wondering where he 
is— 

So Hermod comes to-day unfollow’d 
home.” 

And straight his neighbor, moved with 

wrath, replied :— 

‘‘Deceiver! fair in form, but false in 


heart ! 

Enemy, mocker, whom, though Gods, 
we hate— 

Peace, lest our father Odin hear thee 
ibe! 


Would I might see him snatch thee in 
his hand, 
And bind thy carcase, like a bale, with 
cords, 
And hurl] thee in a lake, to sink or swim! 
If clear from plotting Balder’s death, to 
swim; 
But deep, if thou devisedst it, to drown, 
And perish, against fate, before thy day.” 
So they two soft to one another spake. 
But Odin look’d toward the land, and saw 
His messenger; and he stood forth, and 
cried. 
And Hermod came, and leapt from 
Sleipner down, 
And in his father’s hand put Sleipner’s 
rein, 
And greeted Odin and the Gods, and 
said :— 
‘Odin, my father, and ye, Gods of 
Heaven ! 
Lo, home, having perform’d your will, I 
come. 
Into the joyless kingdom have I been, 
Below, and look’d upon the shadowy 
tribes 
Of ghosts, and communed with their 
solemn queen ; 
And to your prayer she sends you this 
reply : 
Show her through all the world the signs 
of grief ! 
Fails but one thing to grieve, there Balder 
stops ! 
Let Gods, men, brutes, beweep him ; plants 
and stones : 
So shall she know your loss was dear in- 
deed, 
And bend her heart and give you Balder 
back.” 3 
He spoke; and all the Gods to Odin 
look’d ; 


BRITISH POETS 


And cates the Father of the ages 
said :— 
‘“ Ye Gods, these terms may keep an- 
other day. 
But now, put on your arms, and mount 
your steeds, 
And in procession all come near, and 
weep 
Balder; for that is what the dead desire. 
When ye enough have wept, then build 
a pile 
Of the heap’d wood, and burn his corpse 
with fire 
Out of our sight ; that we may turn from 
grief, 
And lead, as erst, our daily life in 
Heaven.” 
He spoke, and the Gods arm’d ; and 
Odin donn’d 
His dazzling corslet and his helm of gold, 
And led the way on Sleipner ; and the 
rest 
Follow’d, in tears, their father and their 
king. 
And thrice in arms around the dead they 
rode, 
Weeping ; the sands were wetted, and 
their arms, 
With their thick-falling tears—so good a 
friend 
They mourn’d that day, so bright, so 
loved a God. 
And Odin came, and laid his kingly 
hands 
On Balder’s breast, and thus began the 
wail :— 
‘‘ Farewell, O Balder, bright and loved, 
my son! 
In that great day, the twilight of the 
Gods, 
When Muspel’s children shall beleaguer 
Heaven, 
Then we shall miss thy counsel and thy 
arm.” 
Thou camest near the next, O warrior 
Thor ! 
Shouldering thy hammer, in thy chariot 
drawn, 
Swaying the long-hair’d goats with 
silver’d rein ; 
And over Balder’s corpse these words 
didst say :— 
‘* Brother, thou dwellest in the dark- 
some land, 
And talkest with the feeble tribes of 
ghosts, 
Now, and I know not how they prize 
thee there— [and mourn’d. 
But here, I know, thou wilt be miss’d 


ARNOLD 


For Povey spirits and high wraths are 
rife 
Among the Gods and Heroes here in 
Heaven, 
As among those whose joy and work is 
war ; 
And daily strifes arise,and angry words. 
But te thy lips, O Balder, night or 
ay, 
Heard no one ever an injurious word 
To God or Hero, but thou keptest back 
The others, laboring to compose their 
brawls. 
Be ye then kind, as Balder too was kind ! 
For we lose him, who smoothed all strife 
in Heaven.” 
He spake, and all the Gods assenting 
wail’d. 
And Freya next came nigh, with golden 


tears ; 
The loveliest Goddess she in Heaven, by 
all 
Most honor’d after Frea, Odin’s wife. 
Her long ago the wandering Oder took 
To mate, but left her to roam distant 


lands ; 

Since then she seeks him, and weeps tears 
of gold. 

Names hath she many; Vanadis on 
earth 

They call her, Freya is her name in 
Heaven ; 

She in her hands took Balder’s head, and 
spake :— 

‘‘Balder, my brother, thou art gone a 

road 

Unknown and long, and haply on that 
way 

My long-lost wandering Oder thou hast 
met, 

For in the paths of Heaven he is not 
found, 


Oh, if it be so, tell him what thou wast 

To his neglected wife, and what he is, 

And wring his heart with shame, to hear 
thy word! 

For he, my husband, left me here to pine, 

Not long a wife, when his unquiet heart 

First drove him from me into distant 
lands ; 

Since then I vainly seek him through 
the world, 

And weep from shore to shore my golden 
tears, 

But neither god nor mortal heeds my 
pain. 

Thou only, Balder, wast for ever kind, 

To take my hand, and wipe my tears, 
and say : 


747 





“Weep not, O Freya, weep no golden tears ! 

One day the wanderi ing Oder will return! 

Or thou wilt find hom in thy faithful 
search 

On some great road, or resting in an inn, 

Or at a ford, or sleeping by a tree. 

So Balder said ;—but Oder, well I know, 

My truant Oder I shall see no more 

To the world’s end; and Balder now is 
gone, 

And I am left uncomforted in Heaven.” 

She spake ; and all the Goddesses be- 

wail’d. 

Last from among the Heroes one came 
near, 

No God, but of the hero-tr oop the chief— 

Regner, who swept the northern sea with 
fleets, 

And ore o’er Denmark and the heathy 
isles, 

Living ; but Ella captured him and 
slew ;— 

A king whose fame then fill’d the vast of 
Heaven. 

Now time obscures it, and men’s later 
deeds. 

He last approach’d the corpse, and 
spake, and said :— 

‘* Balder, there yet are many Scalds 

in Heaven 

Still left, and that chief Scald, thy 
brother Brage, 

Whom we may bid to sing, though 
thou art gone. 


‘And all these gladly, while we drink, 


we hear, 
After the feast is done, in Odin’s hall ; 
But they harp ever on one string, and 
wake 
Remembrance in our soul of wars alone, 
Such as on earth we valiantly have 
waged, 


And blood, and ringing blows, and 
violent death. 
But when thou sangest, Balder, thou 


didst strike 

Another note, and, like a bird in spring, 

Thy voice of joyance minded us, and 
youth, 

And wife, and children, and our ancient 
home, 

Yes, and I, too, 
more 

My dungeon, where the serpents stung 
me dead, 

Nor Ella’s victory on the English coast—- 

But I heard Thora laugh in Gothland 
Isle, 

And saw my shepherdess Aslauga, tend 


remember’d then no 


BRITISH POETS 





748 

Her flock along the white Norwegian 
beach. 

Tears started to mine eyes with yearn- 


ing joy, 
Therefore with praterdl heart I mourn 
thee dead.” 
So Regner spake, and all the Heroes 
groan'd. 
But now the sun had pass’d the height 
of Heaven, 
And soon ee all that day been spent in 
wail ; 
But then the Father of the ages said :— 
‘Ye Gods, there well may be too 
much of wail! 
Bring now the gather’d wood to Balder’s 
shi 
Heap on the deck the logs, and build the 
oyre. 
But ery the Gods and Heroes heard, 
they brought 
The wood to Balder’s ship, and built a 


pile, 

Full the deck’s breadth, and lofty ; then 
the corpse 

Of Balder on the highest top they laid, 

With Nanna on his right, and on his 
left 

Hoder, his brother, 
slew. 

And they set jars of wine and oil to lean 

Against the bodies, and stuck torches 
near, 

Splinters of pine-wood, soak’d with tur- 
pentine ; 

And brought his arms and gold, and all 
his stuff, 

And slew the dogs who at his table fed, 

And his horse, Balder’s horse, whom 
most he loved, 

And placed them on the pyre, and Odin 


whom his own hand 


threw 

A last choice gift thereon, his golden 
ring. 

The mast they fixed, and hoisted up the 
sails, 

Then they put fire to the wood; and 
Thor [stern 


Set his stout shoulder hard against the 

To push the ship through the thick sand ; 
sparks flew 

From the deep trench she plough’d, so 
strong a God 

Furrow’d it; and the water guregled in. 

And the ship floated on the waves, and 
rock’d. 

But in the hills a strong east-wind arose, 

And came down moaning to the sea; 
first squalls 


Ran black o’er the sea’s face, tabs steady 
rush’d 

The breeze, and fill’d the sails, and blew 
the fire. 

And wreathed in smoke the ship stood 
out to sea. 

Soon with a roaring rose the mighty 


fire, 

And the pile crackled ; and between the 
logs 

Sharp quivering tongues of flame shot 
out, and leaped, 

Curling and darting, higher, until they 


lick’d 

The summit of the pile, the dead, the 
mast, 

And ate the shrivelling sails; but still 
the ship 


Drove on, ablaze above her hull with 


fire. 

And the Gods stood upon the beach, and 
gazed. 

And while they gazed, the sun went 
lurid down 

Into the smoke-wrapt sea, and night 
came on. 

Then the wind fell, 
there was calm ; 

But through the dark they watch’d the 
burning ship 

Still carried o’er the distant waters on, 

Farther and farther, like an eye of fire. 

And long, in the far dark, blazed Balder’s 


with night, and 


pile ; 

But fainter, as the stars rose high, it 
flared, 

The bodies were consumed, ash choked 
the pile. 


And as, in a decaying winter-fire, 

A charr’d log, falling, makes a shower 
of sparks— 

So een a shower of sparks the pile fell 


Beddoniee the sea around ; and all was 
dark. 
But the Gods went by starlight up the 
shore 
To Asgard, and sate down in Odin’s hall 
At table, and the funeral-feast began. 
All night they ate the boar Serimner’s 
flesh, 
And from their horns, with 
rimm’d, drank mead, 
Silent, and waited for the sacred morn. 
And morning over all the world was 


silver 


spread. 
Then from their loathéd feasts the Gods 
arose. [ride 


And took their horses, and set forth to 


ARNOLD 


O’er the bridge Bifrost, where is Heim- 
dall’s watch, 

To the ash Igdrasil, and Ida’s plain ; 

Thor came on foot, the rest on horse- 


back rode. 

And they found Mimir sitting by his 
fount 

Of wisdom, which beneath the ashtree 


springs ; 

And saw the Nornies watering the roots 

Of that world-shadowing tree with 
honey-dew. 

There came the Gods, and sate them 
down on stones ; 

And thus the Father of the ages said :— 

** Ye Gods, the terms ye know, which 

-Hermod brought. 

Accept them or reject them ! both have 
grounds, 

ae erie and they bind us, unful- 

*¢ f 

To leave for ever Balder in the grave, 

An unrecover’d prisoner, shade with 
shades. 

But Bae ye say, should the fulfilment 

ail ?— 

Smooth sound the terms, and light to 
be fulfill’d ; 

For dear-beloved was Balder while he 
lived 

In Heaven and earth, and who would 
grudge him tears? 

But from the traitorous seed of Lok 
they come, 


These terms, and I suspect some hidden 


fraud. 


Bethink ye, Gods, is there no other 
way ?— 

Speak, were not this a way, the way for 
Gods? 


If I, if Odin, clad in radiant arms, 

Mounted on Sleipner, with the warrior 
Thor 

Drawn in his car beside me, and my 
sons, 

All the strong brood of Heaven, to swell 
my train, 

Should make irruption into Hela’s realm, 

And set the fields of gloom ablaze with 
light, 

And bring in triumph Balder back to 
Heaven ?.” 

He spake, and his fierce sons applauded 

loud. 

But Frea, mother of the Gods, arose, 

een. wife of Odin; thus she 
said :— 


** Odin, thou whirlwind, what athreat - 


is this! 





7A9 


Thou threatenest what transcends thy 
might, even thine. 
For of all powers the mightiest far art 


thou, 

Lord over men on earth, and Gods in 
Heaven ; 

Yet even from thee thyself hath been 
withheld 


One thing—to undo what thou thyself 
hast ruled. 
For all which hath been fixt, was fixt 


by thee. 

In the beginning, ere the Gods were 
born, 

Before the Heavens were builded, thou 
didst slay 

The giant Ymir, whom the abyss brought 
forth, 

Thou and thy brethren fierce, the sons 
of Bor, 

And cast his trunk to choke the abysmal 
void. 

But of his flesh and members thou didst 
build 

The earth and Ocean, and above them 
Heaven. 


And from the flaming world, where 
Muspel reigns, 

Thou sent’st and fetched’st fire, 
madest lights, 

Sun, moon, and stars, which thou hast 
hung in Heaven, : 

Dividing clear the paths of night and 


and 


day. 

And Asgard thou didst build, and Mid- 
gard fort ; 

Then me thou mad’st; of us the Gods 
were born. 

Last, walking by the sea, thou foundest 
spars 

Of wood, and framed’st men, who till 
the earth, 

Or on, the sea, the field of pirates, sail. 

And all the race of Ymir thou didst 
drown, 

Save one, Bergelmer ;—he on shipboard 
fled 

Thy deluge, and from him the giants 
sprang. 

But all that brood thou hast removed 
far off, 

And set by Ocean’s utmost marge to 
dwell ; 

But Hela into Niflheim thou threw’st, 

And gav’st her nine unlighted worlds to 
rule, 

A queen, and empire over all the dead. 

That empire wilt thou now invade, light 


up 


ise 


Her darkness, from her grasp a subject 
tear ?— 

Try it; but 1, for one, will not applaud. 

Nor dol merit, Odin, thou should’st slight 

Me and my words, though thou be first 
in Heaven ; 

For I too am a Goddess, born of thee, 

Thine eldest, and of me the Gods are 
sprung ; 

And all that is to come I know, but lock 

In mine own breast, and have to none 
reveal’d. 

Come then! since Hela holds by right 
her prey, 

But offers terms for 
Heaven, 

Accept the chance; theu canst no more 
obtain. 

Send through the world thy messengers ; 
entreat 

All living and unliving things to weep 

For Balder ; if thou haply thus may’st 


his release to 


melt 
Hela, and win the loved one back to 
Heaven.” 
She ape and on her face let fall her 
veil, 


And bow’d her head, and sate with 
folded hands. 

Nor did the all-ruling Odin slight her 
word ; 

Straightway he spake, and thus ad- 
dress’d the Gods : 

“Go quickly forth through all the 

world, and pray 

All living and unliving things to weep 

Balder, if haply he may thus be won.” 

When the Gods heard, they straight 

arose, and took 

Their horses, and rode forth through all 
the world ; 

North, south, east, west, they struck, 
and roam’d the world 

Entreating all things to weep Balder’s 
death. 

And all that lived, and all without life, 
wept. 

And as in winter, when the frost breaks 
up, 

At winter’s 
begins, 

And a warm west-wind blows, and 
thaw sets in— 

After an hour a dripping sound is heard 

In all the forests, and the soft-strewn 
SnOW 

Under the trees is dibbled thick with 
holes, {shuffle down ; 

And from the boughs the snowloads 


end, before the spring 


BRITISH POETS 


And, in fields sloping to the south, dark 
plots 
Of grass peep out amid surrounding 
snow, 
And wien and the peasant’s heart is 
a —_— 
So through the world was heard a drip- 
ping noise 
Of all things weeping to bring Balder 
back ; 
And there fell joy upon the Gods to hear. 
But Hermod rode with Niord, whom 
he took. 
To show him spits and beaches of the sea 
Far off, where some unwarn’d might 
fail to weep-—- 
Niord, the God of storms, whom fishers 
know ; 
Not born in Heaven; he was in Van- 
heim rear’d, 
With men, but lives a hostage with the 
Gods ; 
He knows each frith, and every rocky 
creek 
Fringed with dark pines, and sands 
where seafowl scream— 
They two scour’d every coast, and all 
things wept. 
And they rode home together, through 
the wood 
Of Jarnvid, which to east of Midgard lies 
Bordering the giants, where the trees 
are iron ; 
There in the wood before a cave they 
came, 
Where sate, in the cave’s mouth, askinny 
ha 
Toothless and old ; she gibes the passers 
b 
Thok ae call’d, but now Lok wore her 
shape ; 
She greeted them the first, and laugh’d, 
and said :— 
‘“ Ye Gods, good lack, is it so dull in 


Heaven, 

That ye come pleasuring to Thok’s iron 
wood ? 

Lovers of change ye are, fastidious 
sprites. 


Look, as in some boor’s yard a sweet- 
breath’d cow, 

Whose manger is stuff’d full of good 
fresh hay, 

Snuffs at it daintily, and stoops her head 

To chew the straw, her litter, at her feet— 

So ye grow squeamish, Gods, and sniff 
at Heaven!” 

She spake ; but Hermod answer’d her 

and said :— 


ARNOLD 


“ Thok, not for gibes we come, we come 
for tears. 
Balder is dead, and Hela holds her prey, 
But will restore, if all things give him 
tears. 
Begrudge not thine! to all was Balder 
dear.” 
Then, with a louder laugh, the hag 
replied :— 
‘Is Balder dead? and do ye-come for 
tears ? 
Thok with dry eyes will weep o’er 
Balder’s pyre, 
Weep te all other things, if weep they 
will— 
I weep him not! let Hela keep her prey.” 
She spake, and to the cavern’s depth 


she fled, 

Mocking; and Hermod knew their toil 
was vain. 

And as seafaring men, who long have 
wrought 

In the great deep for gain, at last come 
home, 

And towards evening see the headlands 
rise 

Of their dear country, and can plain 
descry 

A fire of wither’d furze which boys have 
lit 

Upon the cliffs, or smoke of burning 
weeds 

Out of a till’d field inland ;—then the 
wind 


Catches them, and drives out again to 


sea ; 

And they go long days tossing up and 
down 

Over the gray sea-ridges, and the glimpse 

Of port they had makes bitterer far their 
toil— 

So the Gods’ cross was bitterer for their 

oy. 
Then, wad at heart, to Niord Hermod 

spake :— 

‘‘ Tt is the accuser Lok, who flouts us all ! 

Ride back, and tellin Heaven this heavy 
news ; 

I must again below, to Hela’s realm.” 

He spoke; and Niord set forth back to 

Heaven. 

But northward Hermod rode, the way 
below, 

The way he knew ; and traversed Giall’s 
stream, 

And down to Ocean groped, and cross’d 
the ice, 

And came beneath the wall, and found 
the grate 


tS 


Still lifted ; well was his return fore- 
known. 

And once more Hermod saw around him 
spread 

The joyless plains, and heard the streams 
of Hell. 

But as he enter'd, on 
bound 

Of Niflheim, he saw one ghost come 
near, 

Hovering, and stopping oft, asif afraid— 

Hoder, the unhappy, whom his own hand 
slew. 

And Hermod look’d, and knew his 
brother’s ghost, 

And call’d him by his name, and sternly 
said :— 

** Hoder, ill-fated, blind in heart and 

eyes ! 

Why tarriest thou to plunge thee in the 
gulf 

Of the deep inner gloom, but flittest here, 

In twilight, on the lonely verge of Hell, 

Far from the other ghosts, and Hela’s 
throne ? 

Doubtless thou fearest to meet Balder’s. 
voice, 

Thy brother, whom through folly thou 
didst slay.” 
He spoke; but Hoder answer’d him, 
and said :— 
‘‘Hermod the nimble, 
pursue 

The unhappy with reproach, even in the 
grave? 

For this I died, and fled beneath the 
gloom, 

Not daily to endure abhorring Gods, 

Nor with a hateful presence cumber 
Heaven ; 

And canst thou not, even here, pass pity- 
ing by? 

No less. than Balder have I lost the ight 

Of Heaven, andcommunion with my kin; 

I too had once a wife, and oncea child, 

And substance, and a golden house in 
Heaven— 

But all I left of my own act, and fled 

Below, and dost thou hate me even here ? 

Balder upbraids me not, nor hates at all, 

Though he has cause, have any cause ; 
but he, 

When that with downcast looks I hither 
came, 

Stretch’d forth his hand, and with be- 
nignant voice, 

Welcome, he said, if there be welcome 
here, 

Brother and fellow-sport of Lok with me! 


the extremest 


dost thou still 


752 BRITISH POETS 


And not to offend thee, Hermod, nor to 
force 
My hated converse on thee, came I up 
From the deep gloom, where I will now 
return ; 
But earnestly I long’d to hover near, 
Not too far off, when that thou camest by; 
To feel the presence of a brother God, 
And hear the passage of a horse of 
Heaven, 
For the last time—for here thou com’st 
no more.” 
He spake, and turn’d to go to the inner 
gloom. 
But Hermod stay’d him with mild words, 
and said :—- 
‘Thou doest well to chide me, Hoder 
blind ! 
Truly thou say’st, the planning guilty 
mind 
Was Lok’s; the unwitting hand alone 
was thine. 
But Gods are like the sons of men in 
this 
When they have woe, they blame the 
nearest cause. 
Howbeit stay, and be appeased! and 
tell : 
Sits Balder still in pomp by Hela’s side, 
Or is he mingled with the unnumber’d 
dead ? ” 
And the blind Hoder answer’d him 
and spake :— 
‘His place of state remains by Hela’s 


side, 
But empty; for his wife, for Nanna 
came 
Lately below, and join’d him; and the 
air 


Frequent the still recesses of the realm 

Of Hela, and hold converse undisturb’d. 

But they too, doubtless, will have 
breathed the balm, 

Which floats before a visitant from 
Heaven, 

And have drawn upward to this verge of 
Hell.” 

He spake ; and, as he ceased, 

of wind 

Roll’d heavily the leaden mist aside 

Round where they stood, and they be- 
held two forms 

Make toward them o’er the stretching 
cloudy plain. 

And Hermod straight perceived them, 
who they were 

Balder and Nanna ; and to Balder said :— 

‘* Balder, too truly thou foresaw’st a 

snare ! 


a puff 


Lok triumphs still, and Hela keeps her 
prey. 

No more to Asgard shalt thou come, nor 
lodge 

In thy own house, Breidablik, nor enjoy 


The love all bear toward thee, nor train ~ 


up 

Forset, thy son, to be beloved like thee. ° 

Here must thou lie, and wait an endless 
age. 

therel ets for the last time, O Balder, 
nail” 

He spake; and Balder answer’d him, 

and said :— 

‘¢‘ Hail and farewell! for here thou 
com’st no more. 

Yet mourn not for me, Hermod, when 
thou sitt’st 

In Heaven, nor let the other Gods 
lament, 

As wholly to be pitied, quite forlorn. 

For Nanna hath rejoin’d me, who, of old, 

In Heaven, was seldom parted from my 
side ; 

And still the acceptance follows me, 
which crown’d 

My former life, and cheers me even here. 

The iron frown of Hela is relax’d 

When I draw nigh, and the wan tribes 
of dead 

Love me, and gladly bring for my award 

Their ineffectual feuds and feeble hates— 

Shadows of hates, but they distress 
them still.” 

And the fleet- footed Hermod made 

reply 

“Thou hast then all the solace death 
allows, 

Esteem and function ; and so faris well. 

Yet here thou lest, Balder, underground. 

Rusting for ever; and the years roll on, 

The generations pass, the ages grow, 

And bring us nearer to the final day 

When from the south shall march the 
fiery band 

And cross the bridge of Heaven, with 
Lok for guide, 

And Fenris at his heel with. broken 
chain ; 

While from the east the giant Rymer 
steers 

His ship, and the great serpent makes to 
land ; 

And all are marshall’d in one flaming 
square 

Against the Gods, upon the plains of 
Heaven. 

I mourn thee, that thou canst not help 
us then.” 


(eo nla pe de a i 


ARNOLD 


He spake; but Balder answer’d hin, 
and said :— 
‘* Mourn not for me! 
for the Gods ; 
Mourn for the men on earth, the Gods 
in Heaven, 
Who live, and with their eyes shall see 
that day ! 
The day will come, when fall shall As- 
gard’s towers, 
And Odin, and his sons, the seed of 
Heaven ; 
But what were I, tosave them in that 
; hour ? 
If strength might save them, could not 
Odin save, 
My father, and his pride, the warrior 
Thor, 
Vidar the silent, the impetuous Tyr? 
I, what were I, when these can nought 
avail ? 
Yet, doubtless, when the day of battle 
comes, 
And the two hosts are eaball d, and 
in Heaven 
The golden-crested cock shall sound 
alarm, 
And ae black brother-bird from hence 


Mourn, Hermod, 


reply, 

And buckiers clash, and spears begin to 
pour— 

Longing will stir within my breast, 
though vain. 

But not to me so grievous, as, I know, 

To other Gods it were, is my enforced 

Absence from fields where I could noth- 
ing aid ; 

For lam long: since weary of your storm 

Of carnage, and find, Hermod, in your 
life 

Something too much of war and _ broils, 
which make 

Life one perpetual fight, a bath of blood. 

Mine eyes are dizzy with the arrowy 
iat 

Mine ears are stunn’d with blows, and 
sick for calm. 

Inactive therefore let me lie, in gloom, 

Unarm’d, inglorious ; I attend the course 

Of ages, and my late return to light, 

In times less alien to a spirit mild, 

In new-recover’d seats, the happier day.” 

He spake ; and the fleet Hermod thus 

replied :— 

‘* Brother, what seats are these, what 
happier day ? 

Tell me, that I may ponder it when 
gone.” [him :— 

And the ray-crowned Balder answer’d 
48 


753 





‘Far to the south, 
there spreads 
Another Heaven, the boundless—no one 


beyond the blue, 


yet 

Hath reach’d it; there hereafter shall 
arise 

The second Asgard, with another name, 

Thither, when o’er this present earth 
and Heavens 

The tempest of the latter days hath 
swept, 

And they from sight have disappear’d, 
and sunk, 

Shall a small remnant of the Gods re- 


pair ; 

Hoder and I shall join them from the 
grave. 

There re-assembling we shall see emerge 

From the bright Ocean at our feet an 
earth 

More fresh, more verdant than the last, 
with fruits 

Self-springing, and a seed of man pre- 
served, 


_ Who then shall live in peace, as now in 


war. 

But we in Heaven shall find again with 
JOY 

The ruin’d palaces of Odin, seats 

Familiar, halls where we have supp’d of 
old; 


‘Re-enter them with wonder, never fill 


Our eyes with gazing, and rebuild with 
tears. 

And we shall tread once more the well- 
known plain 

Of Ida, and among the grass shall find 

The golden dice wherewith we play’d of 


yore ; 

And that will bring to mind the former 
life 

And pastime of the Gods, the wise dis- 
course 

Of Odin, the delights of other days. 

O Hermod, pray that thou may’st join 
us then ! 

Such for the future is my hope ; mean- 
while, 

I rest the thrall of Hela, and endure 

Death, and the gloom which round me 
even now 

Thickens, and to its inner gulf recalls. 

Farewell, for longer speech is not al- 
low’d!” 

He spoke, and waved farewell, and 

gave his hand 

To Nanna; and she gave their brother 
blind [the three 

Her hand, in turn, for guidance; and 


754 


BRITISH POETS 





Departed o’er the cloudy plain, and soon 

Faded from sight into the interior gloom. 

But Hermod stood beside his drooping 
horse, 

Mute, gazing after them in tears; and 
fain, 

Fain had he follow’d their receding steps, 

Though they to death were bound, and 
he to Heaven, 

Then ; but a power he could not break 
withheld. 

And as a stork which idle boys have 
trapp’d, 

And tied him in a yard, at autumn sees 

Flocks of his kind pass flying o’er his 
head 

To warmer lands, and coasts that keep 
the sun ;— 

He strains to join their flight, and from 
his shed 

Follows them with a long complaining 
cry— 

So Hermod gazed, and yearn’d to join 
his kin. 


At last he sigh’d, and set forth back 


to Heaven. 1855. 
STANZAS FROM THE GRANDE 
CHARTREUSE 


THROUGH Alpine meadows soft-suffused 
With rain, where thick the crocus blows, 
Past the dark forges long disused, 

The mule-track from Saint Laurent goes. 
The bridge is cross’d, and slow we ride, 
Through forest, up the mountain-side. 


The autumnal evening darkens round, 

The wind is up, and drives the rain ; 

While, hark! far down, with strangled 
sound 

Doth the Dead Guier’s stream complain, 

Where that wet smoke, among the 
woods, 

Over his boiling cauldron broods. 


Swift rush the spectral vapors white 
Past limestone scars with ragged pines, 


Showing—then blotting from our 
sight !— 

Halt—through the cloud-drift something 
shines ! 


High in the valley, wet and drear, 
The huts of Courrerie appear. 


Strike leftward! cries our guide; and 
higher =. 

Mounts up the stony forest-way. 

At last the encircling trees retire ; 


Look! through the showery twilight 

gray 
What pointed roofs are these advance ?— 
A palace of the Kings of France? 


Approach, for what we seek is here ! 

Alight, and sparely sup, and wait 

For rest in this outbuilding near ; 

Then cross the sward and reach that 
gate. 

Knock; pass the wicket! 
come 

To the Carthusians’ world-famed home. 


Thou art 


The silent courts, where night and day 

Into their stone-carved basins cold 

The splashing icy fountains play— 

The humid corridors behold ! 

Where, ghostlike in the deepening night 

Cowl’d forms brush by in gleaming 
white. 


The chapel, where no organ’s peal 
Invests the stern and naked prayer— 
With penitential cries they kneel 
And wrestle: rising then, with bare 
And white uplifted faces stand, 
Passing the Host from hand to hand ; 


Each takes, and then his visage wan 

Is buried in his cowl once more. 

The cells !—the suffering Son of Man 
Upon the wall—the knee-worn floor— 
And where they sleep, that wooden bed, 
Which shall their coffin be, when dead ! 


The library, where tract and tome 

Not to feed priestly pride are there, 

To hymn the conquering march of Rome, 
Nor yet to amuse, as ours are! 

They paint of souls the inner strife, 
Their drops of blood, their death in life. 


The garden, overgrown—yet mild, 

See, fragrant herbs are flowering there ! 
Strong children of the Alpine wild 
Whose culture is the brethren’s care ; 
Of human tasks their only one, 

And cheerful works beneath the sun. 


Those halls, too, destined to contain 
Each its own pilgrim-host of old, | 
From England, Germany, or Spain— 
All are before me! I behold 

The House, the Brotherhood austere ! 
—And what am I, that I am here? 


For rigorous teachers seized my youth, — 
And purged its faith, and trimm/’d its 
fire, 


ARNOLD 


Show’d me the high, white star of Truth, 

There bade me gaze, and there aspire. 

Even now their whispers pierce the 
gloom ; 

What dost thou in this living tomb ? 


Forgive me, masters of the mind ! 

At whose behest I long ago 

So much unlearnt, so much resign’d— 
I come not here to be your foe! 

I seek these anchorites, not in ruth, 
To curse and to deny your truth ; 


Not as their friend, or child, I speak ! 
But as, on some far northern strand, 
Thinking of his own Gods, a Greek 

In pity and mournful awe might stand 
Before some fallen Runic stone— 

For both were faiths, and both are gone. 


Wandering between two worlds, one 
dead, 

The other powerless to be born, 

With nowhere yet to rest my head, 

Like these, on earth I wait forlorn. 

Their faith, my tears, the world deride— 

I come to shed them at their side. 


Oh, hide me in your gloom profound, 

Ye solemn seats of holy pain! 

Take me, cowl’d forms, and fence me 
round 

Till I possess my soul again ; 

Till free my thoughts before me roll, 

Not chafed by hourly false control! 


For the world cries your faith is now 
But a dead time’s exploded dream ; 
My melancholy, sciolists say, 

Is a pass’d mode, an outworn theme— 
As if the world had ever had 

A faith, or sciolists been sad ! 


Ah, if it be pass’d, take away, 

At least, the restlessness, the pain ; 
Be man henceforth no more a prey 
To these out-dated stings again! 
The nobleness of grief is gone— 
Ah, leave us not the fret alone! 


But—-if you cannot give us ease— 
Last of the race of them who grieve 
Here leave us to die out with these 
Last of the people who believe! 
Silent, while years engrave the brow ; 
Silent—the best are silent now. 


Achilles ponders in his tent, 
The kings of modern thought are dumb ; 
Silent they are, though not content, 


755 


And wait to see the future come. 
They have the grief men had of yore, 
But they contend and cry no more. 


Our fathers water’d with their tears 
This sea of time whereon we sail, 

Their voices were in all men’s ears 

We pass’d within their puissant hail. 
Still the same ocean round us raves, 
But we stand mute,and watch the waves. 


For what avail’d it, all the noise 

And outery of the former men ?— 

Say, have their sons achieved more joys, 
Say, is life lighter now than then ; 

The sufferers died, they left their pain— 
The pangs which tortured them remain. 


What helps it now, that Byron bore, 

With haughty scorn which mock ’d the 
sinart, 

Through Europe to the Aitolian shore 

The pageant of his bleeding heart ? 

That thousands counted every groan, 

And Europe made his woe her own ? 


What boots it, Shelley ! that the breeze 

Carried thy lovely wail away, 

Musical through Italian trees 

Which fringe thy soft blue Spezzian 
bay ? 

Inheritors of thy distress 

Have restless hearts one throb the less ? 


Or are we easier, to have read, 

O Obermann! the sad, stern page, 

Which tells us how thou hidd’st thy 
head 

From the fierce tempest of thine age 

In the lone brakes of Fontainebleau, 

Or chalets near the Alpine snow ? 


Ye slumber in your silent grave !— 

The world, which for an idle day 

Grace to your mood of sadness gave, 
Long since hath flung her weeds away. 
The eternal trifler breaks your spell ; 
But we—we learned your lore too well! 


Years hence, perhaps, may dawn an age, 
More fortunate, alas! than we, 

Which without hardness will be sage, 
And gay without frivolity. 

Sons of the world, oh, speed those years ; 
But, while we wait, allow our tears ! 


Allow them! We admire with awe 
The exulting thunder of your race ; 
You give the universe your law, 


756 BRITISH POETS 


You triumph over time and space ! 


Your pride of life, your tireless powers, - 


We laud them, but they are not ours. 


We are like children rear’d in shade 

Beneath some old-world abbey wall, 

Forgotten in a forest-glade, 

And secret from the eves of all. 

Deep, deep the greenwood round them 
waves, 

Their abbey, and its close of graves ! 


But, where the road runs near thestream, 
Oft through the trees they catch a glance 
Of passing troops in the sun’s beam — 
Pennon, and plume, and flashing lance! 
Forth to the world those soldiers fare, 
To life, to cities, and to war! 


And through the wood, another way, 

Faint bugle-notes from far are borne, 

Where hunters gather, staghounds bay, 

Round some fair forest-lodge at morn. 

Gay dames are there, in sylvan green ; 

Laughter and cries—those notes be- 
tween ! 


The banners flashing through the trees 

Make their blood dance and chain their 
eyes ; 

That bugle-music on the breeze 

Arrests them with a charm’d surprise. 

Banner by turns and bugle woo: 

Ye shy recluses, follow too ! 


O children, what do ye reply ?— 
‘* Action and pleasure, will ye roam 
Through these secluded dells to cry 
And call us ?—but too late ye come ! 
Too late for us your call ye blow, 
Whose bent was taken long ago. 


‘* Long since we pace this shadow’d nave 
We watch those yellow tapers shine, 
Emblems of hope over the grave, 

In the high altar’s depth divine ; 

The organ carries to our ear 

Its accents of another sphere. 


‘ Fenced early in this cloistral round 
Of reverie, of shade, of prayer, 
How should we grow in other ground § ? 
How can we flower in foreign air? 
—Pass, banners, pass, and bugles, cease ; 
And leave our desert to its peace !” 
1855.1 


1 In Fraser’s Magazine. First included in Ar- 
nold’s Poetical Works in 1867, 


FROM SWITZERLAND 


ISOLATION. TO MARGUERITE 

WE were apart ; yet, day by day, 

I bade my heart more constant be. 

I bade it keep the world away, - 

And grow a home for only thee ; 

Nor fear’d but thy love likewise grew, 

Like mine, each day, more tried, more 
true. 


The fault was grave! 
known, 

What far too soon, alas! I learn’d— 

The heart can bind itself alone, 

And faith may oft be unreturn’d. 


I might have 


Self-sway’d our feelings ebb and swell— } 


Thou lov’st no more ;—Farewell! Fare- 
well! 


Farewell !—and thou, thou lonely heart, 
Which never yet without remorse 

Even for a moment didst depart 

From thy remote and spheréd course 

To haunt the place where passionsreign— 
Back to thy solitude again ! 


Back ! with the conscious thrill of shame 
Which Luna felt, that summer-night, 
Flash through her pure immortal frame, 
When she forsook the starry height 

To hang over Endymion’s sleep 

Upon the pine-grown Latmian steep. 


Yet she, chaste queen, had never proved 

How vain a thing is mortal love, 

Wandering in Heaven, far removed. 

But thou hast long had place to prove 

This truth—to prove, and make thine 
own: 

‘* Thou hast been, shalt be, art, alone.” 


Or, if not quite alone, yet they 

Which touch thee are unmating things— 
Ocean and clouds and night and day ; 
Lorn autumns and triumphant springs ; 
And life, and others’ joy and pain, 

And love, if love, of happier men. 


Of happier men—for they, at least, 
Have dream’d two human hearts might 

blend 
In one, and were through faith released 
From isolation without end 
Prolong’d; nor knew, although not less 
Alone than thou, their loneliness. 

1857. 


t 
ee! a ee ee ee 


— 


a a 


ARNOLD 


757 





TO MARGUERITE—CONTINUED 


YES! in the sea of life enisled, 

With echoing straits between us thrown, 

Dotting the shoreless watery wild, 

We mortal millions live alone. 

The islands feel the enclasping flow, 

And then their endless bounds they 
know. 


But when the moon their hollows lights, 
And they are swept by balms of spring, 
And in their glens on starry nights, 

The nightingales divinely sing ; 

And lovely notes, from shore to shore, 
Across the sounds and channels pour— 


Oh! then a longing like despair 

Is to their farthest caverns sent ; 

For surely once, they feel, we were 
Parts of a single continent ! 

Now round us spreads the watery plain—- 
Oh, might our marges meet again ! 


Who order’d, that their longing’s fire 
Should be, as soon as kindled, cool’d ? 
Who renders vain their deep desire ?— 
A God, a God their severance ruled ! 
And bade betwixt their shores to be 
The unplumb’d, salt, estranging sea. 
(1852..)1_ 1857. 


THYRSIS?2 


A Monopy, to commemorate the author’s 
friend, 


ARTHUR HUGH CLOUGH, who died at 
Florence, 1861 


How changed is here each spot man 
makes or fills! 
In the two Hinkseys nothing keeps the 
same ; 
The village street its haunted man- 
sion lacks, 
And from the sign is gone Sibylla’s 
name, 
And from the roofs the twisted chim- 
ney-stacks— 


1Standing alone, under the title: To Marquerite. 
2“There are in the English language three 
elegiac poems so great that they eclipse and 
efface all the elegiac poetry we know; all of 
Italian, all of Greek. It is only because the 
latest born is yet new to us that it can seem 
strange or rash tosay so. The Thyrsis of Mr. 
Arnold makes a third with Lycidas and 
Adonais. .. . Thyrsis, like Lycidas, has a quiet 
and tender undertone which gives it something 
of sacred.” (Swinburne. ) 


Are ye too changed, ye hills? 
See, *tis no foot of unfamiliar men 
To-night from Oxford up your path- 
way strays ! 
Here came L often, often, in old days— 
Thyrsis and 1; we still had Thyrsis then. 


Runs it not here, the track by Childs- 
worth Farm, 
Past the high wood, to where the elm- 
tree crowns 
The hill behind whose ridge the sun- 
set flames? 
The signal-elm, that looks on Ilsley 
Downs, 
The Vale, the three lone weirs, the 
youthful Thames ?— 
This winter-eve is warm, 
Humid the air! leafless, yet soft as 
spring, 
The tender purple spray on copse 
and briars! 
And that sweet city with her dream- 
ing spires, 
She needs not June for beauty’s height- 
ening. 
Lovely all times she lies, lovely  to- 
night !— 
Only, methinks, some loss of habit’s 
power 
Befalls me wandering through this 
upland dim. 
Once pass’d I blindfold here, at any 
hour ; 
Now seldom come I, since came with 
him. . 
That single elm-tree bright 
Against the west—I miss it! is it gone? 
We prized it dearly : while it stood, 
we said, 
Our friend, the Gipsy-Scholar, was 
not dead ; 
While the tree lived, he in these fields 
lived on, 


Too rare, too rare, grow now my visits 
here, 
But once I knew each 
flower, each stick ; 
And with the country-folk acquain- 
tance made 
By barn in threshing-time, by new- 
built rick. 
Here, too, our shepherd-pipes we 
first assay’d. 
Ah me! this many a year 
My pipe is lost, my shepherd’s holi- 
day ! 


field, each 


758 


BRITISH POETS 





Needs must I lose them, needs with 
heavy heart 
Into the world and wave of men de- 
part ; 
But Thyrsis of his own will went away. 


It irk’d him to be here, he could not rest. 
He loved each simple joy the country 
yields, 
He loved his mates ; but yet he could 
not keep, 
For that a shadow lour’d on the fields, 
Here with the shepherds and the 
silly sheep. 
Some life of men unblest 
He knew, which made him droop, and 
fill’d his head. 
He went; his piping took a troubled 
sound 
Of storms that rage outside our 
happy ground; 
He could not wait their passing, he is 
dead. 


So. some tempestuous morn in early 
June, [is o’er, 
When the year’s primal burst of bloom 
Before the roses and the longest 
day— [ floor 
When garden-walks and all the grassy 
With blossoms red and white of 
fallen May 
And chestnut-flowers are strewn— 
So have I heard the cuckoo’s parting 
cry, 
From the wet field, through the vext 
garden-trees, 
Come with the volleying rain and 
tossing breeze: 
The bloom is gone, and with the bloom 


go I! 


Too quick despairer, wherefore wilt thou 
o? 
Soon will the high Midsummer pomps 
come on, 
Soon will the musk carnations break 
and swell, 
Soon shall we have gold-dusted snap- 
dragon, 
Sweet-William with 
cottage-smell, 
And stocks in fragrant blow ; 
Roses that down the alleys shine afar, 
And open, jasmine-muffled lattices, 
And groups under the dreaming 
garden trees, 
And the full moon, and the white 
evening-star. 


his homely 








He harkens not! light comer, he is 
flown ! 
What matters it? next year he will 
return, 
And we shall have him in the 
sweet spring-days, 
whitening hedges, and un- 
crumpling fern, 
And blue-bells trembling by the 
forest-ways, 
And scent of hay new-mown. 
But Thyrsis never more we swains 
shall see ; 
See him come back, and cut a 
smoother reed, 
And blow a strain the world at last 
shall heed— 
For Time, not Corydon, hath conquer’d 
thee ! 


With 


Alack, for Corydon no rival now !— 
But when Sicilian shepherds lost a 
mate, 
Some good survivor with his flute 
would go, 
Piping a ditty sad for Bion’s fate ; 
And cross the unpermitted ferry’s 
flow, 
And relax Pluto’s brow, 
And make leap up with joy the beaute- 
ous head 
Of Proserpine, 
crowned hair 
Are flowers first open’d on Sicilian 
alt 
And flute his friend, like Orpheus, 
from the dead. 


among whose 


O easy access to the hearer’s grace 
When Dorian shepherds sang _ to 
Proserpine ! 
For she herself had trod Sicilian 
fields, 
She knew the Dorian water’s gush 
divine, 
She knew each lily white which 
Enna yields, 
Each rose with blushing face ; 
She loved the Dorian pipe, the Dorian 
strain. 
But ah, of our poor Thames she 
never heard! [stirr’d ; 
Her foot the Cumner cowslips never 
And we should tease her with our 
plaint in vain! 
Well! wind-dispersed and vain the 
words will be, [hour 
Yet, Thyrsis, let me give my grief its 


ARNOLD 


In the old haunt, and find our tree- 
topp’d hill! 
Who, if not I, for questing here hath 
power ? 
I know the wood which hides the 
daffodil, 
I know the Fyfield tree, 
I know what white, what purple fri- 
tillaries 
The grassy harvest of the river- 
fields, 
Above by Ensham, down by Sand- 
ford, yields, 
And what sedged brooks are Thames’s 
tributaries ; 


I know these slopes ; who knows them 
if not I ?— 
But many a dingle on the loved hill- 
side, 
With thorns once studded, 
white-blossom’d trees, 
Where thick the cowslips grew, and 
far descried 
High tower’d the spikes of purple 
orchises, 
Hath since our day put by 
The coronals of that forgotten time ; 
Down each green bank hath gone 
the ploughboy’s team, 
And only in the hidden brookside 
gleam 
Primroses, orphans of the flowery 
prime. 


old, 


Where is the girl, who by the boatman’s 
door, 
Above the locks, above the boating 
throng, 
Unmoor’d our skiff when through 
the Wytham flats, 
Red loosestrife and blond meadow- 
sweet among 
And darting swallows and light 
water-gnats, 
We track’d thé shy Thames shore ? 
Where are the mowers, who, as the 
tiny swell 
Of our boat passing heaved the river- 
grass, 
Stood with suspended scythe to see 
us pass ?— 
They all are gone, and thou art gone 
as well ! 


Yes, thou art gone! and round me too 
the night 
In. ever-nearing circle 
shade. 


weaves her 


759 


I see her veil draw soft across the 


ay, 
I feel her slowly chilling breath invade 
The cheek grown thin, the brown 
hair sprent with gray ; 
I feel her finger light 
Laid pausefully upon life’s headlong 
train ;— 
The foot less prompt to meet the 
morning dew, 
The heart less bounding at emo- 
tion new, 
And hope, once crush’d, less quick to 
spring again. 
And long the way which 
seem’d so short 
To the less practised eye of sanguine 
youth ; 

And high the mountain-tops, in 
cloudy air, 
mountain-tops 
throne of Truth, 

Tops in life’s morning-sun so bright 

and bare ! 
Unbreachable the fort 
Of the long-batter’d world uplifts its 
wall; 

And strange and vain the earthly 

turmoil grows, 

And near and real the charm of thy 

repose, 
And night as welcome as a friend 
would fall. 


appears, 


The where is’ the 


But hush! the upland hath a sudden 
loss 
Of quiet !—Look, adown the dusk 
hill-side, 
A troop of Oxford hunters going 
home, 
As in old days, jovial and talking, 
ride! 
From. hunting with the Berkshire 
hounds they come, 
Quick ! let me fly, and cross 


Into yon further field!—’Tis done, 
and see, 

Back’d by the sunset, which doth 
glorify 


The orange and pale violet evening- 


sky, 
Bare on its lonely ridge, the Tree! 
the Tree! 
I take the omen! Eve lets down her 
veil, 
The white fog creeps from bush to 
bush about, 


760 


The west unflushes, the high stars 
grow bright, 
And in the scatter’d farms the lights 
come out. 
I cannot reach the signal-tree to- 
night, 
Yet, happy omen, hail ! 
Hear it from thy broad lucent Arno- 
vale . 
(For there thine earth-forgetting 
eyelids keep 
The morningless and unawakening 
sleep 
Under the flowery oleanders pale), 


Hear it, O Thyrsis, still our tree is 
there !— 
Ah, vain! These English fields, this 
upland dim, 
‘These brambles pale with mist en- 
garlanded, 
That lone, sky-pointing tree, are not 
for him ; 
To a boon southern country he is 
fled, 
And now in happier air, 
Wandering with the great Mother’s 
train divine 
(And purer or more subtle soul than 
thee, 
I trow, the mighty Mother doth not 


see) 
Within a folding of the Apennine, 


Thou hearest the immortal chants of 


old !— 
Putting his sickle to the perilous 
rain 
In the hot cornfield of the Phrygian 
king, 


For thee the Lityerses-song again 
Young Daphnis with his silver voice 
doth sing ; 
Sings his Sicilian fold, 
His sheep, his hapless love, his blinded 
eyes— 


And how a e@all celestial round him. 


rang, 
And heavenward from the fountain- 
brink he sprang, 
And all the marvel of the golden 
skies. 


There thou art gone, and me thou leavest 
here 
Sole in these fields! yet will I not de- 


spair. 
Despair I will not, while I yet de- 
scry 


BRITISH POETS 


’Neath the mild canopy of English air 
That lonely tree against the western 


sky. 
Still, still these slopes, ’tis clear, 
Our Gipsy-Scholar haunts, outliving 
thee ! : 
Fields where soft sheep from cages 
pull the hay, 
Woods with anemones in flower till 
May, 
Know him a wanderer still; then why 
not me? 


A fugitive and gracious light he seeks, 
Shy to illumine ; and I seek it too. 
This does not come with houses or 
with gold, 
With place, with honor, ane a flatter- 
ing crew; 
‘Tis not in the world’s market 
bought and sold— 
But the smooth-slipping weeks 
Drop by, and leave its seeker still 
untired ; 
Out of the heed of mortals he is 


gone, 
He wends unfollow’d, he must house 
alone ; 
Yet on he fares, by his own heart in- 
spired. 


Thou too, O Thyrsis, on like quest wast 
bound ; 
Thou wanderedst with me for a little 
hour ! 
Men gave thee nothing; but this 
happy quest, 
If men esteemed thee feeble, gave thee 
power, 
If men procured thee trouble, gave 
thee rest. 
And this rude Cumner ground, 
Its fir-topped Hurst, its farms, its 
quiet fields, 
Here cams’t thou in thy jocund 
youthful time, 
Here was thine height of strength, 
thy golden prime ! 
And still the haunt beloved a virtue 
yields. 


What though the music of thy rustic 
flute 
Kept not for long its happy, country 
tone ; 
Lost it too soon, and learnt a stormy 
note 
Of men contention-tost, of men who 
groan, 





ARNOLD 


Which task’d thy pipe too sore, and 
tired thy throat— 
It fail’d, and thou wast mute! 
Yet hadst thou always visions of our 
light, 
And long with men of care thou 
couldst not stay. 
And soon thy foot resumed its wan- 
dering way, 
Left human haunt, and on alone till 
night. 


Too rare, too rare, grow now my visits 
here! 
’Mid city-noise, not, as with thee of 
yore, 
Thyrsis! in reach of sheep-bells is 
my home. 
—Then through the great town’s harsh, 
heart-wearying roar, 
Let in thy voice a whisper often 
come, 
To chase fatigue and fear: 
Why faintest thou! Iwander’d till I died. 
Roam on! The light we sought is 
shining still. 
Dost thow ask proof ? 
crowns the hill, 
Our Scholar travels yet the loved hill-side. 
1866. 


Our tree yet 


YOUTH AND CALM 


Tis death ! and peace, indeed, is here, 
And ease from shame, and rest from fear. 
There’s nothing can dismarble now 
The smoothness of that liimpid brow. 
But is a calm like this, in truth, 

The crowning end of life and youth, 
And when this boon rewards the dead, 
Are all debts paid, has all been said ? 
And is the heart of youth so light, 

Its step so firm, its eyes so bright, 
Because on its hot brow there blows 

A wind of promise and repose 

From the far grave, to which it goes ; 
Because it hath the hope to come, 

One day, to harbor in the tomb? 

Ah no, the bliss youth dreams is one 
For daylight, for the cheerful sun, 

For feeling nerves and living breath— 


Youth dreams a bliss on this side death. ~ 


It dreams a rest, if not more deep, 

More grateful than this marble sleep ; 

It hears a voice within it tell: 

Calm’s not life’s crown, though calm is 

well. 

‘T is all perhaps which man acquires, 

But ’tis not what our youth desires. 
(1852). 1867. 


761 


AUSTERITY OF POETRY 


THAT son of Italy who tried to blow, 
Ere Dante came, the trump of sacred 
song, 


‘In his light youth amid a festal throng 


Sate with his bride to see a public show. 
Fair was the bride, and on her front did 


glow 

Youth like a star; and what to youth 
belong— 

Gay raiment, sparkling gauds, elation 
strong. 

A ae gave way ! crash fella platform ! 
Oo 


’ 

Mid struggling sufferers, hurt to death, 
she lay ! 

Shuddering, they drew her garments 
off—and found 

A robe of sackcloth next the smooth, 
white skin. 

Such, poets, is your bride, the Muse! 





young, gay, 
Radiant, adorn’d outside; a hidden 
ground 
Of thought and of austerity within. 
: 1867. 


WORLDLY PLACE 


Even in a palace, life may be led well! 

So spake the imperial sage, purest of men, 

Marcus Aurelius. But the stifling den 

Of common life, where, crowded up 
pell-mell. 

Our freedom for a little bread we sell, 

And drudge under some foolish master’s 
ken 

Who rates us if we peer outside our 
pen— 

Match’d with a palace, is not this a hell ? 

Even in a palace! On his truth sincere, 

Who spoke these words, no shadow ever 
came ; 

And when my ill-school’d spirit is aflame 

Some nobler, ampler stage of life to win, 

[ll stop, and say: ‘‘ There were no suc- 
cor here! 

The aids to noble life are all within.” 

1867. 


KAST LONDON 


‘Twas August, and the fierce sun over- 


head 

Smote on the squalid streets of Bethnal 
Green. 

And the pale weaver, through his 


windows seen 


In Spitalfields, look’d thrice dispirited. 


762 


I meta preacher there I knew, and said : 

‘‘Tiland o’erwork’d, how fare you in 
this scene ? ”»— 

‘‘ Bravely!” said he; ‘‘ for I of late have 
been 

Much cheer’d with thoughts of Christ, 
the living bread.” 

O human soul! as long as thou canst so 

Set up a mark of everlasting light, 

Above the howling senses’ ebb and flow, 

To cheer thee, and to right thee if thou 
roam— 

Not with lost toil thou laborest through 
the night ! 

Thou mak’st the heaven thou hop’st 
indeed thy home. 1867. 


WEST LONDON 


CROUCH’D on the pavement, close by 
Belgrave Square, 

A tramp I saw, ill, moody, and tongue- 
tied. 

A babe was in her arms, and at her side 

A girl; their clothes were rags, their 
feet were bare. 

Some laboring men, whose work lay 
somewhere there, 

Pass’d opposite; she touch’d her girl, 


who hied 

Across, and begg’d, and came _ back 
satisfied. 

The rich she had let pass with frozen 
stare. 


Thought I: ‘‘ Above her state this spirit 
towers ; 

She will not ask of aliens, but of friends, 

Of sharers in a common human fate. 

She turns from that cold succor, which 
attends 

The unknown little from the unknow- 
ing great, 

And points us to a better time than 
ours.” 1867, 


HAST AND WEST 


IN the bare midst of Anglesey they show 
Two springs which close by one another 


ay ; 

And, ephirteen hundred years agone,”’ 
they say, 

‘Two saints met often where those 
waters flow. 

One came from Penmon westward, and 

- aglow 

Whiten’d his face from the sun’s front- 
ing ray ; 

Kastward the other, from the dying day, 





BRITISH POETS 


And he with unsunn’d face did always 


go.’ 

Seiriol ~ Bright, Kybi the Dark! men 
said. 

The seér from the East was then in light, 

The seér from the West was then in 
shade. 

Ah! now ’tis changed. 
sunshine bright 

The man of the bold West now comes 


In conquering 


array’d ; 
He of the mystic East is touch’d with 
night. 1867. 


THE BETTER PART 


LONG fed on boundless hopes, O race of 
man, 

How angrily thou spurn’st all simpler 
fare ! 

‘*Christ,” some one says, ‘‘ was human 
as we are ; 

No judge eyes us from Heaven, our sin 
to scan ; 

We live no more, when we have done 
our span.” 

‘* Well, then, for Christ,” thou answerest, 
‘‘who can care? 

From sin, which Heaven records not, 
why forbear ? 

Live we like brutes our life without a 
plan !” 

So answerest thou; but why not rather 
say : 

‘Hath man no second life ?—Pitch this 
one high ! 

Sits there no judge in Heaven, our sin 
to see ?— 

More strictly, then, the inward judge 
obey ! 

Was Christa manlikeus? Ah/ letus try 

If we then, too, can be such men as he!” 

1867, 


IMMORTALITY 


Forw’p by our fellow-men, depress’d, 
outworn, 
We leave the brutal world to take its 


way, 

And, Patines ! in another life, we say, 

The world shall be thrust down, and we 
up-borne. 

And will not, then, the immortal armies 
scorn 

The world’s poor, routed leavings? or 
will they, 

Who fail’d under the heat of this life’s 
day, 


- ss 
* = 


ARNOLD ‘ 


Support the fervors of the heavenly 
morn ? 

No, no! the energy of life may be 

Kept on after the grave, but not begun; 

And he who flagg’d not in the earthly 
strife, 

From strength to strength advancing— 
only he, 

His soul well-knit, and all his battles 


won, 
Mounts, and that hardly, to eternal life. 
1867. 


DOVER BEACH 


THE sea is calm to-night, 

The tide is full, the moon lies fair 

Upon the straits ;—on the French coast 
the light 

Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of Eng- 
land stand, 

Glimmering and vast, out in the tran- 
quil bay. 

-Come to the window, sweet is the night- 
air! 

Only, from the long line of spray 

Where the sea meets the moon-blanch’d 
land, 

Listen ! you hear the grating roar 

Of pebbles which the waves draw back, 
and fling, 

At their return, up the high strand, 


Begin, and cease, and then again begin,. 


With tremulous cadence slow, and bring 
The eternal note of sadness in. 


Sophocles long ago 

Heard it on the gzean, and it brought 
Into his mind the turbid ebb and flow 
Of human misery ; we 

Find also in the sound a thought, 
Hearing it by this distant northern sea. 


The Sea of Faith 

Was once, too, at the full, and round 
earth’s shore 

Lay like the folds ofa bright girdle furl’d. 

But now I only hear 

Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar, 

Retreating, to the breath 

Of the night-wind, down the vast edges 
drear 

And naked shingles of the world. 

Ah, love, let us be true 

To one another! for the world, which 
seems 

To lie before us like a land of dreams, 

So various, so beautiful, so new, 

Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor 
light, 


763 


Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for 
pain ; 
And we are here as on a darkling plain 
Swept with confused alarms of struggle 
and flight, 
Where ignorant armies clash by night. 
1867. 


GROWING OLD 


WHAT is it to grow old? 

Is it to lose the glory of the form, 
The lustre of the eye? 

Is it for beauty to forego her wreath ? 
—Yes, but not this alone. 


Is it to feel our strength— 

Not our bloom only, but our strength— 
decay ? 

Is it to feel each limb 

Grow stiffer, every function less exact, 

Each nerve more loosely strung? 


Yes, this,and more; but not 

Ah, ’t is not what in youth we dream’d 
*t would be! 

°T is not to have our life 

Mellow’d and soften’d as with sunset- 
glow, 

A golden day’s decline. 


'T is not to see the world 

As from a height, with rapt prophetic 
eyes, 

And heart profoundly stirr’d ; 

And weep, and feel the fulness of the 
past, 

The years that are no more. 


It is to spend long days 

And not once feel that we were ever 
young ; 

It is to add, immured 

In the hot prison of the present, month 

To month with weary pain. 


It is to suffer this, 

And feel but half, and feebly, what we 
feel. 

Deep in our hidden heart 

Festers the dull remembrance of a 
change, 

But no emotion—none. 


It is—last stage of all— 

When we are frozen up within, and quite 

The phantom of ourselves, 

To hear the world applaud the hollow 
host 


Which blamed the living man. 1867. 


764 


PIS-ALLER 


** MAN is blind because of sin, 
Revelation makes him sure ; 
Without that, who looks within, 
Looks in vain, for all ’s obscure.” 


Nay, look closer into man! 

Tell me, can you find indeed 

Nothing sure, no moral plan 

Clear prescribed, without your creed? 


‘‘No, I nothing can perceive ! 
Without that, all ’s dark for men. 
That, or nothing, I believe.”— 
For God’s sake, believe it then! 

1867. 


THE LAST WORD 


CREEP into thy narrow bed, 
Creep, and let no more be said ! 
Vain thy onset ! all stands fast. 
Thou thyself must break at last. 


Let the long contention cease ! 

Geese are swans, and swans are geese. 
Let them have it how they will! 
Thou art tired ; best be still. 


They out-talk’d thee, hiss’d thee, tore 
thee ? 

Better men fared thus before thee ; 

Fired their ringing shot and pass’d, 

Hotly charged—and sank at last. 


Charge once more, then, and be dumb! 
Let the victors, when they come, 
When the forts of folly fall, 
Find thy body by the wall! 1867, 
BACCHANALIA ; 
OR, 
THE NEW AGE 
I 


THE evening comes, the fields are still. 
The tinkle of the thirsty rill, 

Unheard all day, ascends again ; 
Deserted is the half-mown plain, 
Silent the swaths! the ringing wain, 
The mower’s cry, the dog’s alarms, 
All housed within the sleeping farms! 
The business of the day is done, 

The last-left haymaker is gone. 

And from the thyme upon the height, 
And from the elder-blossom white 


BRITISH POETS 


And yale dog-roses in the hedge, 

And fzom the mint-plant in the sedge, 
In puffs of balm the night-air blows 
The perfume which the day foregoes. 
And on the pure horizon far, 

See, pulsing with the first-born star, 
The liquid sky above the hill! 

The evening comes, the fields are still. 


Loitering and leaping, 

With saunter, with bounds— 
Flickering and circling 

In files and in rounds— 

Gaily their pine-staff green 
Tossing in air, 

Loose o’er their shoulders white 
Showering their hair— 

See ! the wild Mzenads 

Break from the wood, 

Youth and Iacchus 
Maddening their blood. 

See! through the quiet land 
Rioting they pass— 

Fling the fresh heaps about, 
Trample the grass. 

Tear from the rifled hedge 
Garlands, their prize ; 

Fill with their sports the field, 
Fill with their cries. 


Shepherd, what ails thee, then? 
Shepherd, why mute ? 

Forth with thy joyous song ! 
Forth with thy flute ! 

Tempts not the revel blithe ? 
Lure not their cries? 

Glow not their shoulders smooth ? 
Melt not their eyes? 

Is not, on cheeks like those, 
Lovely the flush ? 

—Ah, so the quiet was ! 

So was the hush ! 


II 


The epoch ends, the world is still. 

The age has talk’d and work’d its fill— 

The famous orators have shone, 

The famous poets sung and gone, 

The famous men of war have fought, 

The famous speculators thought, 

The famous players, sculptors, wrought, 

The famous painters fill’d their wall, 

The famous critics judged it all. 

The combatants are parted now— 

Uphung the spear, unbent the bow, 

The puissant crown’d, the weak laid low. 

And in the after-silence sweet, 

Now strifes are hush’d, our ears doth 
meet, 


* 


ARNOLD 


Ascending pure, the bell-like fame 

Of this or that down-trodden name, 

Delicate spirits, push’d away 

In the hot press of the noon-day. 

And o’er the plain, where the dead age 

Did its now silent warfare wage— 

O’er that wide plain, now wrapt in 
gloom, 

Where many a splendor finds its tomb, 

Many spent fames and fallen mights— 

The one or two immortal lights 

Rise slowly up into the sky 

To shine there everlastingly, 

Like stars over the bounding hill. 

The epoch ends, the world is still. 


Thundering and bursting 
In torrents, in waves— 
Carolling and shouting 
Over tombs, amid graves— 
See! on the cumber’d plain 
Clearing a stage, 
Scattering the past about, 
Comes the new age. 

Bards make new poems, 
Thinkers new schools, 
Statesmen new systems, 
Critics new rules. 

All things begin again ; 
Life is their prize ; 

Karth, with their deeds they fill, 
Fill with their cries. 


Poet, what ails thee, then ? 
Say, why so mute? 

Forth with thy praising voice ! 
Forth with thy flute! 
Loiterer! why sittest thou 
Sunk in thy dream ? 

Tempts not the bright new age? 
Shines not its stream ? 

Look, ah, what genius, 

Art, science, wit ! 

Soldiers like Ceesar, 
Statesmen like Pitt ! 
Sculptors like Phidias, 
Raphaels in shoals, 

Poets like Shakespeare— 
Beautiful souls! _ 

See, on their glowing cheeks 
Heavenly the fiush ! 

—Ah, so the silence was ! 

So was the hush ! 


The world but feels the present’s spell, 

The poet feels the past as well ; 

Whatever men have done, might do, 

Whatever thought, might think Nae 
ie 


765 
PALLADIUM 
SET where the upper streams of Simois 
flow 
Was the Palladium, high ’mid rock and 
wood ; 


And Hector was in Ilium, far below, 
And fought, and saw it not—but there 
it stood ! 


It stood, and sun and moonshine rain’d 
their light 

On the pe columns of its glen-built 
hall, 

Backward and forward roll’d the waves 
of fight 

Round Troy—but while this stood, Troy 
could not fall. 


So, in its lovely moonlight, lives the 


soul, 

Mountains surround it and sweet virgin 
air ; 

Cold plashing, past it, crystal waters 
roll ; 


We visit it by moments, ah, too rare! 


We shall renew the battle in the plain 

To-morrow ; red with blood will Xanthus 
be ; 

Hector and Ajax will be there again, 

Helen will come upon the wall to see. 


Then weshall rust in shade, or shine in 
strife, 

And fluctuate *twixt blind hopes and 
blind despairs, 

And fancy that we put forth all our life, 

And never know how with the soul it 
fares, 


Still doth the soul, from its lone fastness 
high, 
Upon our life a ruling effluence send. 
And when it fails, fight as we will, we 
die ; 
And while it lasts, we cannot wholly end. 
1867. 


A WISH 


I ASK not that my bed of death 
From bands of greedy heirs be free ; 
For these besiege the latest breath 
Of fortune’s favor’d sons, not me. 


I ask not each kind soul to keep 
Tearless, when of my death he hears. 
Let those who will, if any, weep! 


766 


There are worse plagues on earth than 
tears. 


Task but that my death may find 
The Freedom to my life denied ; 
Ask but the folly of mankind 
Then, then at last, to quit my side. 


Spare me the whispering, crowded room, 
The friends who come, and gape, and go; 
The ceremonious air of gloom— 

All, which makes death a hideous show ! 


Nor bring, to see me cease to live, 
Some doctor full of phrase and fame, 
To shake his sapient head, and give 
The ill he cannot cure a name. 


Nor fetch, to take the accustom’d toll 
Of the poor sinner bound for death, 
His brother-doctor of the soul, 

To canvass with official breath 


The future and its viewless things— 

That undiscover’d mystery 

Which one who feels death’s winnowing 
wings 

Must needs read clearer, sure,.than he ! 


Bring none of these ; but let me be, 
While all around in silence lies, 
Moved to the window near, and see 
Once more, before my dying eyes, 


Bathed in the sacred dews of morn 

The wide aerial landscape spread— 

The world which was ere I was born, 
The world which lasts when I am dead ; 


Which never was the friend of one, 
Nor promised love it could not give, 
But lit for all its generous sun, 

And lived itself, and made us live. 


There let me gaze, till I become 

In soul, with what I gaze on, wed! 
To feel the universe my home ; 

To have before my mind—instead 


Of the sick room, the mortal strife, 
The turmoil for a little breath— 
The pure eternal course of life, 

Not human combatings with death ! 


Thus feeling, gazing, might I grow 

Composed, refresh’d, ennobled, clear ; 

Then willing let my spirit go 

To work or wait elsewhere or here! 
1867. 


BRITISH POETS 


RUGBY CHAPEL 
NOVEMBER 1857 


CoLDLY, sadly descends 

The autumn-evening. The field 
Strewn with its dank yellow drifts 
Of wither’d leaves, and the elms, 
Fade into dimness apace, 

Silent ;—hardly a shout 

From a few boys lateat their play ! 
The lights come out in the street, 
In the school-room windows ;—but cold, 
Solemn, unlighted, austere, 

Through the gathering darkness, arise 
The chapel-walls, in whose bound 
Thou, my father! art laid. 


There thou dost lie, in the gloom 
Of the autumn evening. But ah! 
That word, gloom, to my mind 
Brings thee back, in the light 

Of thy radiant vigor, again ; 

In the gloom of November we pass’d 
Days not dark at thy side ; 
Seasons impair’d not the ray 

Of thy buoyant cheerfulness clear. 
Such thou wast! and I stand 

In the autumn evening and think 
Of bygone autumns with thee. 


Fifteen years have gone round 
Since thou arosest to tread, 

In the summer-morning, the road 
Of death, at a call unforeseen, 
Sudden. For fifteen years, 

We who till then in thy shade 
Rested as under the boughs 

Of a mighty oak, have endured 
Sunshine and rain as we might, 
Bare, unshaded, alone, 
Lacking the shelter of thee. 


O strong soul, by what shore 
Tarriest thou now? For that force, 
Surely, has not been left vain! 
Somewhere, surely, afar, 

In the sounding labor-house vast 

Of being, is practised that strength, 
Zealous, beneficent, firm ! 


Yes, in some far-shining sphere, 
Conscious or not of the past, 

Still thou performest the word 

Of the Spirit in whom thou dost live— 
Prompt, unwearied, as here ! 

Still thou upraisest with zeal 

The humble good from the ground, 
Sternly repressest the bad ! 

Still, like a trumpet, dost rouse 


ARNOLD 767 


Those who with half-open eyes 
Tread the border-land dim 
Twixt vice and virtue ; reviv’st, 
Succorest !—-this was thy work ; 
This was thy life upon earth. 


What is the course of the life 

Of mortal men on the earth ?— 
Most men eddy about 

Here and there—eat and drink, 
Chatter and love and hate, 
Gather and squander, are raised 
Aloft, are hurl’d in the dust, 
Striving blindly, achieving 
Nothing ; and then they die— 
Perish ;—and no one asks 

Who or what they have been, 
More than he asks what waves, 
In the moonlit solitudes mild 

Of the midmost Ocean, have swell’d, 
Foam’d for a moment, and gone. 


And there are some, whom a thirst 
Ardent, unquenchable, fires, 

Not with the crowd to be spent, 
Not without aim to go round 

In an eddy of purposeless dust, 
Effort unmeaning and vain. 

Ah yes! some of us strive 

Not without action to die 

Fruitless, but something to snatch 
From dull oblivion, nor all 

Glut the devouring grave ! 

We, we have chosen our path— 
Path to a clear-purposed goal, 

Path of advance !—but it leads 

A long, steep journey, through sunk 
Gorges, o’er mountains in snow. 
Cheerful, with friends, we set forth— 
Then on the height, comes the storm. 
Thunder crashes from rock 

To rock, the cataracts reply, 
Lightnings dazzle our eyes. 
Roaring torrents have breach’d 

The track, the stream-bed descends 
In the place where the wayfarer once 
Planted his footstep—the spray 
Boils o’er its borders ! aloft 

The unseen snow-beds dislodge 
Their hanging ruin ; alas, 

Havoc is made in our train ! 
Friends who set forth at our side, 
Falter, are lost in the storm. 

We, we only are left ! 

With frowning foreheads, with lips 
Sternly compress’d, we strain on, 
On--and at nightfall at last 

Come to the end of our way, 

To the lonely inn ’mid the rocks ; 


Where the gaunt and taciturn host 
Stands on the threshold, the wind 
Shaking his thin white hairs— 
Holds his lantern to scan 

Our storm-beat figures, and asks: 
Whom in our party we bring? 
Whom we have left in the snow ? 


Sadly we answer: We bring 

Only ourselves ! we lost 

Sight of the rest in the storm. 
Hardly ourselves we fought through, 
Stripp’d, without friends, as we are. 
Friends, companions, and train, 

The avalanche swept from our side. 


But thou would’st not alone 

Be saved, my father! alone 
Conquer and come to thy goal, 
Leaving the rest in the wild. 

We were weary, and we 

Fearful, and we in our march 
Fain to drop down and to die. 
Still thou turnedst, and still 
Beckonedst the trembler, and still 
Gavest the weary thy hand. 


If, in the paths of the world, 
Stones might have wounded thy feet, 
Toil or dejection have tried 

Thy spirit, of that we saw 
Nothing—to us thou wast still 
Cheerful, and helpful, and firm! 
Therefore to thee it was given 
Many to save with thyself ; 

And, at the end of thy day, 

O faithful shepherd! to come, 
Bringing thy sheep in thy hand. 
And through thee I believe 

In the noble and great who are gone; 
Pure souls honor’d and blest 

By former ages, who else— 
Such, so soulless, so poor, 

Is the race of men whom I see— 
Seem’d but a dream of the heart, 
Seem’d but a cry of desire. 

Yes! I believe that there lived 
Others like thee in the past, 

Not Hke the men of the crowd 
Who all round me to-day 
Bluster or cringe, and make life 
Hideous, and arid, and vile ; 
But souls temper’d with fire, 
Fervent, heroic, and good, 
Helpers and friends of mankind, 


Servants of God !—or sons 
Shall I not call you? because 
Not as servants ye knew 

Your Father’s innermost mind, 


768 


His, who unwillingly sees 

One of his little ones lost— 
Yours is the praise, if mankind 
Hath not as yet in its march 
Fainted, and fallen, and died ! 


See! In the rocks of the world 
Marches the host of mankind, 

A feeble, wavering line. 

Where are they tending ?—A God_. 
Marshall’d them, gave them their goal. 
Ah, but the way is so long! 

Years they have been in the wild! 
Sore thirst plagues them, the rocks, 
Rising all round, overawe ; 
Factions divide them, their host 
Threatens to break, to dissolve. 
—Ah, keep, keep them combined! 
Else, of the myriads who fill 

That army, not one shall arrive ; 
Sole they shall stray ; in the rocks 
Stagger for ever in vain. 

Die one by one in the waste. 


Then, in such hour of need 

Of your fainting, dispirited race, 
Ye, like angels, appear, 

Radiant with ardor divine ! 
Beacons of hope, ye appear ! 
Languor is not in your heart, 
Weakness is not in your word, 
-Weariness not on your brow. 

Ye alight in our van! at your voice, 
Panic, despair, flee away. 

Ye move through the ranks, recall 
The stragglers, refresh the outworn, 
Praise, re-inspire the brave ! 
Order, courage, return ; 

Eyes rekindling, and prayers, 
Follow your steps as ye go. 

Ye fill up the gaps in our files, 
Strengthen the wavering line, 
Stablish, continue our march, 
On, to the bound of the waste, 
On, to the City of God. 


HEINE 


(FROM HEINE’S GRAVE) 


1867. 


THE Spirit of the world, 
Beholding the absurdity of men— 
Their vaunts, their feats—let a sardonic 


smile, 

For one short moment, wander o’er his 
lips. 

That ae was Heine /—for its earthly 
10ur 


The strange guest sparkled ; now ’tis 
pass’d away. 


BRITISH POETS 


That was Heine! and we, 


‘Myriads who live, who have lived, 


What are we all, but a mood, 

A single mood, of the life 

Of the Spirit in whom we exist, 
Who alone is all things in one ? 
Spirit, who fillest us all! 

Spirit, who utterest in each 
New-coming son of mankind 

Such of thy thoughts as thou wilt! 
O thou, one of whose moods, 
Bitter and strange, was the life 

Of Heine—his strange, alas, 

His bitter life !—may a life 

Other and milder be mine ! 

May’st thou a mood more serene, 
Happier, have utter’d in mine! 
May’st thou the rapture of peace 
Deep have embreathed at its core ; 
Made it a ray of thy thought, 

Made it a beat of thy joy! 1867. 


OBERMANN ONCE MORE 


Savez-vous quelque bien qui console du regret 
Wun monde ? OBERMANN. 





GLION ? Ah, twenty years, it cuts 1 

All meaning from a name ! 

White houses prank where once were 
huts. 

Glion, but not the same! 


And yet I know not! All unchanged 
The turf, the pines, the sky ! 

The hills in their old order ranged ; 
The lake, with Chillon by ! 


And, ’neath those chestnut-trees, where 
stiff 

And stony mounts the way, 

The crackling husk-heaps burn, as if 

IT left them yesterday ! 


Across the valley, on that slope, 
The huts of Avant shine ! 

Its pines, under their branches, ope 
Ways for the pasturing kine. 


Full-foaming milk-pails, Alpine fare, 
Sweet heaps of fresh-cut grass, 
Invite to rest the traveller there 
Before he climb the pass— 


1 Probably all who know the Vevey end of the 
Lake of Geneva, will recollect Glion, the moun- 
tain-village above the castle of Chillon. Glion 
now has hotels, pensions, and villas ; but twenty 
years ago it was hardly more than the huts of 
Avant opposite to it,—huts through which goes 
that beautiful path over the Col de Jaman, fol- 
lowed by so many foot-travellers on their way 
from Vevey to the Simmenthal and Thun. 

(Arnold). 


ARNOLD 


The gentian-flower’d pass, its crown 
With yellow spires aflame ; 

Whence drops the path to Alliére down, 
And walls where Byron came.! 


By their green river, who doth change 

His birth-name just below ; 

Orchard, and croft, and _ full-stored 
grange 

Nursed by his pastoral flow. 


But stop !—to fetch back thoughts that 
stray 

Beyond this gracious bound, 

The cone of Jaman, pale and gray, 

See, in the blue profound ! 


Ah, Jaman ! delicately tall 

Above his sun-warm’d firs— 

What thoughts to me his rocks recall, 
What memories he stirs ! 


And who but thou must be, in truth, 
Obermann ! with me here ? 

Thou master of my wandering youth, 
But left this many a year ! 


Yes, I forget the world’s work wrought, 
Its warfare waged with pain ; 

An eremite with thee, in thought 

Once more I slip my chain, 


And to thy mountain-chalet come, 
And lie beside its door, 

And hear the wild bee’s Alpine hum, 
And thy sad, tranquil lore ! 


Again I feel the words inspire 
Their mournful calm ; serene, 
Yet tinged with infinite desire 
For all that might have been— 


The harmony from which man swerved 
Made his life’s rule once more! 

The universal order served, 

Earth happier than before ! 


—While thus I mused, night gently ran 
Down over hill and wood. 

Then, still and sudden, Obermann 

On the grass near me stood. 


Those pensive features well I knew, 
On my mind, years before, 

Imaged so oft ! imaged so true ! 
—A shepherd’s garb he wore, 


1Montbovon. See Byron’s Journal, in his Works, 
vol, iii. p. 258. The river Saane becomes the Sa- 
rine below Montbovon. (Arnold). 


49 


769 


A mountain-flower wasin his hand, 

A book was in his breast. 

Bent on my face, with 
scann’d 

My soul, his eyes did rest. 


gaze which 


‘* And is it thou,” he cried, ‘‘ so long 
Held by the world which we 

Loved not, who turnest from the throng 
Back to thy youth and me ? 


‘* And from thy world, with heart op- 


prest, 
Choosest thou now to turn ?— 
Ah me! we anchorites read things best, 
Clearest their course discern ! 


‘Thou fledst me when the ungenial 
earth, 

Man’s work-place, lay in gloom. 

Return’st thou in her hour of birth, 

Of hopes and hearts in bloom ? 


‘** Perceiv’st: thou not the change of day ? 

Ah! Carry back thy ken, 

What, some two thousand years! 
vey 

The world as it was then ! 


Sur- 


‘** Like ours it look’d in outward air. 
Its head was clear and true, 
Sumptuous its clothing, rich its fare, 
No pause its action knew ; 


‘* Stout was itsarm, each thew and bone 
Seem’d puissant and alive— 

But, ah! its heart, its heart was stone, 
And so it could not thrive! 


“On that hard Pagan world disgust 
And secret loathing fell. 

Deep weariness and sated lust 
Made human life a hell. 


‘¢Tn his cool hall, with haggard eyes, 
The Roman noble lay ; 

He drove abroad, in furious guise, 
Along the Appian way. 


‘“‘He made a feast, drank fierce and fast, 
And crown’d his hair with flowers— 

No easier nor no quicker pass’d 

The impracticable hours. 


‘‘The brooding East with awe beheld 
Her impious younger world. 

The Roman tempest swell’d and swell’d, 
And on her head was hurl’d, 


77° 


‘*The East bow’d low before the blast 
In patient, deep disdain ; 

She let the legions thunder past, 

And plunged in thought again. 


‘*So well she mused, a morning broke 
Across her spirit gray ; 

A conquering, new-born joy awoke, 
And fill’d her life with day. 


‘** Poor world,’ she cried, ‘so deep ac- 
curst, 

That runn’st from pole to pole 

To seek a draught to slake thy thirst— 

Go, seek it in thy soul!’ 


‘* She heard it, the victorious West, 

In crown and sword array’d ! 

She felt the void which mined her breast, 
She shiver’d and obey’d. 


‘‘She veil’d her eagles, snapp’d her 
sword, 

And laid her sceptre down ; 

Her stately purple she abhorr’d, 

And her imperial crown. 


‘* She broke her flutes, she stopp’d her 
sports, 

Her artists could not please ; 

She tore her books, she shut her courts, 

She fled her palaces ; 


‘Lust of the eye and pride of life 
She left it all behind, 

And hurried, torn with inward strife, 
The wilderness to find. 


‘¢ Tears wash’d the trouble from her face! 

She changed into a child! 

"Mid weeds and wrecks she stood—a 
place 

Of ruin—but she smiled ! 


‘Oh, had I lived in that great day, 

How had its glory new 

Fill’d earth and heaven, and caught 
away 

My ravish’d spirit too! 


‘*No thoughts that to the world belong 
Had stood against the wave 

Of love which set so deep and strong 
From Christ’s then open grave. 


** No cloister-floor of humid stone 
Had been too cold for me. 

For me no Eastern desert lone 
Had been too far to flee. 


BRITISH POETS 





‘*No lonely life had pass’d too slow, 
When I could hourly scan 

Upon his Cross, with head sunk low, 
That nail’d, thorn-crowned Man ! 


‘*Could see the Mother with her Child 
Whose tender winning arts 

Have to his little arms beguiled 

So many wounded hearts! 


‘And centuries came and ran their 
course, 

And unspent all that time 

Still, still went forth that Child’s dear 
force, 

And still was at its prime. 


‘* Ay, ages long endured his span 

Of life—’tis true received— 

That gracious Child, that thorn-crown’d 
Man ! 

—He lived while we believed. 


‘‘ While we believed, on earth he went, 

And open stood his grave. 

Men call’d from chamber, church, and 
tent ; 

And Christ was by to save. 


‘*Now he is dead! Far hence he lies 
In the lorn Syrian town ; 

And on his grave, with shining eyes, 
The Syrian stars look down. 


‘In vain men still, with hoping new, - 
Regard his death-place dumb, 

And say the stone is not yet to, 

And wait for words to come. 


‘Ah, o’er that silent sacred land, 

Of sun, and arid stone, 

And crumbling wall, and sultry sand, 
Sounds now one word alone ! 


‘¢ Unduped of fancy, henceforth man 
Must labor !—must resign 

His all too human creeds and scan 
Simply the way divine! 


‘* But slow that tide of common thought, 
Which bathed our life, retired ; 

Slow, slow the old world wore to nought, 
And pulse by pulse expired. 


‘‘Tts frame yet stood without a breach 
When blood and warmth were fled ; 
And still it spake its wonted speech— 
But every word was dead. 


ARNOLD 


** And oh, we cried, that on this corse 

Might falla freshening storm ! 

Rive its dry bones, and with new force 

A new-sprung world inform ! 

“Down came thestorm! O’er France 
it pass’d 

In sheets of scathing fire ; 

All Europe felt that fiery blast, 

And shook as it rush’d by her. 


‘‘ Down came the storm! In ruins fell 
The worn-out world we knew. 

—It pass’d, that elemental swell! 
Again appear’d the blue ; 


“The sun shone in the new-wash’d sky, 
And what from heaven saw he? 
Blocks of the past, like icebergs high, 
Float on a rolling sea! 


‘“* Upon them plies the race of man 
All it before endeavor’d ; 

‘ Ye live,’ I cried, ‘ ye work and plan, 
And know not ye are sever’d ! 


‘*«* Poor fragments of a broken world 
_~Whereon men pitch their tent ! 
Why were ye tooto death not hurl'd 
When your world’s day was spent ? 


“* That glow of central fire is done 
Which with its fusing flame 

Knit all your parts, and kept you one— 
But ye, ye are the same ! 


‘*« The past, its mask of union on, 
Had ceased to live and thrive. 
The past, its mask of union gone, 
Say, is it more alive ? 


‘** Your creeds are dead, your rites are 
dead, 

Your social order too ! 

Where tarries he, the Power who said : 

See, I make all things new ? 


***¢The millions suffer still, and grieve, 
And what can helpers heal 
With old-world cures men half believe 
For woes they wholly feel ? 


*** And yet men have such need of joy! 
But joy whose grounds are true; 

And joy that should all hearts employ 
As when the past was new. 


«Ah, not the emotion of that past, 

Its common hope, were vain ! 

Some new such hope must dawn at last, 
Or man must toss in pain. 


77% 


‘** But now the old is out of date, 
The new is not yet born, 

And who can be alone elate, 
While the world lies forlorn ?’ 


«Then to the wilderness I fled.— 
There among Alpine snows 

And pastoral huts I hid my head, 
And sought and found repose. 


‘“Tt was not yet the appointed hour. 
Sad, patient, and resign’d, 

I watch’d the crocus fade and flower, 
I felt the sun and wind. 


‘The day I lived in was not mine, 
Man gets no second day. 

In dreams I saw the future shine— 
But ah! I could not stay! 


‘¢ Action I had not, followers, fame ; 
[ pass’d obscure, alone. 

The after-world forgets my name, 
Nor do I wish it known. 


‘* Composed to bear, I lived and died, 
And knew my life was vain, 

With fate I murmur not, nor chide. 
At Sevres by the Seine 


‘(If Paris that brief flight allow) 
My humble tomb explore ! 

It bears: Hternity, be thou 

My refuge! and no more. 


* But thou, whom fellowship of mood 
Did make from haunts of strife 

Come to my mountain-solitude, 

And learn my frustrate life ; 


‘*O thou, who, ere thy flying span 
Was past of cheerful youth, 

Didst find the solitary man 

And love his cheerless truth— 


‘* Despair not thou as I despair’d, 

Nor be cold gloom thy prison ! 

Forward the gracious hours have fared, 
And see! the sun is risen ! 


‘¢ He breaks the winter of the past ; 
A green, new earth appears. 

Millions, whose life in ice lay fast, 
Have thoughts, and smiles, and tears. 


‘What though there still need effort, 
strife ? 

Though much be still unwon ? 

Yet warm it mounts, the hour of life ! 

Death’s frozen hour is done! 


172 


BRITISH VEORTS 





‘‘The world’s great order dawns in 
sheen, 

After long darkness rude, 

Divinelier imaged, clearer seen, 

With happier zeal pursued. 


‘* With hope extinct and brow composed 
I mark’d the present die ; 

Its term of life was nearly closed, 

Yet it had more than I. 


‘‘But thou, though to the world’s new 
hour 

Thou come with aspect marr’d, 

Shorn of the joy, the bloom, the power 

Which best befits its bard— 


‘‘Though more than half thy years be 


past, 
And spent thy youthful prime ; 
Though, round thy firmer manhood cast 
Hang weeds of our sad time 


‘*Whereof thy youth felt all the spell, 

And traversed all the shade— 

Though late, though dimm’d, though 
weak, yet tell 

Hope to a world new-made ! 


‘* Help it to fill that deep desire, 

The want which rack’d our brain, 
Consumed our heart with thirst like fire. 
Immedicable pain ; 


‘‘ Which to the wilderness drove out 
Our life, to Alpine snow, 


And palsied all our word with doubt, 
And all our work with woe— 


‘* What still of strength is left, employ, 
This end to help attain : 

One common wave of thought and joy 
Lifting mankind again !” 


—The vision ended. I awoke 

As out of sleep, and no 

Voice moved ;—only the torrent broke 
The silence. far below. 


Soft darkness on the turf did lie. 
Solemn, o’er hut and wood, 

In the yet star-sown nightly sky, 
The peak of Jaman stood. 


Still in my soul the voice I heard 

Of Obermann !——away 

I turn’d ; by some vague impulse stirr’d, 
Along the rocks of Naye 


Past Sonchaud’s piny flanks I gaze 
And the blanch’d summit bare 

Of Malatrait, to where in haze 
The Valais opens fair, 


And the domed Velan, with his snows, 
Behind the upcrowding hills, 

Doth all the heavenly opening close 
Which the Rhone’s murmur fills ;— 


And glorious there, without a sound, 
Across the glimmering lake, 

High in the Valais-depth profound, 

I saw the morning break. 1867. 


ROSSET TI 


LIST OF REFERENCES 
EDITIONS 


* Collected Works, with Preface and Notes by W. M. Rossetti, 2 vol- 
umes, Ellis & Elvey, London (The standard edition ; issued in America by 
Roberts Bros.) Poems, Siddal Edition, 7 volumes, 1900-1901. Poems, 
Handy Volume Edition, 2 volumes, Little, Brown & Co. Family Letters, 
edited with Memoir by W. M. Rossetti, 1895. Letters to William Alling- 
ham, 1854-1870, edited by G. B. Hill, 1897. For other Letters, Journals, 
etc., see the first three titles below. 


BioGRAPHY AND REMINISCENCES 


* RosseTtr1 (W. M.), Ruskin, Rossetti, and Pre-Raphaelitism, 1899 ; 
Pre-Raphaelite Diaries and Letters, 1900; Rossetti Papers 1862-1870, a 
Compilation, 1903. (These three books bring the story of Rossetti’s life, 
and the publication of his papers, down to 1870.) Carver (T. H.), Recol- 
lections of Rossetti, 1882. Srepnuens (F. G.), Dante Gabriel Rossetti 
(dealing with Rossetti chiefly as a painter). Snarre (W.), Dante Gabriel 
Rossetti: a Record and Study, 1882. Nicuoxison (P. W.), Dante Gabriel 
Rossetti, Poet and Painter, 1886. *Kniaur (Joseph), Life of Dante 
Gabriel Rossetti (Great Writers Series), 1887. Woop (Estuerr), Dante 
Rossetti and the Pre-Raphaelite Movement, 1894. Cary (KE. L.), The 
Rossettis, 1900. Marruiier (H. C.), Record of Rossetti, 1901. Brnson 
(A. C.), Rossetti (English Men of Letters Series), 1904. See also J. H. 
Ingram’s Life of Oliver Madox Brown; Anne Gilchrist: Her Life and 
Writings; and Percy H. Bate’s History of the Pre-Raphaelite Movement. 


CRITICISM 


Bueuanan (R.), The Fleshly School of Poetry, and other Phenomena 
of the Day, 1872 (originally in the Contemporary Review, October, 1871). 
Rossrerti (D. G.), The Stealthy School of Criticism (originally in the 
Athenaeum, December 16, 1871; now in his Collected Works). Hamitron 
(W.), The Aésthetic Movement in England, 1882 (also contains an answer 
to Buchanan’s attack). Dawson (W. J.), Makers of Modern English. 
Forman (H. B.), Our Living Poets. * Masie (H. W), Essays in Literary 
Interpretation. * Myrrs (fF. W. H.), Essays Modern: Rossetti and the 
Religion of Beauty. Nerncronr (E.), Letteratura inglese. ** Pater (W.), 
Appreciations. Oxnreuant (Margaret), Victorian Age of Literature. Par- 
MORE (C.), Principle in Art. Sarrazin (G.), Poetes modernes de |’Angle- 
terre. ScuppeR (V. D.), Life of the Spirit. Swarr (A.), Victorian Poets. 
*StepMAN (E. C.), Victorian Poets. ** Swinburne, Essays and Studies. 


773 


ROSSETTI 


MY SISTER’S SLEEP 


SHE fell asleep on Christmas Eve : 
At length the long-ungranted shade 
Of weary eyelids overweigh’d 

The pain nought else might yet relieve. 


Our mother, who had leaned all day 
Over the bed from chime to chiine, 
Then raised herself for the first time, 

And as she sat her down, did pray. 


Her little work-table was spread 
With work to finish. For the glare 
Made by her candle, she had care 

To work some distance from the bed. 


Without, there was a cold moon up, 
Of winter radiance sheer and thin ; 
The hollow halo it was in 

Was like an icy crystal cup. 


Through the small room, with subtle 
sound 
Of flame, by vents the fireshine drove 
And reddened. In its dim alcove 
The mirror shed a clearness round. 


J had been sitting up some nights, 
And my tired mind felt weak and 
blank ; 
Like a sharp strengthening wine it 
drank 
The stillness and the broken lights. 


Twelve struck. 
dling years 
Heard in each hour, 
then 
The rutfled silence spread again, 
Like water that a pebble stirs. 


That sound, by dwin- 


crept off; and 


Our mother rose from where she sat: 
Her needles, as she laid them down, 
Met lightly, and her silken gown 

Settled : no other noise than that. 


“Glory unto the Newly Born!” 
So, as said angels, she did say ; 


Because we were in Christmas Day, 
Though it would still be long till morn. 


Just then in the room over us 
There was a pushing back of chairs, 
As some who had sat unawares’ 

4 

So late, now heard the hour, and rose. 


With anxious softly-stepping haste 
Our mother went where Margaret lay, 
Fearing the sounds o’erhead—should 
they 
Have broken her long watched-for rest ! 


She stooped an and 
turned ; 
But suddenly turned back again ; 
And all her features seemed in pain 
With woe, and her eyes gazed and 
yearned. 


instant, calm, 


For my part, I but hid my face, 
And held my breath, and spoke no 
word : 
There was none spoken; but I heard 
The silence for a little space. 


Our mother bowed herself and wept : 
And both my arms fell, and I said, 
‘‘God knows I knew that she was 

dead.” 

And there, all white, my sister slept. 


Then kneeling, upon Christmas morn 
A little after twelve o’clock 
Ve said, ere the first quarter struck, 
‘*Christ’s blessing on the newly born !” 
1847. 1850. 


THE BLESSED DAMOZEL 


THE blessed damozel leaned out 
From the gold bar of Heaven ; 

Her eyes were deeper than the depth 
Of waters stilled at even ; 

She had three lilies in her hand, 
And the stars in her hair were seven. 


Her robe, ungirt from clasp to hem, 
No wrought flowers did adorn, 


iia 


“a0 


ROSSETTI 


But a white rose of Mary’s gift, 
For service meetly worn ; 

Her hair that lay along her back 
Was yellow like ripe corn. 


Herseemed she scarce had been a day 
One of God’s choristers ; 
The wonder was not yet quite gone 
From that still look of hers ; 
Albeit, to them she left, her day 
- Had counted as ten years. 


(To one, it is ten years of years. 
. Yet now, and in this place, 
Surely she leaned o’er me—her hair 
Fell all about my face. . . 
Nothing: the autumn fall of leaves. 
The whole year sets apace.) 


It was the rampart of God’s house 
That she was standing on; 

By God built over the sheer depth 
The which is Space begun ; 

So high, that looking downward thence 
She scarce could see the sun. 


It lies in Heaven, across the flood 
Of ether, as a bridge. 

Beneath the tides of day and night 
With flame and darkness ridge 

The void, as low as where this earth 
Spins like a fretful midge. 


- Around her, lovers, newly met - 
*Mid deathless love’s acclaims, 
Spoke evermore among themselves 

Their heart-remembered names ; 
And the souls mounting up to God 
Went by her like thin flames. 


And still she bowed herself and stooped 
Out of the circling charm ; 

Until her bosom must have made 
The bar she leaned on warm, 

And the lilies lay as if asleep 
Along her bended arm. 


From the fixed place of Heaven she saw 
Time like a pulse shake fierce 
Through all the worlds. Her gaze still 
strove 
Within the gulf to pierce 
Its path ; and now she spoke as when 
The stars sang in their spheres. 


The sun was gone now ; thecurled moon 
Was like a little feather 

Fluttering far down the gulf; and now 
She spoke through the still weather. 

Her voice was like the voice the stars 
Had when they sang together, 


775 


(Ah sweet ! in that bird’s 
song, 
Strove not her accents there, 
Fain to be harkened ? When those bells 
Possessed the mid-day air, 
Strove not her steps to reach my side 
Down all the echoing stair ?) 


Even now, 


‘¢T wish that he were come to me, 
For he will come,” she said. 
‘‘ Have I not prayed in Heaven ?—on 
earth, 
Lord, Lord, has he not pray’d? 
Are not two prayers a perfect strength ? 
And shall I feel afraid ? 


‘“When round his head the aureole 
clings, 
And he is clothed in white, 
Tl take his hand and go with him 
To the deep wells of light ; 
As unto a stream we will step down, 
And bathe there in God’s sight. 


‘We two will stand beside that shrine, 
Occult, withheld, untrod, 

Whose lampsare stirred continually 
With prayer sent up to God ; 

And see our old prayers, granted, melt 
Kach like a little cloud. 


‘¢ We two will lie i’ the shadow of 
That living mystic tree 

Within whose secret growth the Dove 
Is sometimes felt to be, 

While every leaf that His plumes touch 
Saith His Name audibly. 


‘*¢ And I myself will teach to him, 
I myself, lying so, 

The songs I sing here ; which his voice 
Shall pause in, hushed and slow, 

And find some knowledge at each pause, 
Or some new thing to know.” 


(Alas! We two, we two, thou say’st ! 
Yea, one wast thou with me 

That once of old. But shall God lift 
To endless unity 

The soul whose likeness with thy soul 
Was but its love for thee ?) 


‘‘We two,” she said, ‘‘ will seek the 
groves 
Where the lady Mary is, 
With her five handmaidens, 
names 
Are five sweet symphonies, 
Cecily, Gertrude, Magdalen, 
Margaret and Rosalys. 


whose 


776 


**Circlewise sit they, with bound locks 
And foreheads garlanded ; 

Into the fine cloth white like flame 
Weaving the golden thread, 

To fashion the birth-robes for them 
Who are just born, being dead. 


‘‘ He shall fear, haply, and be dumb: 
Then will I lay my cheek 

To his, and tell about our love, 
Not once abashed or weak : 

And the dear Mother will approve 
My pride, and let me speak. 


“* Herself shall bring us, hand in hand, 
To Him round whom all souls 
Kneel, the clear-ranged unnumbered 
heads 
Bowed with their aureoles: 
And angels meeting us shall sing 
To their citherns and citoles. 


‘* There will I ask of Christ the Lord 
Thus much for him and me :— 

Only to live as once on earth 
With Love, only to be, 

As then awhile, for ever now. 
Together, I and he.” 


She gazed and listened and then said, 
Less sad of speech than mild,— 
‘All this is when he comes.” She 

ceased. 
The light thrilled towards her, fill’d 
With angels in strong level flight. 
Her eyes prayed, and she smil’d. 


(I saw her smile.) But soon their path 
Was vague in distant spheres : 
And then she cast her arms along 
The golden barriers, 
And laid her face between her hands, 
And wept. (I heard her tears.) 
LS47, 1850. 


AUTUMN SONG 


Know’sT thou not at the fall of the leaf 
How the heart feels a languid grief 
Laid on it for a covering ; 
And how sleep seems a goodly thing 
In Autumn at the fall of the leaf? 


And how the swift beat of the brain 
Falters because it is in vain, 
In Autumn at the fall of the leaf 
Knowest thou not ? and how the chief 
Of joys seems—not to suffer pain ? 


BRITISH POETS 


Know’st thou not at the fall of the leaf 
How the soul feels like a dried sheaf 
Bound up at length for harvesting, 
And how death seems a comely thing 
In Autumn at the fall of the leaf ive 
1884.1 


THE PORTRAIT 


THIS is her picture as she was: 
It seems a thing to wonder on, 
As though mine image in the glass 
Should tarry when myself am gone. 
I gaze until she seems to stir,— 
Until mine eyes almost aver 
That now, even now, the sweet lips 
part 
To breathe the words of the sweet 
heart :— 
And yet the earth is over her. 


Alas! even such the thin-drawn ray 

That makes the prison-depths more 
rude,— 

The drip of water night and day 
Giving a tongue to solitude. 

Yet only this, of love’s whole prize, 

Remains ; save what in mournful guise 
Takes counsel with my soul alone,— 
Save what is secret and unknown, 

Below the earth, above the skies. 


In painting her I shrined her face 

’Mid mystic trees, where light falls in 
Hardly at all ; a covert place 

Where you might think to find a din 
Of doubtful talk, and a live flame 
Wandering, and many a shape whose 

name 

Not itself knoweth, and old dew, 

And your own footsteps meeting you, 
And all things going as they came. 


A deep dim wood ; and there she stands 
As in that wood that day : for so 

Was the still movement of her hands 
And such the pure line’s gracious 

flow. 

And passing fair the type must seem, 

Unknown the presence and the dream. 
’T is she: though of herself, alas! 
Less than her shadow on the grass 

Or than her image in the stream. 


That day we met there, I and she 
One with the other all alone ; 
And we were blithe ; yet memory 


1W. M. Rossetti classes this among the earliest 
poems, in date of writing. It was published as 
a song in 1884, and in the Poetical Works, 1886. 


ROSSETTI 


Saddens those hours, as when the 
moon 
Looks upon daylight. And with her 
I stooped to drink the spring-water, 
Athirst where other waters sprang ; 
And where the echo is, she sang,— 
My soul another echo there. 


But when that hour my soul won 
strength 
For words whose silence wastes and 
kills, 
Dull raindrops smote us, and at length 
Thundered the heat within the hills. 
That eve I spoke those words again 
Beside the pelted window-pane ; 
And there she harkened what I said, 
With under-glances that surveyed 
The empty pastures blind with rain. 


Next day the memories of these things, 

Like leaves through which a bird has 
flown, 

Still vibrated with Love’s warm wings; 
Till I must make them all my own 

And paint this picture. So, ’twixt ease 

Of talk and sweet long silences, 
She stood among the plants in bloom 
At windows of a summer room, 

To feign the shadow of the trees. 


And as I wrought, while all above 
And all around was fragrant air, 
In the sick burthen of my love 
It seemed each sun-thrilled blossom 
there 
Beat like a heart among the leaves. 
O heart that never beats nor heaves, 
In that one darkness lying still, 
What now to thee my love’s great will, 
Or the fine web the sunshine weaves? 


For now doth daylight disavow 

Those days,—nought left to see or hear. 
Only in solemn whispers now 

At night-time these things reach mine 


ear, 
When the leaf-shadows at a breath 
Shrink in the road, and all the heath, 
Forest and water, far and wide, 
In limpid starlight glorified, 
Lie like the mystery of death. 


Last night at last I could have slept, 
And yet delayed my sleep till dawn, 

Still wandering. Then it was I wept: 
For unawares I came upon 

Those glades where once she walked 

with me: 


And as I stood there suddenly, 
All wan with traversing the night, 
Upon the desolate verge of light 
Yearned loud the iron-bosomed sea. 


Even so, where Heaven holds breath and 
hears 
The beating heart of Love’s own 
breast,— 

Where round the secret of all spheres 
All angels lay their wings to rest,— 
How shall my soul stand rapt and awed, 

When, by the new birth borne abroad 
Throughout the music of the suns, 

It enters in her soul at once 

And knows the silence there for God! 


Here with her face doth memory sit 
Meanwhile, and wait the day’s decline, 
Till other eyes shall look from it, 
Kyes of the spirit’s Palestine, 

Even than the old gaze tenderer : 
While hopes and aimslong lost with her 
Stand round her image side by side, 

Like tombs of pilgrims that have died 
About the Holy Sepulchre. 1847. 1870. 


THE CARD-DEALER 


CouLp you not drink her gaze like wine ? 
Yet though its splendor swoon 

Into the silence languidly 
As a tune into a tune, 

Those eyes unravel the coiled night 
And know the stars at noon. 


The gold that’s heaped beside her hand, 
In truth rich prize it were ; 
And rich the dreams that wreathe her 
brows 
With magic stillness there ; 
And he were rich who should unwind 
That woven golden hair. 


Around her, where she sits, the dance 
Now breathes its eager heat ; 

And not more lightly or more true 
Fall there the dancers’ feet 

Than fall her cards on the bright board 
As ’twere an heart that beat. 


Her fingers let them softly through, 
Smooth polished silent things ; 
And each one as it falls reflects 
In swift light-shadowings, 
Blood-red and purple, green and blue, 
The great eyes of her rings. 
With 


Whom plays she with? thee, 


who lov’st. . 


778 


Those gems upon her hand ; 

With me, who search her secret brows ; 
With all men, bless’d or bann’d. 

We play together, she and we, 
Within a vain strange land: 


A land without any order,— 
Day even as night, (one saith,)— 
Where who Leth down ariseth not 
Nor the sleeper awakeneth ; 

A land of darkness as darkness itself 
And of the shadow of death. 
What be her cards, you ask? Even 

these :—- 
The heart, that doth but crave 
More, having fed ; the diamond, 
Skilled to make base seem brave ; 
The club, for smiting in the dark ; 
The spade, to dig a grave. 


And do you ask what game she plays? 
With me ’tis lost or won; © 

With thee itis playing still ; 
It is not well begun ; 

But ’tis a game she plays with all 
Beneath the sway o’ the sun. 


with him 


Thou seest the card that falls, she knows 
The card that followeth : 
Her game in thy tongue is called Life, 
As ebbs thy daily breath : 
When she shall speak, thou’lt learn her 
tongue 
And know she calls it Death. 1870. 


AT THE SUNRISE IN 1848 


Gop said, Let there be light! and there 
was light. 

Then heard we sounds as though the 
Earth did sing 

And the Earth’s angel cried upon the 
wing: 

We saw priests fall together and turn 
white : 

And covered in the dust from the sun’s 
sight, 

A king was spied, and yet another king. 

We said: ‘The round world keeps its 
balancing ; 

On this globe, they and we are opposite, — 

If itis day with us, with them ‘tis night. 

Still, Man, in thy just pride, remember 
this : 

Thou hadst not made that thy sons’ 
sons shall ask 

What the word king may mean in their 
day’s task, 


BRITISH. POETS 


But for the light that led: and if light is, 
It is because God said, Let there be 


light.” 1848. 1886. 
ON REFUSAL OF AID BETWEEN 
NATIONS 
Not that the earth is changing, O my 
God! 
Nor that the seasons totter in their 
walk,— 


Not that the virulent ill of act and talic 

Seethes ever as a winepress ever trod,— 

Not therefore are we certain that the rod 

Weighs in thine hand to smite thy 
world ; though now 

ene thine hand so many nations 
00W, 

So many kings:—not therefore, O my 
God !— 

But because Man is parcelled out in men 

To-day ; because, forany wrongful blow, 

No man not stricken asks, ‘‘I would be 
told 

Why thou dost thus;” but his heart 
whispers then, 

‘He is he, lam I.” By this we know. 

That the earth falls asunder, being old. 

1848 or 1849. 1870. 


MARY’S GIRLHOOD 
(For a Picture) 


I 


THIS is that blessed Mary, pre-elect ; 

God’s Virgin. Gone is a great while, 
and she 

Dwelt young in Nazareth of Galilee. 

Unto God’s will she brought devout 
respect, 

Profound simplicity of intellect, 

And supreme patience. From 
mother’s knee 

Faithful and hopeful ; wise in charity ; 

Strong in grave peace ; in pity circum- 
spect. 

So held she through her girlhood; as it 
were 

An angel-watered lily, that near God 

Grows and is quiet. Till, one dawn at 


her 


home 

She woke in her white bed, and had no 
fear 

At all,—yet wept till sunshine, and felt 
awed: 

Because the fulness of the time was 
come, 


ROSSETTI 


II 


THESE are the symbols. 
of red 

I’ the centre is the Tripoint : perfect each, 

Except the second of its points, to teach 

That Christ is not yet born. The books 

—whose head 

Is golden Charity, as Paul hath said— 

Those es are wherein the soul is 
rich : 

Therefore on them the lily standeth, 
which 

Is Innocence, being interpreted. 

The seven-thorn’d briar and the palm 
seven-leaved 

Are her great sorrow and her great 
reward. 

Until the end be full, the Holy One 

Abides without. She soon shall have 
achieved 

Her perfect purity : yea, God the Lord 

Shall soon vouchsafe His Son to be her 
Son. 1848, 1850. 1849, 1870. 


On that cloth 


FOR A VENETIAN PASTORAL 
By GIORGIONE 
(In the Louvre) — 


WATER, for anguish of the solstice :— 


nay, 
But dip the vessel, slowly,—nay, but 


lean 

And hark how at its verge the wave 
sighs in 

Reluctant. Hush! Beyond all depth 


away 
The heat lies silent at the brink of day: 
Now the hand trails upon the viol-string 
That sobs, and the brown faces cease to 
sing, 
Sad with the whole of pleasure. Whither 
stray 
Her eyes now, from whose mouth the 
slim pipes creep 
And leave it pouting, while the shadowed 
grass 
Is coolagainst her naked side? Let be :— 
Say nothing now unto her lest she weep, 
Nor name thisever. Be it as it was,— 
Life touching lips with Immortality. 
1850. 


THE SEA-LIMITS 


CONSIDER the sea’s listless chime: 
Time’s self it is, made audible,— 
The murmur of the earth’s own shell. 


779 


Secret continuance sublime 
Is the sea’s end : our sight may pass 
No furlong further. Since time was, 
This sound hath told the lapse of time. 


No quiet, which is death’s,—it hath 
The mournfulness of ancient life, 
Enduring always at dull strife. 

As the world’s heart of rest and wrath, 
Its painful pulse is in the sands. 

Last utterly, the whole sky stands, 

Gray and not known, along its path. 


Listen alone beside the sea, 
Listen alone among the woods ; 
Those voices of twin solitudes 
Shall have one sound alike to thee: 
Hark where the murmurs of thronged 
men 
Surge and sink back and surge again,— 
Still the one voice of wave and tree. 


Gather a shell from the strown beach 
And listen at its lips: they sigh 
The same desire and mystery, 
The echo of the whole sea’s speech. 
And all mankind is thus at heart 
Not anything but what thou art : 
And Earth, Sea, Man, are allin each. 
1850. 


THE MIRROR 


SHE knew it not,—most perfect pain 
To learn : this too she knew not. Strife 
For me, calm hers, as from the first. 
°T was but another bubble burst 
Upon the curdling draught of life,— 
My silent patience mine again. 


As who, of forms that crowd unknown 
Within a distant mirror’s shade, 
Deems such an one himself, and 
makes 
Some sign; but when the image 
shakes 
No whit, he finds his thought betray’d, 
And must seek elsewhere for his own. 
1850. 1886. 


A YOUNG FIR-WOOD 


THESE little firs to-day are things 
To clasp into a giant’s cap, 
Or fans to suit his lady’s lap. 
From many winters many springs 
Shall cherish them in strength and sap, 
Till they be marked upon the map, 
A wood for the wind’s wanderings, 


780 


All seed is in the sower’s hands : 
And what at first was trained to spread 
Its shelter for some single head ,— 
Yea, even such fellowship of wands,— 
May hide the sunset, and the shade 
Of its great multitude be laid 
Upon the earth and elder sands. 
November, 1850. 1870. 


PENUMBRA 


I pip not look upon her eyes, 

(Though scarcely seen, with no surprise, 
"Mid many eyes a single look,) 

Because they should not gaze rebuke, 
At night, from stars in sky and brook. 


I did not take her by the hand, 

(Though little was to understand 

From touch of hand all friends might 
take, ) 

Because it should not prove a flake 

Burnt in my palm to boil and ache. 


I did not listen to her voice, 

(Though none had noted, where at choice 
All might rejoice in listening, ) 

Because no such a thing should cling 

In the wood’s moan at evening. 


I did not cross her shadow once, 
(Though from the hollow west the sun’s 
Last shadow runs along so far,) 
Because in June it should not bar 

My ways, at noon when fevers are, 


They told me she was sad that day, 

(Though wherefore tell what love’s sooth- 
say, 

Sooner than they, did register ?) 

And my heart leapt and wept to her, 

And yet I did not speak nor stir. 


So shall the tongues of the sea’s foam 

(Though many voices therewith come 

From drowned hope’s home to cry to 
me, ) 

Bewail one hour the more, when sea 

And wind are one with memory. 1870. 


SISTER HELEN 


‘¢Wuy did you melt your waxen man, 
Sister Helen? 
To-day is the third since you began.” 
‘The time was long, yet the time ran, 
Little brother.” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Three days to-day, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


BRITISH POETS 


— 


‘¢ But if you have done your work aright, 
Sister Helen, 

You'll let me play, for yousaid I might.” 

‘¢ Be very still in your play to-night, 

Little brother.” 

(O Mother, Mary Mother, 

Third night, to-night, between Hell and 

Heaven !) 


‘* You said it must melt ere vesper-bell, 
Sister Helen ; 
If now it be molten, all is well.” 
‘* Hven so,—nay, peace! you cannot tell, 
Little brother.” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
O what is this, between Hell and Heaven ?) 


‘*Oh the waxen knave was plump to-day, 
Sister Helen ; - 
How like dead folk he has dropped 
away!” 
‘‘Nay now, of the dead what can you 
Say, 
Little brother?” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
What of the dead, between Hell and 
Heaven ?) 


‘* See, see, the sunken pile of wood, 
Sister Helen, 
Shines through the thinned wax red as 
blood!” 
‘*Nay now, when looked you yet on 
blood, 
Little brother ?” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
How pale she is, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘‘Now close your eyes, for they’re sick 
and sore, 
Sister Helen, 
And VU play without the gallery door.” 
‘* Aye, let ine rest,—I’ll lie on the floor, 
Little brother.” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
What rest to-night, between Hell and 
Heaven ?) 


‘* Here high up in the balcony, 
Sister Helen, 
The moon flies face to face with me.” 
‘* Aye, look and say whatever you see, 
Little brother.” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
What sight to-night, between Hell and 
Heaven ?) 


‘* Outside it’s merry in the wind’s wake, 
Sister Helen ; 


ROSSETTI 


In the shaken trees the chill stars 
shake.” 
‘Hush, heard you a horse-tread as you 
spake, 
Little brother ?” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
What sound to-night, between Hell and 
Heaven ?) 


‘¢ | hear a horse-tread, and I see, 
Sister Helen, 
Three horsemen that ride terribly.” 
** Little brother, whence come the three, 
Little brother ?” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Whence should they come, between Hell 
and Heaven ?) 


“They come by the hill-verge from 
Boyne Bar, 
Sister Helen, 
And one draws nigh, but two are afar.” 
‘*Look, look, do you know them who 
they are, 
Little brother? ” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Who should they be, between Hell and 
Heaven ?) 


‘**Oh, it’s Keith of Eastholm rides so fast, 
Sister Helen, 
For I know the white mane on the blast.” 
**The hour has come, has come at last, 
Little brother ! ” 

(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
hour at last, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


Her 


** He has made asign and called Halloo! 
Sister Helen, 
And he says that he would speak with 


** Oh tell him I fear the frozen dew, 
Little brother.” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Why laughs she thus, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘The wind is loud, but I hear him cry. 
Sister Helen, 
That Keith of Ewern’s like to die.” 

** And he and thou, and thou and I, 

Little brother.” 

(O Mother, Mary Mother, 

And they and we, between Hell and 

Heaven ! ) 


‘‘ Three days ago, on his marriage-morn, 


Sister Helen, 
He sickened, and lies since then forlorn.” 


<< 


781 


‘ For bridegroom’s side is the bride a 
thorn, 
Little brother ?” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Cold bridal cheer, between Hell and 
Heaven ! ) 


“Three days and nights he has lain 
abed, 
Sister Helen, 
And he prays in torment to be dead.” 
‘“The thing may chance, if he have 
prayed, 
Little brother ! ” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
orf he have prayed, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘* But he has not ceased to cry to-day, 
Sister Helen, 
That you should take your curse away.” 
‘*My prayer was heard,—he need but 
pray 
Little brother !” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Shall God not hear, between Hell and 
Heaven ?) 


‘* But he says, till you take back your 
ban, 
Sister Helen, 
His soul would pass, yet never can.” 
‘* Nay then, shall I slay a living man, 
Little brother ?” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
A living soul, between Hell and Heaven!) 


‘* But he calls for ever on your name, 
Sister Helen, 

And says that he melts before a flame.” 
‘‘My heart for his pleasure fared the 

same, 

Little brother. ’ 
(O Mother, Mary Ape 

Fire at the heart, between Hell and 

Heaven ! ) 


‘‘ Here’s Keith of Westholm riding fast, 
Sister Helen, 
For I know the white plume on the 
blast.” 
‘‘The hour, the sweet hour I forecast, 
Little brother !” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Is the hour sweet, between Hell and 
Heaven ?) 


‘‘He stops to speak, and he stills his 
horse, 
Sister Helen ; 


782 


But his words are drowned in the wind’s 
course.” } 
“Nay hear, nay hear, you must hear 
perforce, 
Little brother ! ” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
What word now heard, between Hell and 
Heaven ?) 


‘* Oh he says that Keith of Ewern’s cry, 
Sister Helen, 
Is ever to see you ere he die.” 
‘* In all that his soul sees, there am I, 
Little brother !” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
The soul’s one sight, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘* He sends a ring and a broken coin, 
Sister Helen, 
And bids you mind the banks of Boyne.” 
‘* What else he broke will he ever join, 
Little brother ?” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
No, never joined, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘** He yields you these and craves full fain, 
Sister Helen, 
You pardon him in his mortal pain.” 
‘* What else he took will he give again, 
Little brother ?” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Not twice to give, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘* He calls your name in an agony, 
Sister Helen, 

That even dead Love must weep to see.” 

‘* Hate, born of Love, is blind as he, 

Little brother !” 

(O Mother, Mary Mother, 

Love turned to hate, between Hell and 

Heaven !) 


‘¢ Oh it’s Keith of Keith now that rideés 
fast, 
Sister Helen, 
For I know the white hair on the blast.” 
‘‘ The short, short hour will soon be past, 
Little brother !” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Will soon be past, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘** He looks at me and he tries to speak, 
Sister Helen, 
But oh! his voice is sad and weak !” 
** What here should the mighty Baron 
seek, 


BRITISH POETS 


Little brother?” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Is this the end, between Hell and Heaven ?) > - 


‘* Oh his son still cries, if you forgive, 
Sister Helen, 
The body dies, but the soul shall live.” 
‘* Fire shall forgive me as I forgive, 
Little brother !” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
As she forgives, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘* Oh he prays you, as his heart would 
rive, 
Sister Helen, 
To save his dear son’s soul alive.” 
‘* Fire cannot slay it, it shall thrive, 
Little brother !” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Alas, alas, between Hell and Heaven /) 


‘* He cries to you, kneeling in the road, 
Sister Helen, 
To go with him for the love of God ! ” 
‘* The way is long to his son’s abode, 
Little brother.” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
The way is long, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘* A lady’s here, by a dark steed brought, 

Sister Helen, 
So darkly clad, I saw her not.” 

‘* See her now or never see aught, 
Little brother!” 

(O Mother, Mary Mother, 

What more to see, between Hell and 

Heaven ?) 


‘‘ Her hood falls back, and the moon 
shines fair, 
Sister Helen, 
On the Lady of Ewern’s golden hair.” 
‘* Blest hour of my power and her despair, 
Little brother!” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Hour blest and bann’d, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘‘ Pale, pale her cheeks, that in pride 
did glow, 
Sister Helen, 
’Neath the bridal-wreath three days ago.” 
‘* One morn for pride and three days for 
woe. 
Little brother !” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Three days, three nights, between Hell 
and Heaven !) 


ROSSETTI 


‘* Her clasped hands stretch from her 
bending head, 
Sister Helen ; 
With the loud wind’s wail her sobs are 
wed.” 
‘* What wedding-strains hath her bridal- 
bed, 
Little brother ?” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
What strain but death’s, between Hell 
and Heaven ?) 
‘She may not speak, she sinks in a 
swoon, 
Sister Helen, 
She lifts her lips and gasps on the moon.’ 
* Oh! might I but hear her soul’s blithe 
tune, 
Little brother !” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
Her woe’s dumb cry, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 
**They’ve caught her to Westholm’s 
saddle-bow, 
Sister Helen, 
And her moonlit hair Se white in 
its flow.” 
*¢ Let it turn whiter than winter snow, 
Little brother !” 
(O Mother. Mary Mother, 
Woe-withered gold, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


**O Sister Helen, you heard the bell, 
Sister Helen ! 
More loud than the vesper-chime it fell.” 
‘*No vesper-chime, but a dying knell, 
Little brother !” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
His dying knell, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘* Alas! but I fear the heavy sound, 
. Sister Helen ; 
Is it in the sky or in the ground ?” 
‘* Say, have they turned their horses 
round, 
Little brother ?” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
What would she more, between Hell and 
Heaven ?) 


‘*They have raised the old man from his 
knee, 
Sister Helen, 
_ And they ride in silence hastily.” 
** More fast the naked soul doth flee, 
Little brother!” 


783 


(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
The naked soul, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘*Flank to flank are the three steeds 
gone, | 
Sister Helen, 
But the lady’s dark steed goes alone.” 
‘** And lonely her bridegroom’s soul hath 
flown, 
Little brother.” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother. 
The lonely ghost, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


‘Oh the wind is sad in the iron chill, 
Sister Helen, 
And weary sad they look by the hill.” 
‘But he and I are sadder still, 
Little brother !” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother, 
sad of all, between .Hell and 
Heaven !) 


Most 


‘See, see, the wax has dropped from its 
place, 
Sister Helen, 
And the flames are winning up apace!” 
* Yet here they burn but for a space, 
Little brother !” 
(O Mother, Mary Mother 
Here for a space, between Hell and 
Heaven !) 


* Ah! what white thing at the door has 
cross’d, 

Sister Helen ? 

Ah! what is this that sighs in the frost ?” 
‘* A soul that’s lost as mine is lost, 
Little brother ! ” 

(O Mother, Mary Mother, 

lost, all lost, between Hell and 

Heaven !) 1870. 


Lost, 


THE BURDEN OF NINEVEH 


In our Museum galleries 
To-day I lingered o’er the prize 
Dead Greece vouchsafes to livi ing eyes,— 
Her Art for ever in fresh wise 

From hour to hour rejoicing me, 
Sighing I turned at last to win 
Once more the London dirt and din ; 
And as I made the swing-door spin 
And issued, they were hoisting in 

A winged beast from Nineveh. 


A human face the creature wore, 
And hoofs behind and hoofs before, 
And flanks with dark runes fretted o’er, 


784 


°T was bull, ‘t was mitred Minotaur, 
A dead disbowelled mystery ; 
The mummy of a buried faith 
Stark from the charnel without scathe, 
Its wings stood for the ight to bathe,— 
Such fossil cerements as might swathe 
The very corpse of Nineveh. 


The print of its first rush-wrapping, 
Wound ere it dried, still ribbed the 
thing, 
What song did the brown maidens sing, 
From purple mouths alternating, 
When that was woven languidly ? 
What vows, what rites, what pa 
preferr’d, 
What songs has the strange image 
heard ? 
In what blind vigil stood interr’d 
For ages, till an English word 
Broke silence first at Nineveh ? 


Oh when upon each sculptured court, 
Where even the wind might not re- 
sort,— 
O’er which Time passed, of like import 
With the wild Arab boys at sport,— 
A living face looked in to see :— 
Oh seemed it not—the spell once broke— 
As though the carven warriors woke, 
As though the shaft the string forsook, 
The cymbals clashed, the chariots shook, 
And there was life in Nineveh ? 


On London stones our sun anew 
The beast’s recovered shadow threw. 
(No shade that plague of darkness knew, 
No light, no shade, while older grew 
By ages the old earth and sea.) 
Lo thou! could all thy priests have 
shown 
Such proof to make thy godhead known? 
From their dead Past thou liv’st alone 
And still thy shadow is thine own 
Even as of yore in Nineveh. 


That day whereof we keep record, 

When near thy city-gates the Lord 

Sheltered his Jonah with a gourd, 

This sun, (I said) here present, pour’d 
Even thus this shadow that I see. 

This shadow has been shed the same 

From sun and moon,—from lamps which 

came 

For prayer,—from fifteen days of flame, 

The last, while smouldered to a name 
Sardanapalus’ Nineveh. 


Within thy shadow, haply, once 
Sennacherib has knelt, whose sons 


BRITISH POETS 





Smote him between the altar-stones : 
Or pale Semiramis her zones 
Of gold, her incense brought to thee, 
In love for grace, in war for aid : 
Ay, and who else? ... till ‘neath thy 
shade 
Within his trenches newly made 
Last year the Christian knelt and 
pray 
Not to thy ‘str ength—in Nineveh. 


Now, thou poor god, within this hall 

Where the blank windows blind the wall 

From pedestal to pedestal, 

The kind of light shall on thee fall 
Which London takes the day to be: 

While school-foundations in the act 

Of holiday, three files compact, 

Shall learn to view thee as a fact 

Connected with that zealous tract : 
‘*Rome,—Babylon and Nineveh.” 


Deemed they of this, those worshippers, 
When, in some mythic chain of verse 
Which man shall not again rehearse, 
The faces of thy ministers 

Yearned pale with bitter ecstasy ? 
Greece, Egypt, Rome,—did any god 
Before whose feet men knelt unshod 
Deem that in this unblest abode 
Another scarce more unknown god 

Should house with him, from Nineveh? 


Ah! in what quarries lay the stone 

From which this pygmy pile has grown, 

Unto man's need how long unknown, 

Since thy vast temples, court and cone, 
Rose far in desert history ? 

Ah! what is here that does not lie 

All strange to thine awakened eye? 

Ah! what is here can testify 

(Save that dumb presence of the sky) 
Unto thy day and Nineveh ? 


Why, of those mummies in the room 
Above, there might indeed have come 
One out of Egypt to thy home, 
Analien. Nay, but were not some 

Of these thine own ‘ antiquity ” ? 
And now,—they and their gods and thou 
All relics here together,—now 
Whose profit ? whether bull or cow, 
Isis or Ibis, who or how, 

Whether of Thebes or Nineveh ? 


The consecrated metals found, 

And ivory tablets, underground, 
Winged ter aphim and creatures crown’d 
When air and daylight filled the mound, 


. 


ROSSETTI 


785 





Fell into dust immediately. 
And even as these, the images 
Of awe and worship,—even as these,— 
So, smitten with the sun’s increase, 
Her glory mouldered and did cease 
From immemorial Nineveh. 


The day her builders made their halt, 

Those cities of the lake of salt 

Stood firmly ’stablished without fault, 

Made proud with pillars of basalt, 
With sardonyx and porphyry. 

The day that Jonah bore abroad 

To Nineveh the voice of God, 

A brackish lake lay in his road, 

Where erst Pride fixed her sure abode, 
As then in royal Nineveh. 


The day when he, Pride’s lord and Man’s, 
Showed all the kingdoms at a glance 
To Him before whose countenance 
The years recede, the years advance, 
And said, Fall down and worship me :— 
’*Mid all the pomp beneath that look, 
Then stirred there, haply, some rebuke, 
Where to the wind the salt pools shook, 
And in those tracts, of life forsook, 
That knew thee not, O Nineveh ! 


Delicate harlot! On thy throne 

Thou with a world beneath thee prone 
In state for ages sat’st alone ; 

And needs were years and lustres flown 

Ere strength of man could vanquish 

thee : 
Whom even thy victor foes must bring, 
Still royal, among maids that sing 
As with doves’ voices, taboring 
Upon their breasts, unto the King,— 

A kingly conquest, Nineveh ! 

..... Here woke my thought. The 
wind’s slow sway 

Had waxed ; and like the human play 

Of scorn that smiling spreads away, 

The sunshine shivered off the day : 

The callous wind, it seemed to me, 
Swept up the shadow from the ground : 
And pale as whom the Fates astound, 
The god forlorn stood winged and 

crown’d ; 
Within I knew the cry lay bound 

Of the dumb soul of Nineveh. 


And as I turned, my sense half shut 
Still saw the crowds of kerb and rut 
Go past as marshalled to the strut 
Of ranks in gypsum quaintly cut. 

It seemed in one same pageantry 


5° 


They followed forms which had been 
erst ; 
To pass, till on my sight should burst 
That future of the best or worst 
When some may question which was 
first, 
Of London or of Nineveh. 


For as that Bull-god once did stand 
And watched the burial-clouds of sand, 
Till these at last without a hand 
Rose o’er his eyes, another land, 

And blinded him with destiny :— 
So may he stand again ; till now, 
In ships of unknown sail and prow, 
Some tribe of the Australian plough 
Bear him afar,—a relic now 

Of London, not of Nineveh ! 


Or it may chance indeed that when 

Man’s age is hoary among men,— 

His centuries threescore and ten,— 

His furthest childhood shall seem then 
More clear than later times may be: 

Who, finding in this desert place 

This form, shall hold us for some race 

That walked not in Christ’s lowly ways, 

But bowed its pride and vowed its praise 
Unto the god of Nineveh. 


The smile rose first,—anon drew nigh 
The thought: . . . Those heavy wings 
spread high 
So sure of flight, which do not fly ; 
That set gaze never on the sky ; 
Those scriptured flanks it cannot see ; 
Its crown, a brow-contracting load ; 
Its planted feet which trust the sod:... 
(So grew the image as I trod :) 
O Nineveh, was this thy God,— 
Thine also, mighty Nineveh? 1856. 


MARY MAGDALENE 
AT THE DOOR OF SIMON THE PHARISEE 
(For a Drawing }) 

‘Way wilt thou cast the roses from thine 
hair ? 

Nay, be thou all a rose,—wreath, lips, 
and cheek. 

Nay, not this house,—that banquet- 
house we seek ; 


See how they kiss and enter; come thou 
there. 


1JIn the drawing Mary has left a festal proces- 
sion, and is ascending by a sudden impulse the 
steps of the house where she sees Christ. Her 
ork has followed her and is trying to turn her 
ack, 


786 


BRIVISHSROETS 








This delicate day of love we two will 
share 

Till at our ear love’s whispering night 
shall speak. 

What, sweet one,—hold’st thou still the 
foolish freak ? 

Nay, when I kiss thy feet they ’ll leave 
the stair.” 

‘*Oh loose me! See’st thou not my 
Bridegroom’s face 

That draws me to Him? 
my kiss, 

My hair, my tears He craves to-day :— 
and oh! 

What words can tell what other day and 
place 

Shall see me clasp those blood-stained 
feet of His? 

He needs me, calls me, loves me: let me 
go!” 1856-7. 1870. 


For His feet 


ASPECTA MEDUSA 


(For a Drawing) 


ANDROMEDA, by Perseus saved and wed, 
Hankered each day to see the Gorgon’s 
head : 
Till o’er a fount he held it, bade her lean, 
And mirrored in the wave was safely 
seen 
That death she lived by. 
Let not thine eyes know 
Any forbidden thing itself, although 
It once should save as well as kill: but 
be 
Its shadow upon life enough for thee. 
1870. 


LOVE'S NOCTURN 


MASTER of the murmuring courts 
Where the shapes of sleep convene !— 
Lo! my spirit here exhorts 
All the powers of thy demesne 
For their aid to woo my queen. 
What reports 
Yield thy jealous courts unseen ? 


Vaporous, unaccountable, 
Dreamland lies forlorn of light, 
Hollow like a breathing shell. 
Ah! that from all dreams I might 
Choose one dreamand guide its flight ! 
IT know well | 
What her sleep should tell to-night. 


There the dreams are multitudes : 
Some that will not wait for sleep, 
Deep within the August woods ; 
Some that hum while rest may steep 


Weary labor laid a-heap ; 
Interludes, 
Some, of grieycus moods that weep. 


Poets’ fancies all are there: 
There the elf-girls flood with wings 
Valleys full of plaintive air ; 
There breathe perfumes; 
rings 
Whirl the foam-bewildered springs ; 
Siren there 
Winds her dizzy hair and sings. 


there in 


Thence the one dream mutually 
Dreamed in bridal unison, 

Less than waking ecstasy ; 
Half-formed visions that make moan 
In the house of birth alone ; 

And what we, 
At death’s wicket, see, unknown. 


But for mine own sleep, it lies 
In one gracious form’s control, 
Fair with honorable eyes, 
Lamps of a translucent soul ; 
O their glance is loftiest dole, 
Sweet and wise, 
Wherein Love descries his goal. 


Reft of her, my dreams are all 
Clammy trance that fears the sky: 
Changing footpaths shift and fall ; 
From polluted coverts nigh, 
Miserable phantoms sigh : 
Quakes the pall, 
And the funeral goes by. 


Master, is it soothly said 
That, as echoes of man’s speech 
Far in secret clefts are made, 
So do all men’s bodies reach 
Shadows o’er thy sunken beach,— 
Shape or shade 
In those halls portrayed of each? 


Ah! might I, by thy good grace 
Groping in the windy stair, 
(Darkness and the breath of space, 
Like loud waters everywhere), 
Meeting mine own image there 
Face to face, 
Send it from that place to her ! 


Nay, not I; but oh! do thou, 
Master, from thy shadow kind 
Call my body’s phantom now: 
Bid it bear its face declin’d 
Till its flight her slumbers find, 
And her brow 
Feel its presence bow like wind. 


RUSSEL 


oe 


s ° 

Where in groves the gracile Spring 

Trembles, with mute orison 
Confidently strengthening, 

Water’s voice and wind’s as one 

Shed an echo in the sun. 

Soft as Spring, 
Master, bid it sing and moan. 


Song shall tell how glad and strong 
Is the night she soothes alway ; 
Moan shall grieve with that parched 
tongue 
Of the brazen hours of day : 
Sounds as of the springtide they, 
Moan and song, 
While the chill months long for May. 


Not the prayers which with all leave 
The world’s fluent woes prefer,— 
Not the praise the world doth give, 
Dulcet fulsome whisperer ;— 
Let it yield my love to her, 
And achieve 
Strength that shall not grieve or err. 


Wheresoe’er my dreams befall, 
Both at night-watch (let it say), 
And where round the sun-dial 
The reluctant hours of day, 
Heartless, hopeless of their way, 
Rest and eall; 
There her glance doth fall and stay. 


Suddenly her face is there ; 
So do mounting vapors wreathe 
Subtle-scented transports where 
The black fir-wood sets its teeth. 
Part the boughs and look beneath,— 
Lilies share 
Secret waters there, and breathe. 


Master, bid my shadow bend 
Whispering thus till birth of light, 
Lest new shapes that sleep may send 
Scatter all its work to flight ;— 
Master, master of the night, 
Bid it spend 
Speech, song, prayer, and end aright. 


Yet, ah me! if at her head 
There another phantom lean 
Murmuring o’er the fragrant bed,— 
Ah! and if my spirit’s queen 
Smile those alien words between,— 
Ah! poor shade ! 
Shall it strive, or fade unseen ? 


How should love’s own messenger 
Strive with love and be love’s foe? 
Master, nay! If thus, in her, 


787 


Sleep a wedded heart should show,— 
Silent let mine image go, 

Its old share 
Of thy spell-bound air to know. 


Like a vapor wan and mute, 
Like a flame, so let it pass ; 
One low sigh across her lute, 
One dull breath against her glass; 
And to my sad soul, alas! 
One salute 
Cold as when death’s foot shall pass. 


Then, too, let all hopes of mine, 
All vain hopes by night and day, 
Slowly at thy summoning sign 
Rise up pallid and obey. 
Dreams, if this is thus, were they :— 
Be they thine, 
And to dreamworld pine away. 


Yet from old time, life, not death, 
Master, in thy rule is rife: 
Lo! through thee, with mingling breath, 
Adam woke beside his wife. 
O Love bring me so, for strife, 
Force and faith, 
Bring me so not death but life! 


Yea, to Love himself is pour’d 
This frail song of hope and fear. 
Thou art Love, of one accord 
With kind Sleep to bring her near, 
Still-eyed, deep-eyed, ah how dear ! 
Master, Lord, 
In her name implor’d,O hear! 1870. 
FIRST LOVE REMEMBERED 


PEACE in her chamber, wheresoe’er 
It be, a holy place : 
The thought still brings my soul such 
_ grace 
As morning meadows wear. 


Whether it still be small and light, 

A maid’s who dreams alone, 

As from her orchard-gate the moon 
Its ceiling showed at night: 


Or whether, in a shadow dense 
As nuptial hymns invoke, 
Innocent maidenhood awoke 

To married innocence : 


There still the thanks unheard await 
The unconscious gift bequeathed ; 
For there my soul this hour has 

breathed 


An air inviolate. 1870. 


788 


PLIGHTED PROMISE 


IN a soft-complexioned sky, 
Fleeting rose and kindling gray, 
Have you seen Aurora fly 
At the break of day ? 
So my maiden, so my plighted may 
Blushing cheek and gleaming eye 
Lifts to look my way. 


Where the inmost leaf is stirred 
With the heart-beat of the grove, 
Have you heard a hidden bird 
Cast her note above ? 
So my lady, so my lovely love, 
Echoing Cupid’s prompted word, 
Makes a tune thereof. 


Have you seen, at heaven’s mid-height, 
In the moon-rack’s ebb and tide, * 
Venus leap forth burning white, 
Dian pale and hide? 
So my bright breast-jewel, so my bride, 
One sweet night, when fear takes 
flight, 
Shall leap against my side. 1870. 


SUDDEN LIGHT 


I HAVE been here before, 
But when or how I cannot tell : 
I know the grass beyond the door, 
The sweet keen smell, 
The sighing sound, the lights around 
the shore. 


You have been mine before,— 
How long ago I may not know: 
But just when at that swallow’s soar 
Your neck turned so, 
Some veil did fall,—I knew it all of yore. 


Has this been thus before ? 
And shall not thus time’s eddying 
flight 
Still with our lives our loves restore 
In death’s despite, 
And day and night yield one delight 
once more? 1870. 


THE WOODSPURGE 


THE wind flapped loose, the wind was 
still, 

Shaken out dead from tree and hill: 

I had walked on at the wind’s will,— 

I sat now, for the wind was still. 


Between my knees my forehead was,— 
My lips, drawn in, said not Alas! 


BRIIGSHe POLS 


My hair was over in the grass, 
My naked ears heard the day pass. 


My eyes, wide open, had the run 

Of some ten weeds to fix upon ; 

Among those few, out of the sun, 

The woodspurge flowered, three cups in 
one, 


From perfect grief there need not be 
Wisdom or even memory : 

One thing then learnt remains to me,— 
The woodspurge has acup of three. 1870. 


THE HONEYSUCKLE 


I PLUCKED a honeysuckle where 
The hedge on high is quick with thorn, 
And climbing for the prize, was torn, 
And fouled my feet in quag-water ; 
And by the thorns and by the wind 
The blossom that I took was thinn’d 
And yet I found it sweet and fair. 


Thence to a richer growth I came, 
Where, nursed in mellow intercourse, 
The honeysuckles sprang by scores, 

Not harried like my single stem, 

All virgin lamps of scent and dew. 
So from my hand that first I threw, 
Yet plucked not any more of them, 1870. 


A LITTLE WHILE 


A LITTLE while a little love 
The hour yet bears for thee and me 
Who have not drawn the veil to see 
If still our heaven be lit above. 
Thou merely, at the day’s last sigh, 
Hast felt thy soul prolong the tone, 
And I have heard the night-wind cry 
And deemed its speech mine own. 


A little while a little love 
The scattering autumn hoards for us 
Whose bower is not yet ruinous 
Nor quite unleaved our songless grove. 
Only across the shaken boughs 
We hear the flood-tides seek the sea, 
And deep in both our hearts they rouse 
One wail for thee and me. 


A little while a little love 
May yet be ours who have not said 
The word it makes our eyes afraid 
To know that each is thinking of. 
Not yet the end: be our lips dumb 
In smiles a little season yet: 
Ill tell thee, when the end is come, 


How we may best forget. 1870. 


ROSSETTI 789 





TROY TOWN 


HEAVENBORN HELEN, Sparta’s queen, 
(O Troy Town!) 
Had two breasts of heavenly sheen, 


The sun and moon of the heart’s desire : 


All Love’s lordship lay between. 
~(O Troy’s down, 
Tall Troy’s on fire !) 


Helen knelt at Venus’ shrine, 
(O Troy Town !) 

Saying ‘A little gift is mine, 

A little gift fora heart’s desire. 

Hear me speak and make me a sign! 
(O Troy’s down, 
Tall Troy's on fire !) 


** Look, I bring thee a carven cup; 
(O Troy Town !) 
See it here as I hold it up,— 
Shaped it is to the heart's desire, 
Fit to fill when the gods would sup. 
(O Troy's down, 
Tall Troy's on fire !) 


‘* It was moulded like my breast ; 
(O Troy Town !) 

He that sees it may not rest, 

Rest at all for his heart’s desire. 

O give ear to my heart’s behest ! 
(O Troy’s down, 
Tall Troy's on fire!) 


‘* See my breast, how like it is; 
(O Troy Town !) 
See it bare for the air to kiss! 
Is the cup to thy heart’s desire ? 
O for the breast, O make it his! 
(O Troy's down, 
Tall Troy’s on fire !) 


‘** Yea, for my bosom here I sue: 

(O Troy Town !) 
Thou must give it where ’t is due, 
Give it there to the heart’s desire. 
Whom do I give my bosom to? 

(O Troy’s down, 

Tall Troy’s‘on fire /) 


‘¢ Hach twin breast is an apple sweet ! 
(O Troy Town !) 
Once an apple stirred the beat 
Of thy heart with the heart’s desire : 
Say, who brought it then to thy feet ? 
(O Troy’s down, 
Tall Troy’s on fire /) 


*¢ They that claimed it then were three : 


(O Troy Town !) 
For thy sake two hearts did he 


Make forlorn of the heart’s desire. 

Do for him as he did for thee! 
(O Troy’s down, 
Tall Troy's on fire !) 


‘* Mine are apples grown to the south, 
(O Troy Town !) 
Grown to taste in the days of drouth, 
Taste and waste to the heart’s desire : 
Mine are apples meet for his mouth !” 
(O Troy’s down, 
Tall Troy’s on fire !) 


Venus looked on Helen’s gift, 

(O Troy Town !) 
Looked and smiled with subtle drift, 
Saw the work of her heart’s desire :— 
‘* There thou kneel’st for Love to lift! ” 

(O Troy's down, 

Tall Troy’s on fire !) 


Venus looked in Helen’s face, 

(O Troy Town !» 
Knew far off an hour and place, 
And fire lit from the heart’s desire ; 
Laughed and said, ‘“‘Thy gift hath 

grace !,” 
(O Troy's down, 
Tall Troy's on fire !) 


Cupid looked on Helen’s breast, 
(O Troy Town /) 
Saw the heart within its nest, 
Saw the flame of the heart’s desire,— 
Marked his arrow’s burning crest. 
(O Troy’s down, 
Tall Troy’s on fire?) 


Cupid took another dart, 
(O Troy Town !) 
Fledged it for another heart, 
Winged the shaft with the heart’s desire, 
Drew the string and said, ‘‘ Depart ! ” 
(O Troy’s down, 
Tall Troy’s on fire !) 


Paris turned upon his bed, 

(O Troy Town!) 
Turned upon his bed and said, 
Dead at heart with the heart’s desire,— 
‘*O to clasp her golden head !” 

(O Troy’s down, 

Tall Troy’s on fire /) 

1870. 


THE STREAM’S SECRET 


WHAT thing unto mine ear 
Wouldst thou convey,—what secret 
thing, 
O wandering water ever whispering ? 


79° 


Surely thy speech shall be of her. 
Thou water, O thou whispering wan- 
derer, 
What message dost thou bring ? 


Say, hath not Love leaned low 
This hour beside thy far well-head, 
And there through jealous hollowed 
fingers said 
The thing that most I long to know,— 
Murmuring with curls all dabbled in thy 
flow 
And washed lips rosy red ? 


He told it to thee there 
Where thy voice hath a louder tone ; 
But where it welters to this little moan 
His will decrees ‘that I should hear. 
Now speak: for with the silence is no 
fear, 
And Iam all alone. 


Shall Time not still endow 
One hour with life, and I and she 
Slake in one kiss the thirst of memory ? 
Say, stream ; lest Love should disavow 
Thy service, and the bird upon the 
bough 
Sing first to tell it me. 


Nay, why 
I mind them 


What whisperest thou ? 
Name the dead hours? 
well. 

ghosts in many darkened door- 
ways dwell 

With desolate eyes to know them by. 
That hour must still be born ere it can 

die 
Of that I’d have thee tell. 


Their 


But hear, before thou speak ! 
Withhold, I pray, the vain behest 
That while the maze hath still its bower 
for quest 
My burning heart should cease to seek. 
Be sure that Love ordained for souls 
more meek 
His roadside dels of rest. 


Stream, when this silver thread 
In flood-time is a torrent brown, 
May any bulwark bind thy foaming 
crown ? 
Shall not the waters surge and spread 
And to the crannied boulders of their 
bed 
Still shoot the dead drift dye 


Let no rebuke find place 
In speech of thine: or it shall prove 


BRITISH“ ®&OsTsS 


That thou dost ill expound the words of 


Love. 
Even as thine eddy’s rippling race 
Would blur the perfect image of his face 
I will have none thereof, 


O learn and understand 
That ’gainst the wrongs himself did 
wreak 
Love sought her aid ; until her shad nny 
cheek 
And eyes beseeching gave command ; 
And compassed in her close COM Dera 
ate hand 
My heart must burn and speak. 


For then at last we spoke 
What eyes so oft had told to eyes 
Through that long-lingering silence 
whose half-sighs 
Alone the buried secret broke, 
Which with snatched hands and lips’ re- 
verberate stroke 
Then from the heart did rise. 


But she is far away 
Now; nor the hours of night grown 
hoar 
Bring yetto me, long gazing from the 
door, 
The wind-stirred robe of roseate gray 
And rose-crown of the hour that Jone 
the day 
When we shall meet once more. 


Dark as thy blinded wave 
When brimming midnight floods the 
glen,— 
Bright as the laughter of thy runnels 
when 
The dawn yields all the light they 
crave ; 
Even so these hours to wound and that 
to save 
Are sisters in Love’s ken. 


Oh sweet her bending grace 
Then when I kneel beside her feet ; 
And sweet her eyes’ o’erhanging 
heaven ; and sweet 
The gathering folds of her embrace ; 
And her fall’n hair at last shed round 
my face 
When breaths and tears shall meet. 


Beneath her sheltering hair, 
In the warm silence near her breast, 
Our kisses and our sobs shall sink to rest ; 
As in some still trance made aware 


ROSSETTI 





That day and night have wrought to 
fulness there 
And Love has built our nest. 


And as in the dim grove, 
When the rains cease that hushed 
them long, 
"Mid glistening boughs the song-birds 
wake to song,— 
So from our hearts deep-shrined in 


love, 
While the leaves throb beneath, around, 
above, 
The quivering notes shall throng. 


Till tenderest words found vain 
Draw back to wonder mute and deep, 
And closed lips in closed arms a silence 
keep, 
Subdued by memory’s circling strain,-- 
The wind-rapt sound that the wind 
brings again 
While all the willows weep. 


Then by her summoning art 
Shall memory conjure back the sere 
Autumnal Springs, from many a dying 


year 
Born dead ; and, bitter to the heart, 
The very ways where now we walk apart 
Who then shall cling so near. 


* And with each thought new-grown, 
Some sweet caress or some sweet name 
Low-breathed shall let me know her 
thought the same: 
Making me rich with every tone 
And touch of the dear heaven so long 
unknown 
That filled my dreams with flame. 


Pity and love shall burn 
In her pressed cheek and cherishing 
hands ; 
And from the living spirit of love that 
stands 
Between her lips to soothe and yearn, 
Each separate breath shall clasp me 
round in turn 
And loose my spirit’s bands. 


Oh passing sweet and dear, 
Then when the worshipped form and 
face 
Are felt at length in darkling close em- 
brace ; 
Round which so oft the sun shone clear, 
With mocking light and pitiless atmo- 
sphere, 
In many an hour and place. 


igs 


Ah me! with what proud growth 
Shall that hour’s thirsting race be run ; 
While, for each several sweetness still 
begun 
Afresh, endures love’s endless drouth ; 
Sweet hands, sweet hair, sweet cheeks, 
sweet eyes, sweet mouth, 
Kach singly wooed and won. 


Yet most with the sweet soul 
Shall love’s espousals then be knit ; 
What time the governing cloud sheds 
peace from it 
O’er tremulous wings that touch the ~ 
goal, 
And onthe unmeasured height of Love’s 
control 
The lustral fires are lit. 


Therefore, when breast and cheek 
Now part, from long embraces free,— 
Each on the other gazing shall but see 
A self that has no need to speak : 
All things unsought, yet nothing more 
to seek,— 
One love in unity. 


O water wandering past,— 
Albeit to thee I speak this thing, 

O water, thou that wanderest whispering, 
Thou keep’st thy counsel to the last. 
What spell upon thy bosom should Love 

cast, 
Its secret thence to wring ? 


Nay, must thou hear the tale 
Of the past days,—the heavy debt 
Of life that obdurate time withholds,— 
ere yet 
To win thine ear these prayers prevail, 
And by thy voice Love’s self with high 
All-hail 
Yield up the amulet ? 


How should all this be told ?— 


All the sad sum of wayworn days ;— 
Heart’s anguish in the impenetrable 


maze ; 
And on the waste uncolored wold 
The visible burthen of the sun grown 
cold 
And the moon’s laboring gaze? 


Alas! shall hope be nurs’d 
On life’s all-succoring breast in vain, 
And made so perfect only to be slain ? 
Or shall not rather the sweet thirst 
Even yet rejoice the heart with warmth 
dispers’d 
And strength grown fair again ? 


ie 


Stands it not by the door— 
Love’s Hour—till she and I shall meet 
With bodiless form and unapparent feet 
That cast no shadow yet before, 
Though round its head the dawn begins 
~to pour 
The breath that makes day sweet? 


Its eyes invisible 
Watch till the dial’s thin-thrown shade 
Be born,—yea, till the journeying line 
be laid 
Upon the point that wakes the spell, 
And there in lovelier light than tongue 
can tell 
Its presence stand array’d. 


Its soul remembers yet 
Those sunless hours that passed it by ; 
And still it hears the night’s disconso- 
late cry, 
And feels the branches wringing wet 
Cast on its brow, that may not once for- 


get, 
Dumb tears from the blind sky. 


But oh! when now her foot 
Draws near, for whose sake night and 





day 
Were long in weary longing sighed 
away, 
The hour of Love, ’mid airs grown 
mute 


Shall sing beside the door, and Love’s 
own lute 


Thrill to the passionate lay. 


Thou know’st, for Love has told 
Within thine ear, O stream, how soon 
That song shall lift its sweet appointed 
tune. 
O tell me, for my lips are cold, 
And in my veins the blood is waxing 
old 
Even while I beg the boon. 


So, in that hour of sighs 
Assuaged, shall we beside this stone 
Yield thanks for grace; while in thy 

mirror shown 
The twofold image softly lies, 
Until we kiss, and each in other’s eyes 
Is imaged all alone. 


Still silent? Can no art 
Of Love’s then move thy pity? Nay, 
To thee let nothing come that owns his 
sway : 
Let happy lovers have no part 


BRITISH POETS 


With thee; nor even so sad and poor a 


heart 
As thou hast spurned to-day. 
To-day? Lo! night is here. 


The glen grows heavy with some veil 
Risen from the earth or fall’n to make 
earth pale ; 
And all stands hushed to eye and ear, 
Until the night-wind shake the shade 
like fear 
And every covert quail. 


Ah! by another wave 
On other airs the hour must come 
Which to thy heart, my love, shall call 
me home. 
Between the lips of the low cave 
Against that night the lapping waters 
lave, 
And the dark lips are dumb. 


But there Love’s self doth stand, 
And with Life’s weary wings far flown, 
And with Death’s eyes that make the 
water moan, 
Gathers the water in his hand: 
And they that drink know nought of 
sky or land’ 
But only love alone. 


O soul-sequestered face 
Far off,—O were that night but now ! 
So even beside that stream even I and 
thou 
Through thirsting lips should draw 
Love’s grace, 
And in the zone of that supreme embrace 
Bind aching breast and brow. 


O water whispering 
Still through the dark into mine ears,— 
As with mine eyes, is it not now with 
hers ?— 
Mine eyes that add to thy cold spring, 
Wan water, wandering water weltering, 
This hidden tide of tears. 1870. 


LOVE-LILY 


BETWEEN the hands, between the brows, 
Between the lips of Love-Lily, 

A spirit is born whose birth endows 
My blood with fire to burn through 

me ; 

Who breathes upon my gazing eyes, 
Who laughsand murmurs in mine ear, 

At whose least touch my color flies, 
And whom my life grows faint to hear. 


ROSSETTI 





Within the voice, within the heart, 
Within the mind of Love-Lily, 
A spirit is born who lifts apart 
His tremulous wings and looks at me ; 
Who on my mouth his finger lays, 
And shows, while whispering lutes 
confer, 
That Eden of Love’s watered ways 
Whose winds and spirits worship her. 


Brows, hands, and lips, heart, mind, 
and voice, 
Kisses and words of Love-Lily,— 
Oh! bid me with your joy rejoice 
Till riotous longing rest in me! 
Ah! let not hope be still distraught, 
But find in her its gracious goal, 
Whose speech Truth knows not from 
her thought 
Nor Love her body from her soul. 
1870. 


THE HOUSE OF LIFE 
THE SONNET 


A Sonnet is a moment’s monument,— 

Memorial from the Soul’s eternity 

To one dead deathless hour. Look that 
it be, 

Whether for lustral rite or dire portent, 

Of its own arduous fulness reverent : 

Carve it in ivory or in ebony, 

As Day or Night may rule; and let 
Time see 

Its flowering crest impearled and orient. 

A Sonnet is a coin: its face reveals 

The Soul,—its converse, to what Power 
tis due :—— 

Whether for tribute to the august appeals 

Of Life, or dower in Love's high retinue, 

It serve; or ’mid the dark wharf’s cav- 
ernous breath. 

In Charon’s palm it pay the toll to 
Death. 


PART I. YOUTH AND CHANGE 
I. LOVE ENTHRONED 


I MARKED all kindred Powers the heart 
finds fair :— 

Truth, with awed lips ; and Hope, with 
eyes upcast ; 

And Fame, whose loud wings fan the 
ashen Past 

To signal-fires, ObJivion’s flight to scare ; 

And pat, with still some single golden 

air 


793 


Unto his shoulder clinging, since the 
last 

Embrace wherein two sweet arms held 
him fast ; 

And Life, still wreathing flowers for 
Death to wear. 

Love’s throne was not with these; but 
far above 

All passionate wind of welcome and 
farewell 

He sat in breathless bowers they dream 
not of ; 

Though Truth foreknow Love’s heart, 
and Hope foretell, 

And Fame be for Love’s sake desirable, 

And Youth be dear, and Life be sweet 
to Love. 


II. BRIDAL BIRTH 


As when desire, long darkling, dawns, 


and first 

The mother looks upon the new-born 
child, 

Even so my Lady stood at gaze and 
smiled 


When her soul knew at length the Love 
if nurs’d. 
Born with her life, creature of poignant 


thirst 

And exquisite hunger, at her heart 
Love lay 

Quickening in darkness, till a voice that 
day 


Cried on him, and the bonds of birth 
were burst. 

Now, shadowed by his wings, our faces 
yearn 

Together, as his fullgrown feet now 
range 

The grove, and his warm hands our 
couch prepare : 

Till to his song our bodiless souls in turn 

Be born his children, when Death’s nup- 
tial change 

Leaves us for light the halo of his hair. 


III. LOVE’S TESTAMENT 


O THOU who at Love’s hour ecstatically 
Unto my heart dost ever more present, 
Clothed with his fire, thy heart his tes- 


tament ; 
Whom Ihave neared and felt thy breath 
to be 


The inmost incense of his sanctuary ; 

Who without speech hast owned him, 
and, intent 

Upon his will, thy life with mine _ hast 
blent, 


To 


BRITISH’ POETS 





And murmured, ‘‘lam thine, thou ‘rt 
one with me!” 

O what from thee the grace, to me the 
prize, 

And what to Love the glory,—when the 
whole 

Of the deep stair thou tread’st to the 
dim shoal 

And weary water of the place of sighs, 

And there -dost work deliverance, as 
thine eyes 

Draw up my prisoned spirit to thy soul ! 


IV. LOVESIGHT 


WHEN do I see thee most, beloved one? 

When in the light the spirits of mine eyes 

Before thy face, their altar, solemnize 

The worship of that Love through thee 
made known ? 

Or when in the dusk hours, 
alone, ) 

Close-kissed and eloquent of still replies 

Thy twilight-hidden glimmering visage 
lies, 

And my soul only sees thy soul its own? 

O love, my love! if I no more should see 

Thyself, nor on the earth the shadow of 
thee, 

Nor image of thine eyes in any spring,— 

How then should sound upon Life’s 
darkening slope 

The ground-whirl of the perished leaves 
of Hope, 

The wind of Death’s imperishable wing ? 


(we two 


V. HEART’S HOPE 


By what word’s power, the key of paths 
untrod, 

Shall] I the difficult deeps of Love explore, 

Till parted waves of Song yield up the 
shore 

Even as that sea which Israel crossed 
dryshod ? 

For lo! in some poor rhythmic period, 

Lady, I fain would tell how evermore 

Thy soul I know not from thy body, nor 

Thee from myself, neither our love from 
God. 

Yea, in God’s name, and Love’s, and 
thine, would I 
from one 

evidence 

As to all hearts all things shall signify ; 

Tender as dawn’s first hill-fire, and in- 
tense 

As instantaneous penetrating sense, 

In Spring’s birth-hour, of other Springs 
gone by. 


Draw loving heart such 


VII. LOVE'S LOVERS 


SoME ladies love the jewels in Love’s 
ZONE 

And gold-tipped darts he hath for pain- 
less play 

In idle scornful hours he flings away ; 

And some that listen to his lute’s soft 
tone 

Do love to vaunt the silver praise their 
own ; 

Some prize his blindfold sight; and 
there be they 

Who kissed his wings which brought 
him yesterday 

And thank his wings to-day that he is 
flown. 

My lady only loves the heart of Love: 

Therefore Love’s heart, my lady, hath 
for thee 

His bower of unimagined flower and 
tree : 

There kneels he now, and all-anhun- 
gered of 

Thine eyes gray-lit in shadowing hair 
above, 

Seals with thy mouth his immortality. 


IX. PASSION AND WORSHIP 


ONE flame-winged brought a white- 
winged harp-player 

Even where my lady and I lay all alone ; 

Saying : ‘‘ Behold, this minstrel is un- 
known ; 

Bid him depart, for I am minstrel here: 

Only my strains are to Love’s dear ones 
dear.” 

Then said I: ‘‘ Through thine hautboy’s 
rapturous tone 

Unto my lady still this harp makes 
moan, 

And still she deems the cadence deep 
and clear.” 

Then said my lady: ‘*‘ Thou art Passion 
of Love, 

And this’ Love’s Worship : 
plights to me. 

Thy mastering music walks the sunlit 
sea : 

But where wan water trembles in the 
grove 

And the wan moon is all the light there- 
of, 

This harp still makes my name its vol- 
untary.” 


both he 


X. THE PORTRAIT 


O Lorp of all compassionate control, 
O Love ! let this my lady’s picture glow 


ROSSETTI 


Under my hand to praise her name, and 
show 

Even of her inner self the perfect whole: 

That he who seeks her beauty’s furthest 
goal, 

Beyond the light that the sweet glances 
throw 

And refluent wave of the sweet smile, 
may know 

The very sky and sea-line of her soul. 

Lo! itis done. Above the enthroning 


throat 

The mouth’s mould testifies of voice and 
kiss 

The shadowed eyes remember and fore- 
see. 

Her face is made her shrine. Let all men 
note 

That in all years (O Love, thy gift is 
this !) 

They that would look on her must come 
to me. 


XI. THE LOVE-LETTER 


WARMED by her hand and shadowed by 
her hair 

As close she leaned and poured her heart 
through thee, 

Whereof the articulate throbs accom- 
pan 

The smooth black stream that makes thy 
whiteness fair,— 

Sweet fluttering sheet, 
breath aware,— 

Oh let thy silent song disclose to me 

That soul wherewith her lips and eyes 
agree 

Like married music in Love’s answering 
air. 

Fain had I watched her when, at some 
fond thought, 


even of her 


Her bosom to the writing closelier 
press’d, 

And her breast’s secrets peered into her 
breast ; 


When, through eyes raised an instant, 
her soul sought 
My soul, and from the sudden confluence 
caught 
The words that made her love the love- 
liest. 


XII. THE LOVERS’ WALK 


SWEET twining hedgeflowers wind-stir- 
red in no wise 

On this June day ; and hand that clings 
in hand :— 





195 

Still glades ; and meeting faces scarcely 
faniw’d : 

An osier-odored stream that draws the 
skies 

Deep to its heart ; and mirrored eyes in 
eyes :— 

Fresh hourly wonder o’er the Summer 
land 

Of light and cloud ; and two souls softly 
spann’d 

With one o’erarching heaven of smiles 
and sighs :— 

Even such their path, whose bodies lean 
unto 

Each other’s visible sweetness amor- 
ously — 

Whose passionate hearts lean by Love’s 
high decree 

Together on his heart for ever true, 
As the cloud-foaming firmamental blue 
Rests on the blue line of a foamless sea, 
XIII. YOUTH’S ANTIPHONY 
‘* T LOVE you, sweet: how can you ever 
learn 

How much I love you?” 
even So, 

And so I learn it.” 
not know 

How fair you are.” 
earn 

Your love, so much is all my love’s con- 
cern.” 

‘* My love grows hourly, sweet.” ‘‘ Mine 
too doth grow, 

Yet love seemed full so 
ago!” 

Thus lovers speak, till kisses claim their 
turn. 

Ah! happy they to whom such words as 
these 

In youth have served for speech the 
whole day long, 

Hour after hour, remote from the world’s 
throng, 

Work, contest, fame, all lfe’s confe- 
derate pleas,— 

What while Love breathed in sighs and 
silences 

Through two blent souls one rapturous 
undersong. 


‘¢ You I love 
‘* Sweet, you can- 


‘* Tf fair enough to 


many hours 


XIV. YOUTH’S SPRING-TRIBUTE 

On this sweet bank your head thrice 
sweet and dear 

Ilay, and spread your hair on either 
side, 


796 


BRITISH POETS 





And see the newborn woodflowers bash- 
ful-eyed 

Look through the golden tresses here 
and there. 

On these debateable borders of the year 

Spring’s foot half falters ; scarce she yet 
may know 

The leafless blackthorn-blossom from 
the snow ; 

And through her bowers the wind’s way 
still is clear. 

But April's sun strikes down the glades 
to-day ; 

So Se eyes upturned, and feel my 
<1ss 

Creep, as the Spring now thrills through 
every spray, 

Up your warm throat to your warm 
lips; for this 

Is even the hour of Love’s sworn suit- 
service, 

With whom cold hearts are 
castaway. 


counted 


XV. THE BIRTH-BOND 


HAVE you not noted, in some family 

Where two were born of a first marriage- 
bed, 

How still they own their gracious bond, 
though fed 

And nursed on the forgotten breast and 


knee ?— 

How to their father’s children they shall 
be 

In act and thought of one goodwill; but 
each 

Shall for the other have, in silence 


speech, 

And in a word complete community ? 

Even so, when first I saw you, seemed 
it, love, 

That among souls allied to mine was yet 

One nearer kindred than life hinted of. 

O born with me somewhere that men 
forget, 

And though in years of sight and sound 
unmet, * 

Known for my soul’s birth-partner well 
enough ! 


XVII. BEAUTY’S PAGEANT 


WHat dawn-pulse at the heart of heaven, 
or last 

Incarnate flower of culminating day,— 

What marshalled marvels on the skirts 
of May, 

Or song full-quired, sweet June's enco- 
miast ; 


What glory of change by nature’s hand 
amass’d 

Can vie with all those moods of varying 
grace 

Which o’er one loveliest woman’s form 
and face 

Within this hour, 
have pass’d ? 

Love’s very vesture and elect disguise 

Was each fine movement,—wonder new- 
begot 

Of lily or swan or swan-stemmed galiot ; 

Joy to his sight who now the sadlier 
sighs, 

Parted again, and sorrow yet for eyes 

Unborn, that read these words and saw 
her not. 


within this room, 


XVIII. GENIUS IN BEAUTY 

BEAUTY like hers is genius. Not the call 

Of Homer’s or of Dante’s heart sub- 
lime,— 

Not Michael’s hand furrowing the zones 
of time,— 

Is more with compassed mysteries musi- 
cal ; 

Nay, not in Spring’s or Summer’s sweet 
footfall 

More gathered gifts exuberant Life be- 
queathes 

Than doth this sovereign face, whose 
love-spell breathes 

Even from its shadowed contour on the 
wall. 

As many men are poets in their youth, 

But for one sweet-strung soul the wires 
prolong 

Even through all change the indomi- 
table song ; 

So in like wise the envenomed years, 
whose tooth 

Rends shallower grace with ruin void of 
ruth, 

Upon this beauty’s power shall wreak 
no wrong. 

XIX. SILENT NOON 

Your hands lie open in the long, fresh 
grass ,— 

The finger-points look through like rosy 
blooms: 

Your eyes smile peace. 
gleams and glooms 

’Neath billowing skies that scatter and 
amass. 

All round our nest, far as the eye can 
pass, 


The pasture 


ROSSETTI 


Lah 





Are golden kingcup-fields with silver 
edge 

- Where the cow-parsley skirts the haw- 
thorn hedge. 

*T is visible silence, still as the hour- 
glass. 

Deep in the sun-searched growths the 
dragon-fly 

Hangs like a blue thread loosened from 
the sky,— 

So this wing’d hour is dropped to us 
from above. 

Oh! clasp we to our hearts, for death- 
less dower, 


This close-companioned inarticulate 
hour 

When twofold silence was the song of 
love. 

XXI. LOVE-SWEETNESS 

SWEET dimness of her loosened hair’s 
downfall 

About thy face; her sweet hands round 
thy head 


In gracious fostering union garlanded ; 

Her tremulous smiles; her glances’ 
sweet recall 

Of love; her murmuring sighs memo- 


rial ; 

Her mouth’s culled sweetness by thy 
kisses shed 

On ee and neck and eyelids, and so 
e 

Back to her mouth, which answers there 
for all :— 

What sweeter than these things, except 
the thing 

In lacking which all these would lose 
their sweet :— 

The confident heart’s still fervor: the 


swift beat 

And soft subsidence of the spirit’s 
wing, 

Then when it feels, in cloud-girt way- 
faring, 

The breath of kindred plumes against 
its feet ? 

XXIV. PRIDE OF YOUTH 


EVEN as a child, of sorrow that we give 

The dead, but little in his heart can 
find, 

Since without need of thought to his 
clear mind 

Their turn it is to die and his to live :— 

Even so the winged New Love smiles to 
receive 


Along his eddying plumes the auroral 
wind, 

Nor, forward glorying, casts one look 
behind 

Where night-rack shrouds the Old Love 
fugitive. 

There is a change in every hour’s recall, 

And the last cowslip in the fields we see 

On the same day with the first corn- 
poppy. 

Alas for hourly change! Alas for all 

The loves that from his hand proud 
Youth lets fall, 

Even as the beads of a told rosary ! 


XXXVI. MID-RAPTURE 


THOU lovely and beloved, thou my love ; 

Whose kiss seems still the first ; whose 
summoning eyes, 

Even now, as for our love-world’s new 


sunrise, 

Shed very dawn; whose voice, attuned 
above 

All modulation of the deep-bowered 
dove 


’ 
Is like a hand laid softly on the soul ; 
Whose hand is like a sweet voice to con- 
trol 
Those worn tired brows it hath the keep- 
ing of :— 
What word can answer to thy word— 
what gaze 
To thine, which now absorbs within its 
: sphere 
My worshipping face, till I am mirrored 
there 
Light-circled in a heaven of deep-drawn 
rays? 
What clasp, what kiss mine inmost heart 
can prove, 
O lovely and beloved, O my love? 


XXVII. HEART’S COMPASS 

SOMETIMES thou seem’st not as thyself 
alone, 

But asthe meaning of all things that 
are ; . 

A breathless wonder, shadowing forth 
afar 

Some heavenly solstice hushed and _ hal- 
cyon ; 

Whose unstirred lips are music’s visible 
tone ; 

Whose eyes the sun-gate of the soul 
unbar, 


Being of its furthest fires oracular — 
The evident heart of all life sown and 
mown. 





BRITISH POETS 





Even such love is; and is not thy name 
Love? 

Yea, by thy hand the Love-god rends 
apart 

All gathering clouds of Night’s ambigu- 
ous art ; 

Flings them far down, and sets thine 
eyes above ; 

And simply, as some gage of flower or 
glove, 

Stakes with a smile the world against 
thy heart. 

XXXI. HER GIFTS 

HIGH grace, the dower of queens; and 
therewithal 

Some wood-born wonder’s sweet sim- 
plicity ; 

A glance like water brimming with the 

Or hyacinth-light where forest-shadows 
fall ; 

Such thrilling pallor of cheek as doth 
enthral] 

The heart ; a mouth whose passionate 
forms imply 

All music and all silence held thereby ; 

Deep golden locks, her sovereign coronal; 

A round reared neck, meet column of 
Love’s shrine 

To cling to when the heart takes sanc- 
tuary ; 

Hands which for ever at Love’s bidding 


e, 

And soft-stirred feet still answering to 
his sign : — 

These are her gifts, as tongue may tell 
them o’er. 

Breathe low her name, 
that means more. 


my soul; for 


XXXII. EQUAL TROTH 

NoT by one measure mayst thou mete 
our love 

For how should I be loved as I love thee ?-— 

I, graceless, joyless, lacking absolutely 

All gifts that with thy queenship best 
behove ;— 

Thou, throned in every heart’s elect al- 
cove, 

And crowned with garlands culled from 
every tree, 

Which for no head but thine, by Love’s 
decree, 

All beauties and all mysteries interwove. 

But here thine eyes and lips yield soft 
rebuke :— 


‘Then only,” (say’st thou) ‘*‘could I 
love thee less, 
When thou couldst doubt my = love’s - 


equality.” 

Peace, sweet! If not to sum but worth 
we look, 

Thy heart’s transcendence, not my heart’s 
excess,— 

Then more a thousandfold thou lov’st 
than I. 

XXXIII. VENUS VICTRIX 

CduLD Juno’s self more sovereign pres- 
ence wear 

Than thou, ’mid other ladies throned 


in grace ?— 

Or Pallas, when thou bend’st with soul- 
stilled face 

O’er poet’s page gold- -shadowed in thy 
hair ? 

Dost yeu than Venus seem less heavenly 

air 

When o’er the sea of love’s tumultuous 
trance 

Hovers thy smile, and mingles with 
thy glance 

That sweet voice like the last wave mur- 
muring there ? 

Before such triune loveliness divine > 

Awestruck I ask, which goddess here 
most claims 

The prize that, howsoe’er adjudged, is 
thine ? 

Then Love breathes low the sweetest of 
thy names ; 

And Nenu Victrix to my heart doth 

rin 
Herself, the Helen of her guerdoning. 


XXXIV. THE DARK GLASS 


Not I myself know all my love for thee : 

How should I reach so far, who cannot 
weigh 

To-morrow’s dower by gage of yesterday ? 

Shall birth and death, and all dark names 
that be 

As doors and windows bared to some 
loud sea, 

Lash deaf mine ears and blind my face 
with spray ; 

And shall my sense pierce love,—the 
last relay 

And ultimate outpost of eternity ? 

Lo! what am I to Love, the lord of all? 

One murmuring shell he gathers from 
the sand, 

One little heart- flame sheltered in his 
hand, 


ROSSETTI 


Yet through thine eyes he grants me 
clearest call 

And veriest touch of powers primordial 

That any hour-girt life may understand. 


XL. SEVERED SELVES 


Two separate divided silences, 

Which, brought together, would find 
loving voice ; 

‘Two glances which together would re- 
joice 

In love, now lost like stars beyond dark 
trees ; 

Two hands apart whose touch alone gives 
ease ; 

Two bosoms which, heart-shrined with 
mutual flame, 

Would, meeting in one clasp, be made 
the same ; 

Two souls, the shores wave-mocked of 
sundering seas :— 

Such are we now. Ah! may our hope 
forecast 

Indeed one hour again, when on this 
stream 

Of darkened love once more the light 
shall gleam ?— 

An hour how slow to come, how weedy 

ast,— 

Which blooms and fades, and only leaves 
at last, 

Faint as shed flowers, the attenuated 
dream. 


XLI. THROUGH DEATH TO LOVE 


LIKE labor-laden moonclouds faint to flee 

From winds that sweep the winter- 
bitten wold,— 

Like multiform circumfluence manifold 

Of night’s flood-tide,—like terrors that 
agree 

Of hoarse-tongued fire and inarticulate 
sea,— 

Even such, within some glass dimmed 
by our breath, 

Our hearts discern wild images of Death, 

Shadows and shoals that edge eternity. 

Howbeit athwart Death’s imminent 
shade doth soar 

One Power, than flow of stream or flight 
of dove 

Sweeter to glide around, to brood above. 

Tell me, my heart,—what angel-greeted 
door 

Or threshold of wing-winnowed thresh- 
ing-floor 

Hath guest fire-fledged as thine, whose 
lord is Love ? 


799 


XLVI. DEATH-IN-LOVE 


THERE came an image in Life’s retinue 

That had Love’s wings and bore his 
gonfalon : 

Fair was the web, and nobly wrought 
thereon, 

O soul-sequestered face, thy form and 
hue ! 

Bewildering sounds, 
wakens to, 

Shook in its folds; 
heart its power 

Sped trackless asthe immemorable hour 

When birth’s dark portal groaned and 
all was new. 

Buta veiled woman followed, and she 
caught 

The banner round its staff, to furl and 
cling,— 

Then plucked a feather from the bearer’s 
wing, 

And held it to his lips that stirred it not, 

And said to me, ‘‘ Behold, there is no 
breath : 

Tand this Love 


such as Spring 


and through my 


are one, and Iam Death.” 


XLIX. WILLOWWOOD—I 


I SAT with Love upon a woodside well, 

Leaning across the water, I and he ; 

Nor ever did he speak nor looked at me, 

But touched his lute wherein was audible 

The certain secret thing he had to tell: 

Only our mirrored eyes met silently 

In the low wave; and that sound came 
to be 

The passionate voice I knew; and my 
tears fell. 

And at their fall, his eyes beneath grew 


hers ; 

And with his foot and with his wing- 
feathers 

He swept the spring that watered my 
heart’s drouth. 

Then the dark ripples spread to waving 
hair, 

And as I stooped, her own lips rising 
there 

Bubbled with brimming kisses at my 
mouth. 


Tica WW LOW WOOD Tt 


AND now Love sang: but his was such 
a song, 

So meshed with half-remembrance hard 
to free, 

As souls disused in death’s sterility 

May sing when the new birthday tarries 
long. 


8007 


BRITISH “POETS 





And I was made aware of a dumb throng 

That stood aloof, one form by every tree, 

Ali mournful forms, for each was I or she, 

The shades of those our days that had 
no tongue. 

They looked on us, and knew us and 
were known ; 

While fast together, alive from the abyss, 

Clung the soul-wrung implacable close 
kiss ; 

And pity of self through 
broken moan 

Which said, ‘‘ For once, for once, for 
once alone!” 

And still Love sang, and what he sang 
was this :— 


all made 


LI. WILLOW WOOD—III 


‘‘O YE, all ye that walk in Willowwood, 

That walk with hollow faces burning 

white ; 

fathom-depth of 

widowhood, 

What long, what longer hours, one life- 
long night, 

Ere ye again, who so in vain have wooed 

Your last hope lost, who so in vain invite 

Your lips to that their unforgotten food, 

Ere ye, ere ye again shall see the light ! 

Alas! the bitter banks in Willowwood, 

With tear-spurge wan, with blood-wort 
burning red: 

Alas! if ever such a pillow could 

Steep deep the soul in sleep till she were 
dead ,— 

Better all life forget her than this thing, 

That Willowwood should hold her wan- 
dering !” 


What soul-struck 


LI. WILLOWWOOD—IV 


So sang he: and as meeting rose and 
rose 

Together cling through the wind’s well- 
away 

Nor change at once, yet near the end of 
day 

The leaves. drop loosened where the 
heart-stain glows,— 

So when the song died did the kiss un- 
close ; 

And her face fell back drowned, and was 
as gray ; 

As its gray eyes; and if it ever may 

Meet mine again I know not if Love 
knows. 

Only I know that I leaned low and drank 

A long draught from the water where 
she sank, 


Her oe and all her tears and all her 
soul : 

And as I leaned, I know I felt Love’s 
face 

Pressed on my neck with moan of pity 
and grace, 

Till both our heads were in his aureole. 


LIII. WITHOUT HER 


WHat of her glass without her? The 
blank gray 

There where the pool is blind of the 
moon’s face. 

Her dress. without her? 
empty space 

Of cloud-rack whence the moon has 
passed away. 

Her paths without her? Day’s appointed 
sway 

Usurped by desolate night. Her pil- 
lowed place 

Without her? Tears, ah me! for love’s 
good grace, 

And cold forgetfulness of night or day. 

What of the heart without her? Nay, 
poor heart, 

Of thee what word remains ere speech 
be still? 

A wayfarer by barren ways and chill, 

Steep ways and weary, without her thou 
art, 

Where the long cloud, the long wood’s 
counterpart, 

Sheds doubled darkness up the laboring 
hill. 


The tossed 


LV. STILLBORN LOVE 


THE hour which might have been yet 
might not be, 

Which man’s and woman’s heart con- 
ceived and bore 

Yet whereof life was barren,—on what 


shore 

Bides it the breaking of Time’s weary 
sea ? 

Bondchild of all consummate joys set 
free, 


It somewhere sighs and serves, and 
mute before 

The house of Love, hears through the 
echoing door 

His hours elect in choral consonancy. 

But lo! what wedded souls now hand in 
hand 

Together tread at last the immortal 
strand 

With eyes where burning memory lights 
love home ? 


ROSSETTI. 


Lo! how the little outcast hour has 
turned 
And leaped to them and in their faces 
yearned :— 
‘*‘Tam your child: O parents, ye have 
come !”- 
LVI. TRUE WOMAN—I. HERSELF 


To be a sweetness more desired than 
Spring ; 

A bodily beauty more acceptable 

Than the wild rose-tree’s arch that 
crowns the fell ; 

To be an essence more environing 

Than wine’s drained juice; a music 


ravishing 

More than the passionate pulse of Phil- 
omel ;:— 

To be all this ’neath one soft bosom’s 
swell 

That is the flower of life :—how strange 
a thing ! P 

How strange a thing to be what Man 
can know 

But as a sacred secret! Heaven’s own 
screen 


Hides her soul’s purest depth and loveli- 
est glow ; 

Closely withheld, as all things most un- 
seen ,—— 

The wave-bowered pearl,—the heart- 
shaped seal of green 

That flecks the snowdrop underneath the 
snow. 


LVII. TRUE WOMAN—II. HER LOVE 


SHE loves him ; for her infinite soul is 
Love, 

And he her lodestar. Passion in her is 

A glass facing his fire, where the bright 


bliss 

Is mirrored, andthe heat returned. Yet 
move 

That glass, a stranger’s amorous flame to 
prove, 


And it shall turn, by instant contraries, 

Ice to the moon; while her pure fire to 
his 

For whom it burns, clings close i’ the 
heart’s alcove. 


Lo! they are one. With wifely breast 


to breast 

And circling arms, she welcomes all 
command 

Of love,—her soul to answering ardors 
fann’d : 

Yet as morn springs or twilight sinks to 
rest, 


51 


Sol 


Ah! who shall say she deems not love- 
lest 
The hour of sisterly sweet hand-in-hand ? 


LVII, TRUE WOMAN-—III, HER HEAVEN 


Ir to grow old in Heaven is to grow 
young, 

(As the Seer saw and said,) then blest 
were he 

With youth for evermore, whose heaven 
should be 

True Woman, she whom these 
notes have sung, 

Here and hereafter,—choir-strains of her 
tongue,— 

Sky-spaces of her 
that flee 

About her soul’s immediate sanctuary ,— 

Were Paradise all uttermost worlds 


weak 


eyes,—sweet signs 


among. 

The sunrise blooms and withers on the 
hill 

Like any hillflower; and the noblest 
troth 


Dies here to dust. Yet shall Heaven’s 
promise clothe 
Even yet those lovers who have cherished 
still 
This test for love :—in every kiss sealed 
fast 
To feel the first kiss and forbode the last. 
LIX. LOVE’S LAST GIFT 


LOVE to his singer held a glistening leaf, 
And said : ‘*‘ The rose-tree and the apple- 


tree 

Have fruits to vaunt or flowers to lure 
the bee ; 

And golden shafts are in the feathered 
sheaf 

Of the great harvest-marshal, the year’s 
chief, 

Victorious Summer; aye, and ‘neath 


warm sea 

Strange secret grasses lurk inviolably 

Between the filtering channels of sunk 
reef. 

All are my blooms ; and all sweet blooms 
of love 

To thee I gave whileSpring and Summer 
sang ; 

But Autumn stops to listen, with some 
pang 

From those worse things the wind is 
moaning of. 

Only this laurel dreads no winter days: 

Take my last gift ; thy heart hath sung 
my praise.” 


802 


PART II. CHANGE AND FATE 


LX. TRANSFIGURED LIFE 


As growth of form or momentary glance 

In a child’s features will recall to mind 

The father’s with the mother’s face com- 
bin’d,— 

Sweet interchange that memories still 
enhance : 

And yet, as childhood’s years and youth’s 
advance, 

The gradual mouldings leave one stamp 
behind, 

Till in the blended likeness now we find 

A separate man's or woman’s counte- 
nance :— 

Soin the Song, the singer’s Joy and Pain, 

Its very parents, evermore expand 

To bid the passion’s fullgrown birth re- 
main, 

By Art’s transfiguring essence subtly 
spann’d ; 

And from that song-cloud shaped as a 
man’s hand 

There comes the sound as of abundant 
rain. 


LXI. THE SONG-THROE 


By thine own tears thy song must tears 
pers 

O Singer! Magic mirror thou hast none 

Except thy manifest heart; and save 
thine own 

Anguish or ardor, else no amulet. 

Cisterned in Pride, verse is the feathery 


je 
Of soulless air-flung fountains ; 


nay, 
more dry 

Than the Dead Sea for throats that thirst 
and sigh, 

That song o’er which no singer’s lids 
grew wet. 

The Song-god—He the Sun-god—is no 
slave 


Of thine : thy Hunter he, who for thy soul 

ledges his shaft : to no august control 

Of thy skilled hand his quivered store he 
gave : 

But if thy lips’ loud cry leap to his 
smart, 

The inspir’d recoil shall pierce thy 

brother’s heart. 


LXV. KNOWN IN VAIN 


As two whose love, first foolish, widen- 
ing scope, 
Knows suddenly, to music highand soft, 


BRITISH POETS 


The Holy of holies; who because they 
scoff’d 

Are now amazed with shame, nor dare 
to cope 

With the whole truth aloud, lest heaven 
should ope ; 

Yet, at their meetings, laugh not as they 
laugh’d 

In speech; nor speak, at length; but 
sitting oft 

Together, within hopeless sight of hope 

For hours are silent :—So it happeneth 

When Work and Will awake too late, to 


aze 

After fheir life sailed by, and hold their 
breath. 

Ah! who shall dare to search through 
what sad maze 

Thenceforth their incommunicable ways 

Follow the desultory feet of Death? 

LXVI. THE HEART OF THE NIGHT 

From child to youth; 
arduous man ; 

From lethargy to fever of the heart ; 

From faithful life to dream-dowered 
days apart ; 

From trust to doubt ; 
brink of ban ;— 

Thus much of change in one swift cycle 


from youth to 


from doubt to 


ran 
Till now. Alas, the soul !—how soon 
must she 


Accept her primal immortality,— 

The flesh resume its dust whence it be- 
gan? 

O Lord of work and peace! O Lord of 
life ! 

O Lord, the awful Lord of will! though 
late, 

Even yet renew this soul with duteous 
breath : 

That when the peace is garnered in from 
strife, 

The work retrieved, the will regenerate, 

This soul may see thy face, O Lord of 
death ! 

LXVIIl. THE LANDMARK 

Was that the landmark? What—the 
foolish well 

Whose wave, low down, I did not stoop 
to drink, 

But sat and flung the pebbles from its 
brink 

In sport to send its imaged skies pell- — 
mell, 


ROSSETTI 


(And mine own image, had I noted 


well !)— 

Was that my point of turning ?—I had 
thought 

The stations of my course should rise un- 
sought, 


As altar-stone or ensigned citadel. 

But lo! the path is missed, I must go 
back, 

And thirst to drink when next I reach 
the spring 

Which once I stained, which since may 
have grown black. 

Yet though no light be left nor bird now 
sing 

As here I turn, PU thank God, hasten- 
ing, 

That the same goal is still on the same 
track. 

LXxX. THE HILL SUMMIT 
THIS feast-day of the sun, his altar there 
In the broad west has blazed for vesper- 


song ; 

And I Been loitered in the vale too long 

And gaze now a belated worshipper. 

Yet may I not forget that I was ’ware, 

So journeying, of his face at intervals 

Transfigured where the fringed horizon 
falls, bes 

A fiery bush with coruscating hair. 

And now that I have climbed and won 
this height, 

I must tread downward through the 
sloping shade 

And travel the bewildered tracks till 
night. 

Yet for this hour I still may here be 
stayed 

And see the gold air and the silver fade 

And the last bird fly into the last light. 


LXXI. THE CHOICE—I1 


Eat thou and drink; to-morrow thou 
shalt die. 

Surely the earth, that’s wise being very 
old, 

Needs not our help. 
love, and hold 

Thy sultry hair up from my face; thatI 

May pour for thee this golden wine, 
brim-high, 

Till round the glass thy fingers glow 
like gold. 

We'll drown all hours : 
hours are toll’d, 

Shall leap, as fountains veil the chang- 
ing sky. 


Then loose me, 


thy song, while 


803 
Now kiss, andthink that there are really 
those, 
My own high-bosomed beauty, who 
increase 


Vain gold, vain lore,and yet might 
choose our way ! 

ae many years they toil ; then on 

ay 

They die not,—for their life was death, 
—but cease ; 

And round their narrow lips the mould 
falls close. 


LXXII. THE CHOICE—II 


Watcu thou and fear ; to-morrow thou 
shalt die. 

Or art thou sure thou shalt have time 
for death ? 

Is not the day which God’s word promis- 
eth 

To come man knows 
yonder sky, 

Now while we speak, the sun speeds 
forth: can I 

Or thou assure him of his goal? God’s 
breath 

Even at this moment haply quickeneth 

The air to a flame; till spirits, always 
nigh 

Though screened and_ hid, shall walk 
the daylight here. 

And dost thou prate of all that man 
shall do? 

Canst thou, who hast but plagues, pre- 
sume to be 

Glad in his gladness that comes after 


not when? In 


thee ? 
Will his strength slay thy worm in Hell? 
Go to: 
Cover thy countenance, and watch, and 
fear. 
LXXUI, THE CHOICE—III 


THINK thou and act; to-morrow thou 
shalt die. 

Outstretched in the sun’s warmth upon 
the shore, 

Thou say’st : ‘‘ Man’s measured path is 
all gone o’er: 

Up all his years, steeply, 
and sigh, 

Man clomb until he touched the truth ; 
and I, 

Even I, am he whom it was destined 
for.” 

How should this be ? 
much more 


with strain 


Art thou then so 


804 


Than they who sowed, that thou shouldst 
reap thereby ? 

Nay, come up hither. 
washed mound 

Unto the furthest flood-brim look with 
me ; 

Then reach on with thy thought till it be 
drown’d. 

Miles and miles distant though the last 
line be, 

And though thy soul sail leagues and 
leagues beyond,— 

Still, leagues beyond those leagues, there 
is more sea. 


From this wave- 


LXXIV. OLD AND NEW ART—I 


ST. LUKE THE PAINTER 


GIvE honor unto Luke Evangelist ; 
For he it was (the aged legends say) 
Who first taught Art to fold her hands 


and pray. 

Scarcely at once she dared to rend the 
mist 

Of devious symbols; but soon having 
wist 


How sky-breadth and field-silence and 
this day 

Are symbols also in some deeper way, 

She looked through these to God and 
was God’s priest. 

And if, past noon, her toil began to irk, 

And she sought ‘talismans, and tur ned 
in vain 


To soulless self-reflections of man’s 
skill,— 

Yet now, in this the twilight, she might 
still 


Kneel in the latter grass to pray again, 
Ere the night cometh and she may not 
work, 
LXXV. OLD AND NEW ART—II 

NOT AS THESE 


“T am not astheseare,” the poet saith 

In youth’s pride, and the painter, among 
men 

At bay, where never pencil comes nor 
pen, 

And shut about with his own frozen 
breath. 

To others, for whom only rhyme wins 
faith 

As poets,—only paint as painters,—then 

He turns in the cold silence ; and again 

Shrinking, ‘‘I am not as these are,” he 
saith. 

And say that this is so, what follows it? 


BRITISH POETS 


For were thine eyes set backwards in 
thine head, 

Such words were well; but they see on, 
and far. 

Unto the lights of the great Past, new-lit 

Fair for the Future’s track, look thou 
instead,— 

Say thou instead, ‘‘Iam not as these 
are.” 


LXXVI. OLD AND NEW ART—III 


THE HUSBANDMAN 


THOUGH God, as one thatis an house- 
holder, 

Called these to labor in his vineyard first, 

Before the husk of darkness was well 


burst 

Bidding them grope their way out and 
bestir, 

(Who, questioned of their wages, ans- 
wered, ‘‘Sir, 

Unto each man a penny:”) though the 
worst 

Burthen of heat was theirs and the dry 
thirst 


Though God hath since found none such 
as these were 

To do their work like them :—Because 
of this 

Stand not ye idle in the market-place. 

Which of ye knoweth he is not that last 

Who may be first by faith and will ?— 
yea, his 

The hand which after the appointed 


days 
And hours shall give a Future to their 
Past ? 
LXXVII. SOUL’S BEAUTY 


(Sibylla Palmifera) 


UNDER the arch of Life, where love and 
death, 

Terror and mystery, ‘guard her shrine, I 
saw 

Beauty enthroned ; and though her gaze 
struck awe, 

I drew it in as simply as my breath. 

Hers are the eyes which, over and 
beneath, 

The sky and sea bend on theeyrery is 
can draw, 

By sea or sky or woman, to one law, 

The allotted bondman of her palm and 
wreath. 

This is that Lady Beauty, in whose praise 

Thy voice and hand shake still;—long 
known to thee 


ROSSETTI 


By flying hair and fluttering hem,—the 
beat 


Following her daily of thy heart and 
feet, 

How passionately and irretrievably, 

In what fond flight, how many ways 
and days! 


BODY’S BEAUTY 
(Lilith) 


OF Adam/’s first wife, Lilith, it is told 

(The witch he loved before the gift of 
Eve, ) 

That, ere the snake’s, her sweet tongue 
could deceive, 

And her enchanted hair was the first 
gold. 

And still she sits, young while the earth 
is old, 

And, subtly of herself contemplative, 

Draws men to watch the bright web 
she can weave, 

Till heart and body and life are in its 
hold. 

The rose and poppy are her flowers ; for 
where 

Is he not found, O Lilith, whom shed 
scent 

And soft-shed kisses and soft sleep shall 
snare? 

Lo! as that youth’s eyes burned at 
thine, so went 

Thy spell through him, and left his 
straight neck bent 

And round his heart one strangling 
golden hair, 


LXXVIII. 


LXXXI. MEMORIAL THRESHOLDS 


WHAT place so strange,~though unre- 
vealed snow 

With unimaginable fires arise 

At the earth’s end,—what passion of 
surprise 

Like frost-bound fire-girt scenes of long 
ago? 

Lo! this is none but I this hour; and lo! 

This is the very place which to mine 
eyes 

Those mortal hours in vain immortalize, 

’Mid hurrying crowds, with what alone 
I know. 

City, of thine a single simple door; 

By some new Power reduplicate, must 
be 

Even yet my life-porch in eternity, 

Even with one presence filled, as once 
of yore; 





805 


Or mocking winds whirl round a chaff- 
strown floor 

Thee and thy years and these my words 
and me. 


LXXXII. HOARDED JOY 


I saip: ‘‘ Nay, pluck not,—let the first 
fruit be: 

Even as thou sayest, it is sweet and red, 

But let it ripen still. The tree’s bent 
head 

Sees in the stream its own fecundity 


And bides the day of fulness. Shall 
not we 

At the sun’s hour that day possess the 
shade, 

And claim our fruit before its ripeness 
fade, 


And‘eat it from the branch and praise 
the tree?” 

I say: ‘* Alas! our fruit hath wooed the 
sun 

Too long,—’t is fallen and floats adown 
the stream. 

Lo, the last clusters! 
every one, 

And let us sup with summer; ere the 
gleam 

Of autumn set the year’s pent sorrow 
free, 

And the woods wail like echoes from 
the sea.” 


Pluck them 


LXXXIII. BARREN SPRING 


ONCE more the changed year’s turning 
wheel returns : 

And as a girl sails balanced in the wind, 

And now before and now again behind 

Stoops as it swoops, with cheek that 
laughs and burns,— 

So Spring comes merry towards me here, 
but earns 

No answering smile from me, whose life 
is twin’d 

With the dead boughs that winter still 
must bind, 

And whom to-day the Spring no more 
concerns. 

Behold, this crocus is a withering flame ; 

This snowdrop, snow ; this apple-blos- 
som’s part 

To breed the fruit that breeds the ser- 
pent’s art. 

Nay, for these Spring-flowers, turn thy 
face from them, 

Nor stay till on the year’s last lily-stem 

The white cup shrivels round the golden 
heart, 


806 


BRITISH POETS 





LXXXIV. FAREWELL TO THE GLEN 


SWEET stream-fed glen, why say ‘‘ fare- 
well” to thee 

Who far’st so well and find’st for ever 
smooth 

The brow of Time where man may read 
no ruth? 

Nay, do thou rather say ‘‘ farewell ” to 
me, 

Who now fare forth in bitterer fantasy 

Than erst.was mine where other shade 
might soothe 

By other streams, what while in fragrant 
youth 

The bliss of being sad made melancholy. 

And yet, farewell! For better shalt thou 
fare 

When children bathe sweet faces in thy 
flow 

And happy lovers blend sweet shadows 
there 

In hours to come, than when an hour 


ago 
Thine echoes had but one man’s sighs to 


bear 
And thy trees whispered what he feared 
to know. 
LXXXVI. LOST DAYS 


THE lost days of my life until to-day, 

What were they, could I see them on 
the street 

Lie as they fell? 
wheat 

Sown once for food but trodden into 
clay ? 

Or golden coins squandered and still to 


Would they be ears of 


pay ? 

Or drops of blood dabbling the guilty 
feet ? 

Or such spilt water asin dreams must 
cheat 

The undying throats of Hell, athirst 
alway? 

I do not see them here ; but after death 

God knows I know the faces I shall see, 

Each one a murdered self, with low 
last breath. 

‘Tam thyself,—what hast thou done 
to me?” 

‘* And I—and I-—thyself,” (lo! each one 
saith, 

‘* And thou thyself to all eternity !” 
LXXXIX. THE TREES OF THE GARDEN 
YE who have passed Death’s haggard 

hills ; and ye 


Whom trees that knew your sires shall 
cease to know 

And still stand silent :—is it alla show,— 

A wisp that laughs upon the wall ?— 
decree 

Of some inexorable supremacy 

Which ever, as man strains his blind 
surmise 

From depth to ominous depth, looks 
past his eyes, 

Sphinx-faced with unabashéd augury ? 

Nay, rather question the Earth's self. 
Invoke 

The storm-felled forest-trees moss-grown 
to-day 

Whose roots are hillocks where the 
children play ; 

Or ask the silver sapling *neath what 
yoke 

Those stars, his spray-crown’s clustering 
gems, shall wage 

Their journey still when his boughs 
shrink with age. 


xc. ‘‘ RETRO ME, SATHANA!” 


GET thee behind me. 
curled, 

Stooping against the wind, a charioteer 

Is snatched from out his chariot by the 
hair, 

So shall Time be; and as the void ear, 
hurled 

Abroad by reinless steeds, even so the 
world: 

Yea, even as chariot-dust upon the air, 

It shall be sought and not found any- 
where. . 

Get thee behind me, Satan. Oft un- 
furled, 

Thy perilous wings can beat and break 
like lath 

Much mightiness of men to win thee 
praise. 

Leave these weak feet to tread in narrow 
ways. 

Thou still, upon the broad vine-shel- 
tered path, 

Mayst wait the turning of the phials of 
wrath 

For certain years, for certain months 
and days. 


Even as, heavy- 


- XCI. LOST ON BOTH SIDES 

AS whentwo men have loved a woman 
well, 

Each hating each, through Love’s and 
Death’s deceit ; 


ROSSETTI 


Since not for either this stark marriage- 


sheet 

And the long pauses of this wedding- 
bell ; 

Yet o'er her grave the night and day 
dispel 

At last their feud forlorn, with cold and 
heat 

Nor other than dear friends to death 

may fleet 

The a left that most of her can 
tell :-— 

So separate hopes, which ina soul had 
wooed 

The one same Peace, strove with each 
other long, 

And Peace before their faces perished 
since : 

So through that soul, in restless brother- 
hood, 

They roam together now, and wind 
among 

Its bye-streets, knocking at the dusty 
inns, 


XCIV. MICHELANGELO’S KISS 


GREAT Michelangelo, with age grown 
bleak 

And paren uos labors, having once o’er- 
sai 

All grievous memories on his long life 
shed, 

This worst regret to one true heart could 
speak :— 

That when, with sorrowing love and re- 
verence meek, 

He stooped o’er sweet Colonna’s dying 


bed, 

His Muse and dominant Lady, spirit- 
wed,— 

Her hand he kissed, but not her brow or 
cheek. 

O Buonarrotti,— good at Art’s fire- 
wheels 

To urge her chariot!—even thus the 
Soul, 

Touching at length some sorely-chast- 
ened goal, 


Earns oftenest but a little: her appeals 

Were deep and mute,—lowly her claim. 
Let be : 

What holds for her Death’s garner ? 
And for thee? 


XCVI. LIFE THE BELOVED 


As thy friend’s face, with shadow of soul 
o’erspread, {hath been 
Somewhile unto thy sight perchance 


807 

Ghastly and strange, yet never so is 
seen 

In thought, but to all fortunate favor 
wed ; 

As thy love’s death-bound features never 
dead 

To memory’s glass return, but con- 
travene 

Frail fugitive days, and alway keep, I 
ween, 


Than all new lifea livelier lovelihead :— 

So Life herself, thy spirit’s friend and 
love, 

Even still as Spring’s authentic har- 
binger 

Glows with fresh hours for hope to glorify; 

Though pale she lay when in the winter 
grove 

Her funeral flowers were snow-flakes 
shed on her 

And we red wings of frost-fire rent the 
sky. 


XCVII. A SUPERSCRIPTION 


Look in my face; my name is Might- 
have-been ; 

I amalso fe No-more, Too-late, Fare- 
well ; 

Unto thine ear I hold the dead-sea shell 

Cast up thy Life’s foam-fretted feet be- 
tween ; 

Unto thine eyes the glass where that is 


seen 

Which had Life’s form and Love’s, but 
by my spell 

Is now a shaken shadow intolerable, 

Of ultimate things unuttered the frail 
screen. 

Mark me, how still lam! 
there dart 

One moment through thy soul the soft 
surprise 

Of that winged Peace which lulls the 
breath of sighs,— 

Then shalt thou see me smile, and turn 
apart 

Thy visage to mine ambush at thy heart 

Sleepless with cold commemorative eyes. 


But should 


XCIX. NEWBORN DEATH—I 


To-DAY Death seems to me an infant 
child 

Which her worn mother Life upon my 
knee 

Has set to grow my friend and play with 
me ; 

If haply so my heart might be beguil’d 

To find no terrors in a face so mild,— 


808 


If haply so my weary heart might be 

Unto the newborn milky eyes of thee, . 

O Death, before resentment reconcil’d. 

How long, O Death? And shall thy feet 
depart 

Still a young child’s with mine, or wilt 
thou stand 

Fullgrown the helpful daughter of my 
heart, 

What time with thee indeed I reach the 
strand 

Of the pale wave which knows thee 
what thou art, 

And drink it in the hollow of thy hand? 


C. NEWBORN DEATH—II 


AND thou, O Life, the lady of all bliss, 

With whom, when our first heart beat 
fulland fast, 

I wandered till the haunts of men were 
pass’d, 

And in fair places found all bowers amiss 

Till only woods and waves might hear 
our kiss, 

While to the winds all thought of Death 
we cast :— 

Ah, Life! and must I have from thee at 
last 

No smileto greet me and no babe but 

this ? 

Love, the child once ours; and 

Song, whose hair 

Blew like a flame and blossomed like a 
wreath ; 

And Art, whose eyes were worlds by 
God found fair ; 

These o’er the book of Nature mixed their 
breath 

With neck-twined arms, as 

watched them there: 

And did these die that thou mightst 
bear me Death? 


Lo! 


oft we 


CI. THE ONE HOPE 


WHEN vain desire at last and vain re- 
egret 

Go hand in hand to death, and all is 
vain, 

What shall assuage the unforgotten pain 

And teach the unforgetful to forget ? 

Shall Peace be still a sunk stream long 
unmet,— 

Or may the soul at once in a green plain 
Stoop through the spray of some sweet 
life-fountain | 
And cull the dew-drenched flowering 

amulet ? 





BRITISH POETS 


Ah! when the wan soul in that golden 


air 

Between the scriptured petals sofily 
blown 

Peers breathless for the gift of grace 
unknown, 


Ah! let none other alien spell soe’er 

But only the one Hope’s one name be 
there,— 

Not less nor more, but even that word. 
alone. 1869, 1870, 1881.4 


THE CLOUD CONFINES 


THE day is dark and the night 
To him that would search their heart ; 
No lips of cloud that will part 

Nor morning song in the light: 
Only, gazing alone, 
To him wild shadows are shown, 
Deep under deep unknown 

And height above unknown height. 


Still we say as we go,— 
‘‘Strange to think by the way, 

Whatever there is to know, 
That shall we know one day.” 


The Past is over and fled ; 
Named new, we name it the old; 
Thereof some tale hath been told, 
But no word comes from the dead ; 
Whether at all they be, 
Or whether as bond or free, 
Or whether they too were we, 
Or by what spell they have sped. 


Still we say as we go,— 
‘*Strange to think by the way, 

Whatever there is to know, 
That shall we know one day.” 


What of the heart of hate 
That beats in thy breast, O Time ?— 
Red strife from the furthest prime, 
And anguish of fierce debate ; 
War that shatters her slain, 
And peace that grinds them as grain, 
And eyes fixed ever in vain 
On the pitiless eyes of Fate. 





Still we say as we go, 
‘Strange to think by the way, 


1 Sixteen Sonnets, Numbers 25, 39, 47, 49-52, 63, 
65, 67, 86, 91, 97, 99, and 100, were published in the 
Fortnightly Review, 1869. Fifty Sonnets (for the 
exact list see W. M. Rossetti’s edition of the 
Collected Works, I, 517) were published, with 
eleven lyrics, as ‘‘ Sonnets and Songs towards a 
work to be entitled The House of Life,’ in the 
Poems. 1870. The House of Life, asit now stands, 
consisting of sonnets only, was published in 
Ballads and Sonnets, 1881. 


ROSSETTI 809 


Whatever there is to know, 
That shall we know one day.” 


What of the heart of love 
That bleeds in thy breast, O Man? 
Thy kisses snatched ‘neath the ban 

Of fangs that mock them above: 
Thy bells prolonged unto knells, 
Thy hope that a breath dispels, 
Thy bitter forlorn farewells 

And the empty echoes thereof ? 


Still we say as we go,— 
‘* Strange to think by the way, 
Whatever there is to know, 
That shall we know one day.” 


The sky leans dumb on the sea, 

Aweary with all its wings ; 

And oh! the song the sea sings 
Is dark everlastingly.: 

Our past is clean forgot, 

Our present is and is not, 

Our future’s a sealed seedplot, 
And what betwixt them are we ?— 


We who say as we go,— 
‘Strange to think by the way, . 

Whatever there is to know, 
That shall we know one day.” 

1872. 


THREE SHADOWS 


I LOOKED and saw your eyes — 
In the shadow of your hair, 
As a traveller sees the stream 
In the shadow of the wood; 
And I said, ‘‘ My faint heart sighs, 
Ah me! to linger there, 
To drink deep and to dream 
In that sweet solitude.” 


I looked and saw your heart 
In the shadow of your eyes, 
As a seeker sees the gold 
In the shadow of the stream ; 
And I said, ‘‘ Ah me? what art 
Should win the immortal prize, 
Whose want must make life cold 
And Heaven a hollow dream ?” 


I looked and saw your love 
In the shadow of your heart, 
As a diver sees the pearl 
In the shadow of the sea ; 
And I murmured, not above 
My breath, but all apart,— 
‘* Ah! you can love, true girl, 
And is your love for me?” 
1881, 


INSOMNIA 


THIN are the night-skirts left behind 
By daybreak hours that onward creep, 
And thin, alas! the shred of sleep 
That wavers with the spirit’s wind: 
But in half-dreams that shift and roll 
And still remember and forget, 
My soul this hour has drawn your soul 
A little nearer yet. 


Our lives, most dear, are never near, 
Our thoughts are never far apart, 
Though all that draws us heart to heart 

Seems fainter now and now more clear. 

To-night Love claims his full control, 
And with desire and with regret 

My soul this hour has drawn your soul 

A little nearer yet. 


Is there a home where heavy earth 

Melts to bright air that breathes no 

pain, 

Where water leaves no thirst again 
And springing fire is Love’s new birth? 
If faith long bound to one true goal 

May there at length its hope beget, 
My soul that hour shall draw your soul 

For ever nearer yet. 1881. 


CHIMES 


I 


Honey-flowers to the honey-comb 
And the honey-bees from home. 


A honey-comb and a honey-flower, 
And the bee shall have his hour. 


A honeyed heart for the honey-comb, 
And the humming bee flies home. 


A heavy heart in the honey-flower, 
And the bee has had his hour. 


Il 


A honey-cell’s in the honeysuckle, 
And the honey-bee knows it well. 


The honey-comb has a heart of honey, 
And the humming bee ’sso bonny. 


A honey-flower ’s the honeysuckle, 
And the bee ’s in the honey-bell. 


The honeysuckle is sucked of honey, 
And the bee is heavy and bonny. 


810 BRITISHZEGE LS 


II 


Brown shell first for the butterfly 
And a bright wing by and by. 


Butterfly, good-by to your shell, 
And, bright wings, speed you well. 


Bright lamplight for the butterfly 
And a burnt wing by and by. 


Butterfly, alas for your shell, 
And, bright wings, fare you well. 


IV 


Lost love-labor and lullaby, 
And lowly let love le. 


Lost love-morrow and love-fellow 
And love’s life lying low. 


Lovelorn labor and life laid by 
And lowly let love lie. 


Late love-longing and life-sorrow 
And love’s life lying low. 


V 


Beauty’s body and benison 
With a bosom-flower new-blown. 


Bitter beauty and blessing bann’d 
With a breast to burn and brand. 


Beauty’s bower in the dust o’erblown 
With a bare white breast of bone. 


Barren beauty and bower of sand 
With a blast on either hand. 


VI 


Buried bars in the breakwater 
And bubble of the brimming weir. 


Body’s blood in the breakwater 
And a buried body’s bier. 


Buried bones in the breakwater 
And bubble of the brawling weir. 


Bitter tears in the breakwater 
And a breaking heart to bear. 


VII 


Hollow heaven and the hurricane 
And hurry of the heavy rain. 


Hurried clouds in the hollow heaven 
And a heavy rain hard-driven. 


The heavy rain it hurries amain 
And heaven and the hurricane. 


Hurrying wind o’er the heaven’s hollow 
And the heavy rain to follow. 1881. 


SOOTHSAY 


LET no man ask thee of anything 

Not yearborn between Spring and 
Spring. 

More of all worlds than he can know, 

Each day the single sun doth show. 

A trustier gloss than thou canst give 

From all wise scrolls demonstrative, 

The sea doth sigh and the wind sing. 


Let no man awe thee on any height 


‘Of earthly kingship’s mouldering might. 


The dust his heel holds meet for thy 
brow 

Hath all of it been what both are now; 

And thou and he may plague together 

A beggar’s eyes in some dusty weather 

When none that is now knows sound or 
sight. 


Crave thou no dower of earthly things 
Unworthy Hope’s imaginings. 

To have brought true birth of Song to be 
And to have won hearts to Poesy, 

Or anywhere in the sun or rain 

To have loved and been beloved again, 
Is loftiest reach of Hope’s bright wings. 


The wild waifs cast up by the sea 

Are diverse ever seasonably. 

Even so the soul-tides still may land 

A different drift upon the sand. 

But one the sea is evermore : 

And one be still, ’twixt shore and shore, 
As the sea’s life, thy soul in thee. 


Say, hast thou pride? How then may fit 
Thy mood with flatterer’s silk-spun wit ? 
Haply the sweet voice lifts thy crest, 

A breeze of fame made manifest. 

Nay, but then chaf’st at flattery ? Pause: 
Be sure thy wrath is not because 

It makes thee feel thou lovest it. 


Let thy soul strive that stil the same 
Be early friendship’s sacred flame. 

The affinities have strongest part 

In youth, and draw men heart to heart: 
As life wears on and finds no rest, 

The individual in each breast 

Is tyrannous to sunder them. 


In the life-drama’s stern cue-call, 
A friend ’s a part well-prized by all: 


ROSSETTI 


And if thou meet an enemy, 

What art thou that none such should be? 
Even so: but if the two parts run 

Into each other and grow one, 

Then comes the curtain’s cue to fall. 


Whate’er by other’s need is claimed 
More than by thine,—to him unblamed 
Resign it: and if he should hold 

What more than he thou lack’st, bread, 

gold, 

Or any good whereby we live,— 

To thee such substance let him give 
Freely : nor he nor thou be shamed. 


- Strive that thy works prove equal : lest 
That work which thou hast done the best 
Should come to be to thee at length 
(Even as to envy seems the strength 

Of others) hateful and abhorr’d,— 
Thine own above thyself made lord,— 
Of self-rebuke the bitterest. 


Unto the man of yearning thought 
And aspiration, to do nought 

Is in itself almost an act,— 

Being chasm-fire and cataract 

Of the soul’s utter depths unseal’d. 
Yet woe to thee if once thou yield 
Unto the act of doing nought ! 


How callous seems beyond revoke 

The clock with its last listless stroke ! 
How much too late at length !—to trace 
The hour on its forewarning face, 

The thing thou hast not dared to do!.... 
Behold, this muy be thus! Ere true 

It prove, arise and bear thy yoke. 


Let lore of all Theology 

Be to thy soul what it can be: 

But know,—the Power that fashions man 
Measured not out thy little span 

For thee to take the meting-rod 

In turn, and so approve on God 

Thy science of Theometry. 


To God at best, to Chance at worst, 
Give thanks for good things, last as first. 
But windstrown blossom is that good 
Whose apple is not gratitude. 

Even if no prayer uplift thy face, 

Let the sweet right to render grace 

As thy soul’s cherished child be nurs’d. 


Didst ever say, ‘‘ Lo, I forget?” 
Such thought was to remember yet. 
As in a gravegarth, count to see 
The monuments of memory. 


SII 


Be this thy soul’s appointed scope :— 
Gaze onward without claim to hope, 
Nor, gazing backward, court regret. 
1881. 
ON BURNS 


IN whomsoe’er, since Poesy began, 

A Poet most of all men we may scan, 

Burns of all poets is the most a Man. 
1886. 


FIVE ENGLISH POETS 
I. THOMAS CHATTERTON 


WITH Shakespeare’s manhood at a boy’s 
wild heart,— 

Through Hamlet’s doubt to Shakespeare 
near allied, 

And kin to Milton through his Satan’s 
pride,— 

At Death’s sole door he stooped, and 
craved a dart; 

And to the dear new bower of England’s 
art,— 

Even to that shrine Time else had dei- 
fied 


| The unuttered heart that soared against 


his side,— 

Drove the fell point, and smote life’s 
seals apart. 

Thy nested home-loves, noble -Chatter- 


ton ; 

The angel-trodden stair thy soul could 
trace 

Up Redcliffe’s spire; and in the world’s 
armed space 

Thy gallant sword-play :—these to many 


an one 

Are sweet for ever; as thy grave un- 
known 

And love-dream of thine unrecorded 
face. 


Il WILLIAM BLAKE 


(To FREDERICK SHIELDS, ON HIS SKETCH OF 
BLAKE’S WORK-ROOM AND DEATH-ROOM, 38 Foun- 
TAIN COURT, STRAND.) 


THIS is the place. Even here the daunt- 
less soul, 

The unflinching hand, wrought on; till 
in that nook, 

As on that very bed, his life partook 

New birth, and passed. Yon river’s 
dusky shoal, 

Whereto the close-built coiling lanes 
uproll, 

Faced his work-window, 
eyes would stare, 


whence his 


812 


Thought-wandering, unto nought that 
met them there, 

But to the unfettered irreversible goal, 

This cupboard, Holy of Holies, held the 
cloud 

Of his soul writ and limned; this other 
one, 

His true wife’s charge, full oft to their 
abode 

Yielded for daily bread the martyr’s 
stone, 

Ere yet their food might be that Bread 
alone, 

The words now home- “speech 
mouth of God. 


of the 


Ill. SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE 


Hs Soul fared forth (as from the deep 
home-grove 

The father-songster plies the hour- long 
quest, ) 

To feed his soul-brood hungering in the 
nest ; 

But his warm Heart, the mother-bird, 
above 

Their callow fledgling progeny stillhove 

With tented roof of wings and fostering 
breast 

Till the Soul fed the soul-brood. Richly 
blest 

From Heaven their growth, whose food 
was Human Love. 

Yet ah! Like desert pools that show 
the stars 

Once in long leagues,—even such the 
scarce-snatched hours 

Which deepening pain left to his lord- 
liest powers :— 

Heaven lost through spider-trammelled 
prison-bars. 

Six years, from sixty 5 
dling skies 

Own them, a beacon to our centuries. 


saved! Yet kin- 


IV. JOHN KEATS 


THE weltering London ways where chil- 
dren weep 

And girls whom none call maidens 
laugh,—strange road 


Miring his outward steps, who inly 
trode 
The bright Castalian brink and Latmos’ 


steep :— 

Even such his life’s cross-paths; till 
deathly deep 

He toiled through sands of Lethe; and 
long pain, 


BRITISH* POETS 


Weary with labor spurned and love 
found vain, 

In dead Rome’s sheltering shadow wrap- 
ped his sleep. 

O pang-dowered Poet, whose reverber- 
ant lips 

And heart-strung lyre awoke the Moon’s 
eclipse ,— 

Thou whom the daisies glory in grow- 
ing o’er,— 

Their fragrance clings around thy name, 
not writ 

But rumor’d in water, while the fame 
of it 

Along Time’s flood goes echoing ever- 
more. 


V. PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY 


(INSCRIPTION FOR THE COUCH, STILL PRESERVED, 
ON WHICH HE PASSED THE LAST NIGHT OF HIS 
LIFE. ) 


*TWIXT those twin worlds,—the world of 
Sleep, which gave 

No dream to warm,—the tidal world of 
Death, 

Which the earth’s sea, as the earth, re- 
plenisheth,— 

Shelley, Song’s orient sun, to breast the 
wave, 

Rose from this couch that morn. 
did he brave 

Only the sea ?—or did man’s deed of hell 

Engulf his bark ’mid mists impene- 
trable?yy 

No eye discerned, nor any power might 
save, 

When that mist cleared, O Shelley ! 
what dread veil 

Was rent for thee, to whom far-darkling 
Truth 

Reigned sovereign guide through thy 
brief ageless youth ? 

Was the Truth thy Truth, Shelley ?— 
Hush! All-Hail, 

Past doubt, thou gav’st 
Truth’s bright sphere 

Art first of praisers, being most praiséd 
here. 1881. 


Ah! 


it ; and in 


THE KING’S TRAGEDY 


JAMES I oF Scots.—20TH FEBRUARY, 
1487. 


I CATHERINE am a Douglas born, 
A name to all Scots dear ; 

And Kate Barlass they’ve called me now 
Through many a waning year, 


ROSSETTI 


This old arm’s withered now. ’T was 
once . 
Most deft ’mong maidens all 
To rein the steed, to wing the shaft, 
To smite the palm-play ball. 


In hall adown the close-linked dance 
It has shone most white and fair ; 
It has been the rest for a true lord’s head, 
And many a sweet babe’s nursing-bed, 
And the bar to a King’s chambeére. 


Aye, lasses, draw round Kate Barlass, 
And hark with bated breath 
How good King James, King Robert’s 
son, 
Was foully done to death. 


Through all the days of his gallant youth 
The princely James was pent, 
By his friends at first and then by his 
foes, 
In long imprisonment. 


For the elder Prince, the kingdom’s heir, 
By treason’s murderous brood 
Was slain; and the father quaked for 
the child 
With the royal mortal blood. 


I’ the Bass Rock fort, by his father’s care, 
Was his childhood’s life assured ; 
And Henry the subtle Bolingbroke, 
Proud England's King, ’neath the south- 
ron yoke 
His youth for long years immured. 


Yet in all things meet for a kingly man 
Himself did he approve ; 
And the nightingale through his prison- 
wall 
Taught him both lore and love. 


For once, when the bird’s song drew him 
close 
To the opened window-pane, 
In her bowers beneath a lady stood, 
A light of life to his sorrowful mood, 
Like a lily amid the rain. 


And for her sake, to the sweet bird’s note, 
He framed a sweeter Song, 

More sweet than ever a poet’s heart 
Gave yet to the English tongue. 


She was a lady of royal blood ; 
And when, past sorrow and teen, 
He stood where still through his crown- 
less years 
His Scottish realm had been, 


813 


At Scone were the happy lovers crowned, 
A heart-wed King and Queen. 


But the bird may fall from the bough of 
youth, 
And song be turned to moan, 
And Love’s storm-cloud be the shadow 
of Hate, 
When the tempest-waves of a troubled 
State 
Are beating against a throne. 


Yet well they loved ; and the god of Love, 
Whom well the King had sung, 

Might find on the earth no truer hearts 
His lowliest swains among. 


From the days when first she rode abroad 
With Scottish maids in her train, 

I Catherine Douglas won the trust 
Of my mistress, sweet Queen Jane. 


And oft she sighed, ‘‘To be born a 
King)” 
And oft along the way 
When she saw the homely lovers pass 
She has said, ‘*‘ Alack the day ! ” 


Years waned,—the loving and toiling 
years : 
Till England’s wrong renewed 
Drove James, by outrage cast on his 
crown, 
To the open field of feud. 


’T was when the King and his host were 
met 
At the leaguer of Roxbro’ hold, 
The Queen o’ the sudden sought his camp 
With a tale of dread to be told. 


And she showed him a secret letter writ 
That spoke of treasonous strife, 

And how a band of his noblest lords 
Were sworn to take his life. 


‘¢ And it may be here or it may be there, 
In the camp or the court,” she said : 
‘* But for my sake come to your people’s 
arms 
And guard your royal head.” 


Quoth he, ‘‘’T is the fifteenth day of the 
siege, 
And the castle ’s nigh to yield.” 
‘*O face your foes on your throne,” she 
cried, 
‘‘And show the power you wield ; 
And under your Scottish people’s love 
You shall sit as under your shield,” 


814 


At the fair Queen’s side I stood that day 
When he bade them raise the siege, 
And back to his Court he sped to know 

How the lords would meet their Liege. 


But when he summoned his Parliament, 
The louring brows hung round, 
Like clouds that circle the mountain- 
head 
Ere the first low thunders sound. 


For he had tamed the nobles’ lust 
And curbed their power and pride, 
And reached out an arm to right the 


poor 
Through Scotland far and wide ; 
And many a lordly wrong-doer 
By the headsman’s axe had died. 


°T was then upspoke Sir Robert Greeme, 
The bold o’ermastering man:— | 
‘““O King, in the name of your Three 
states 
I set you under their ban ! 


‘‘For, as your lords made oath to you 
Of service and fealty, 

Even in likewise you pledged your oath 
Their faithful sire to be :— 


‘* Yet all we here that are nobly sprung 
Have mourned dear kith and kin 

Since first for the Scottish Barons’ curse 
Did your bloody rule begin.” 


With that he laid his hands on his 
King :— 
‘*Ts this not so, my lords ?” 
But of all who had sworn to league with 
him 
Not one spake back to his words. 


Quoth the King :—‘‘ Thou speak’st but 
for one Estate, 
Nor doth it avow thy gage. 
Let my lege lords hale this traitor 
hence!” 
The Greeme fired dark with rage :— 
‘¢ Who works for lesser men than himself, 
He earns but a witless wage!” 


But soon from the dungeon where he lay 
He won by privy plots, 
And forth he fled with a price on his 
head 
To the country of the Wild Scots. 


And word there came from Sir Robert 
Greme 
To the King at Edinbro’ :— 


BRITISH eee 





‘* No Liege of mine thou art ; but I see 
From this day forth alone in thee 
God's creature, my mortal foe. 


‘« Through thee are my wifeand children 
lost, 
My heritage and lands ; 
And when my God shallshow me a way, 
Thyself my mortal foe will I slay 
With these my proper hands.” 


Against the coming of Christmastide 
That year the King bade call 

I the Black Friars’ Charterhouse of Perth 
A solemn festival. 


And we of his household rode with him 
In a close-ranked company ; 
But not till the sun had sunk from his 
throne 
Did we reach the Scottish Sea. 


That eve was clenched fora boding storm, 
"Neath a toilsome moon half seen ; 
The cloud stooped low and the surf 
rose high; 
And-where there was a line of the sky, 
Wild wings loomed dark between. 


And on a rock of the black beach-side, 
By the veiled moon dimly lit, 
There was something seemed to heave 
with life 
As the King drew nigh to it. 


And was it only the tossing furze 
Or brake of the waste sea-wold ? 
Or was it an eagle bent to the blast ? 
When near we came, we knew it at last 
For a woman tattered and old. 


But it seemed as though by a fire within 
Her writhen limbs were wrung ; 

And assoonas the King was close to her, 
She stood up gaunt and strong. 


’T was then the moon sailed clear of the 
rack 
On high in her hollow dome ; 
And still as aloft with hoary crest 
Each clamorous wave rang home, 
Like fire in snow the moonlight blazed 
Amid the champing foam. 


And the woman held his eyes with her 
eyes :— 
‘“*O King, thou art come at last ; 
But thy wraith has haunted the Scottish 
Sea 
To my sight for four years past. 


ROSSETTI 


‘¢ Four years it is since first I met, 
— %*Twixt the Duchray and the Dhu, 
A shape whose feet clung close in a 
shroud, 
And that shape for thine I knew. 


‘* A year again, and on Inchkeith Isle 
I saw thee pass in the breeze, 

With the cerecloth risen above thy feet 
And wound about thy knees, 


‘* And yet a year, in the Links of Forth, 
As a wanderer without rest, 
Thou cam’st with both thine arms 7’ 
the shroud 
That clung high up thy breast. 


‘** And in this hour I find thee here, 
And well mine eyes may note 
That the winding-sheet hath passed thy 
breast 
And risen around thy throat. 


** And when I meet thee again, O King, 
That of death hast such sore drouth,— 
Except thou turn again on this shore,— 
The winding-sheet shall have moved 
once more 
And covered thine eyes and mouth. 


‘‘O King, whom poor men bless for 
their King, 
Of thy fate be not so fain ; 
But these my words for God’s message 
take, 
And turn thy steed, O King, for her sake 
Who rides beside thy rein!” 


While the woman spoke, the King’s 
horse reared 
As if it would breast the sea, 
And the Queen turned pale as she heard 
on the gale 
The voice die dolorously. 


When the woman ceased, the steed was 
still, 
But the King gazed on her yet, 
And in silence save for the wail of the sea 
His eyes and her eyes met. 


At last he said :—‘‘ God’s ways are His 
own; 
Man is but shadow and dust. 
Last night I prayed by His altar-stone ; 
To-night I wend to the feast of His Son ; 
And in Him I set my trust. 


** [have held my people in sacred charge, 
And have not feared the sting 


815 


Of proud men’s hate,—to His will resign’d 
Who has but one same death for a hind 
And one same death for a King. 


‘* Andif Godin His wisdom have brought 
close 
The day when I must die, 
That day by water or fire or air 
My feet shall fall in the destined snare 
Wherever my road may lie. 


‘What man can say but the Fiend hath 
set 
Thy sorcery on my path, 
My heart with the fear of death to fill, 
And turn me against God’s very will 
To sink in His burning wrath ?” 


The woman stood as the train rode past, 
And moved nor limb nor eye ; 
And when we were shipped, we saw her 
there 
Still standing against the sky. 


Asthe ship made way, the moon once 
more 
Sank slow in her rising pall ; 
And I thought of the shrouded wraith 
of the King, 
And I said, ‘‘ The Heavens know all.” 


And now, ye lasses, must ye hear 
How my name is Kate Barlass :— 
But a little thing, when all the tale 
Is told of the weary mass 
Of crimeand woe which in Scotland’s 
realm 
God’s will let come to pass. 


°T was in the Charterhouse of Perth 
That the King and all his Court 
Were met, the Christmas Feast being 
done, 
For solace and disport. 


’'T was a wind-wild eve in February, 
And against the casement-pane 
The branches smote like summoning 
hands 
And muttered the driving rain. 


And when the wind swooped over the 
lift 
And made the whole heaven frown, 
It seemed a grip was laid on the walls 
To tug the housetop down. 


And the Queen was there, more stately 
fair 
Than a lily in garden set ; 


816 


And the king was loth to stir from her 
side ; 
For as on the day when she was his bride, 
Even so he loved her yet. 


And the Earl of Athole, the King’s false 
friend, 
Sat with him at the board ; 
And Robert Stuart the chamberlain 
Who had sold his sovereign Lord. 


Yet the traitor Christopher Chaumber 
there 
Would fain have told him all, 
And vainly four times that night he 
strove « 
To reach the King through the hall. 


But the wine is bright at the goblet’s 
brim 
Though the poison lurk beneath ; 
And the apples still are red on the tree 
Within whose shade may the adder be 
That shall turn thy life to death. 


There was a knight of the King’s fast 
friends 
Whom he called the King of Love ; 
And to such bright cheer and courtesy 
That name might best behove. 


And the King and Queen both loved 
him well 
For his gentle knightliness ; 
And with him the King, as that eve 
wore on, 
Was playing at the chess. 


And the King said, (for he thought to 
jest 
And soothe the Queen thereby ;)— 
*‘In a book ’t is writ that this same year 
A King shall in Scotland die. 


** And I have pondered the matter o’er, 
And this have I found, Sir Hugh,— 
There are but two Kings on Scottish 

ground, 
And those Kings are land you. 


‘And I have a wife anda newborn heir, 
And you are yourself alone ; 

So stand you stark at my side with me 
To guard our double throne. 


‘‘For here sit I and my wife and child, 
As well your heart shall approve, 

In full surrender and soothfastness, 
Beneath your Kingdom of Love.” 


BRITISH -POETS 


And the Knight laughed, and the Queen 
too smiled ; 
But I knew her heavy thought, 
And I strove to find in the good King’s 
jest 
What cheer might thence be wrought. 


And I said, ‘‘ My Liege, for the Queen’s 
dear love 
Now sing the song that of old 
You made, when a captive Prince you 


lay, 
And the nightingale sang sweet on the 


spray, 
In Windsor’s castle-hold.” 


Then he smiled the smile I knew so well 
When he thought to please the Queen ; 

The smile which under all bitter frowns 
Of hate that rose between, 

For ever dwelt at the poet’s heart 
Like the bird of love unseen. 


And he kissed her hand and took his 
harp, 
And the music sweetly rang ; 
And when the song burst forth, it 
seemed 
°T was the nightingale that sang. 


‘* Worship, ye lovers, on this May: 
Of bliss your kalends are begun : 
Sing with us, Away, Winter, away ! 
Come, Summer, the sweet season and 
sun! 
Awake for shame,—your heaven is 
won,— 
And amorously your heads lift all: 
Thank Love, that you to his grace doth 
call |” 


But when he bent to the Queen, and 
sang 
The speech whose praise was hers, 
It seemed his voice was the voice of the 
Spring 
And the voice of the bygone years. 


‘* The fairest and the freshest flower 
That ever I saw before that hour, 

The which o’ the sudden made to start 
The blood of my body to my heart. 


* * * * * * 


Ah sweet, are ye a worldly creature — 
Or heavenly thing in form of nature ?” 


And the song was long, and richly stored 
With wonder and beauteous things : 
And the harp was tuned to every change 


ROSSETTI 


Of minstrel ministerings ; 
But when he spoke of the Queen at the 
last, 
Its strings were his own heart-strings. 


** Unworthy but only of her grace, 
Upon Love’s rock that’s easy and sure, 
In guerdon of all my love’s space 
She took me her humble crecture. 
Thus fell my blissful aventure 
In youth of love that from day to day 
Flowereth aye new, and further I say. 


** To reckon all the circumstance 
As it happed wien lessen gan my sore, 
Of my rancor and woful chance, 
It were too long,—I have done therefor. 
And of this flower I say no more 
But unto my help her heart hath tended 
And even from death her man defended.” 


** Aye, even from death,” to myself I 
said ; 
For I thought of the day when she 
Had borne him the news, at Roxbro’ 


siege, 
Of the fell confederacy. 


But Death even then took aim as he sang 
With an arrow deadly bright ; 
And the grinning skull lurked grimly 
“aloof, 
And the wings were spread far over the 
roof 
More dark than the winter night. 


Yet truly along the amorous song 
Of Love’s high pomp and:state, 
There were words of Fortune’s trackless 
doom 
And the dreadful face of Fate. 


And oft have I heard again in dreams 
The voice of dire appeal 

In which the King then sang of the pit 
That is under Fortune’s wheel. 


** And under the wheel beheld I there 
An ugly Pit as deep as hell, 
That to behold I quaked for fear : 
And this I heard, that who therein fell 
Came no more up, tidings to tell: 
Whereat, astound of the fearful sight, 
I wist not what to do for fright.” 


And oft has my thought called up again 
These words of the changeful song :— 
“* Wist thou thy pain and thy travail 
To come, well might’st thou weep and 
wail!” 
And our wail, O God ! is long. 


52 


817 


= 


But the song’s end was all of his love ; 
And well his heart was grac’d 
With her smiling lips and her tear-bright 
eyes 
As his arm went round her waist. 


And on the swell of her long fair throat 
Close clung the necklet-chain 

As he bent her pearl-tir’d head aside, 

And in the warmth of his love and pride 
He kissed her lips full fain. 


And her true face was a rosy red, 
The very red of the rose 

That, couched on the happy garden-bed, 
In the summer sunlight glows. 


And all the wondrous things of love 
That sang so sweet through the song 
Were in the look that met in their eyes, 

And the look was deep and long. 


°T was then a knock came at the outer 
gate, 
And the usher sought the King. 
‘*The woman you met by the Scottish 


ea, 
My Liege, would tell you a thing ; 
And she says that her present need for 
speech 
Will bear no gainsaying.” 
And the King said :—‘‘The hour is late ; 
To-morrow will serve, I ween.” 
Then he charged the usher strictly, and 
said : 
‘*No word of this to the Queen.” 


But the usher came again to the King, 
‘Shall I call her back? ’quoth he: 
‘* For as she went on her way, she cried, 


‘Woe! Woe! then the thing must 
be . ” 

And the King paused, but he did not 
speak. 


Then he called for the Voidee-cup : 
And as we heard the twelfth hour strike, 
There by true lips and false lips alike 

Was the draught of trust drained up. 


So with reverence meet to King and 
Queen, 
To bed went all from the board ; 
And the last to leave of the courtly train 
Was Robert Stuart the chamberlain 
Who had sold his sovereign lord. 


And all the locks of the chamber-door 
Had the traitor riven and brast ; 


818 


And that Fate might win sure way from 
afar, 
He had drawn out every bolt and bar 
That made the entrance fast. 


And now at midnight he stole his way 
To the moat of the outer wall, 

And laid strong hurdles closely across 
Where the traitors’ tread should fall. 


But we that were the Queen’s bower- 
maids 
Alone were left behind ; 
And with heed we drew the curtains 
close 
Against the winter wind. 


And now that all was still through the 
hall, 
More clearly we heard the rain 
That clamored ever against the glass 
And the boughs that beat on the pane. 


But the fire was bright in the ingle-nook, 
And through empty space around 
The shadows cast on the arras’d wall 
’Mid the pictured kings stood sudden and 
tall 
Like spectres sprung from the ground. 


And the bed was dight in a deep alcove ; 
And as he stood by the fire 

The king was still in talk with the Queen 
While he doffed his goodly attire. 


And the song had brought the image 
back 
Of many a bygone year ; 
And many a loving word they said 
With hand in hand and head laid to 
head ; 
And none of us went anear. 


But Love was weeping outside the house, 
A child in the piteous rain ; 
And as he watched the arrow of Death, 
He wailed for his own shafts close in the 
sheath 
That never should fly again. 


And now beneath the window arose 
A wild voice suddenly : 
And the King reared straight, but the 
@ueen fell back 
As for bitter dule to dree ; 
And all of us knew the woman’s voice 
Who spoke by the Scottish Sea. 


**O King,” she cried, ‘‘in an evil hour 
They drove me from thy gate ; 


BRITISH POETS 


And yet my voice must rise to thine 
ears ; 
But alas! it comes too late! 


‘* Last night at mid-watch, by Aberdour, 
When the moon was dead in theskies 
O King, ina death-light of thine own 
I saw thy shape arise. 


‘¢ And in full season, as erst I said, 
The doom had gained its growth ; 
And the shroud had risen above thy neck 
And covered thine eyes and mouth, 


‘And no moon woke, but the pale dawn 
broke, 
And still thy soul stood there ; 
And I thought its silence cried to my 
soul 
As the first rays crowned its hair. 


‘*Since then have I journeyed fast and 
fain 
In very despite of Fate, 
Lest Hope might still be found in God’s 
will: 
But they drove me from thy gate. 


‘“For every man on God’s ground, O 
King, 
His death grows up from his birth 
In a shadow-plant perpetually ; 
And thine towers high, a black yew- 
tree, 
O’er the Charterhouse of Perth!” 


That room was built far out from the 
house ; 
And none but we in the room 
Might hear the voice that rose beneath, 
Nor the tread of the coming doom. 


For now there came a torchlight-glare, 
And a clang of arms there came ; 

And not a soulin that space but thought 
Of the foe Sir Robert Graeme. 


Yea, from the country of the Wild Scots, 
O’er mountain, valley, and glen, 
He had brought with him in murderous 
league 
Three hundred armed men. 


The King knew all in an instant’s flash, 
And like a King did he stand ; 

But there was no armor in all the room, 
Nor weapon lay to his hand. 


And all we women flew to the door 
And thought to have made it fast: 


ROSSETTI 


But the bolts were gone and the bars’ 


were gone 
And the locks were riven and brast. 


And he caught the pale queen in his 
arms 
As the iron footsteps fell,— 
Then loosed her, standing alone, and 
said, 
‘*Our bliss was our farewell!” 


And ’twixt his lips he murmured a 
prayer, 
And he crossed his brow and breast ; 
And proudly in royal hardihood 
Even so with folded arms he stood,— 
The prize of the bloody quest. 


Then on me leaped the Queen like a 
deer : , 
‘Catherine, help!” she cried. 
And low at his feet we clasped his knees 
Together side by side. 
“Oh! even a King, for his people’s 
sake, 
From treasonous death must hide !” 


‘For her sake most!” I cried, and I 
marked 
The pang that my words would wring. 
And the iron tongs from the chimney- 
nook 
I snatched and held to the King :— 
‘Wrench up the plank! and the vault 
beneath 
Shall yield safe harboring.” 


With brows low-bent, from my eager 
hand 
The heavy heft did he take; 
And the plank at his feet he wrenched 
and tore ; 
And as he frowned through the open 
floor, 
Again I said, ‘‘ For her sake !” 


Then he cried to the Queen, ‘* God’s will 
be done!” 

For her hands were clasped in prayer. 
And down he sprang to the inner crypt ; 
And straight we closed the plank he had 

ripp’d 

And toiled to smoothe it fair. 


(Alas! in that vault a gap once was 
Wherethro’ the King might have fled ; 
But three days since close-walled had it 
been [therein 
By his will; for the ball would roll 
When without at the palm he play’d.) 


819 


Then the Queen cried, ** Catherine, keep 
the door, 
And I to this will suffice!” 
At her word I rose all dazed to my 
feet, 
And my heart was fire and ice. 


And louder ever the voices grew, 
And the tramp of men in mail; 

Until to my brain it seemed to be 

As though I tossed on a ship at sea 
In the teeth of a crashing gale. 


Then back I flew to the rest ; and hard 
We strove with sinews knit 

To force the table against the door ; 
But we might not compass it. 


Then my wild gaze sped far down the 
hall 
To the place of the hearthstone-sill ; 
And the Queen bent ever above the 
floor, 
For the plank was rising still. 


And now the rush was heard on the 
stair, 
And ‘* God, what help?” was our cry. 
And was I frenzied or was I bold? 
I looked at each empty stanchion-hold, 
And no bar but my arm had I! 


Like iron felt my arm, as through 
The staple I made it pass :— 
Alack! it was flesh and bone—no more! 
*T was Catherine Douglas sprang to the 
door, 
But I fell back Kate Barlass. 


With that they all thronged into the 
hall, 
Half dim to my failing ken ; 
And the space that was but a void before 
Was a crowd of wrathful men. 
Behind the door I had fall’n and lay, 
Yet my sense was wildly aware, 
And for all the pain of my shattered 
arm 
I never fainted there. 


Even as I fell, my eyes were cast 
Where the King leaped down to the 


pit ; 
And lo! the plank was smooth in its 
place, 
And the Queen stood far from it. 


And under the litters and through the 
bed 
And within the presses all 


820 





The traitors sought for the King, and 
pierced 
The arras around the wall, 


And through the chamber they ramped 
and stormed 
Like lion's loose in the lair, 
And scarce could trust to their very 
eyes,— 
For behold! no King was there. 


Than one of them seized the Queen, and 
cried ,— 
‘* Now tell us, where is thy lord ?” 
And he held the sharp point over her 
heart : [start, 
She drooped not her eyes nor did she 
But she answered never a word. 


Then the sword half pierced the true 
true breast : 
But it was the Greeme’s own son 
Cried, ‘‘ This is a woman,—we seek a 
man!” 
And away from her girdle-zone 
He struck the point of the murderous 
steel ; 
And that foul deed was not done. 


And forth flowed all the throng hkea 
sea, 
And ’t was empty space once more ; 
And my eyes sought out the wounded 
Queen , 
As I lay behind the door. 


And Isaid : ‘‘ Dear Lady, leave me here, 
For I cannot help you now ; 
But fly while you may, and none shall 
reck 
Of my place here lying low.” 


And she said, ‘‘ My Catherine, God help 
thee !” 
Then she looked to the distant floor, 
And clasping her hands, ‘‘ Oh God help 
him,” 
She sobbed, ‘‘ for we can no more!” 


But God He knows what help may mean, 
If it mean to live or to die; 

And what sore sorrow and mighty moan 

On earth it may cost ere yet a throne 
Be filled in His house on high. 


And now the ladies fled with the Queen ‘ 
And through the open door 
The night-wind wailed round the empty 
room 
And the rushes shook on the floor. 


BRITISH -POETS 


And the bed drooped low in the dark re- 
cess 
Whence the arras was rent away ; 
And the firelight still shone over the 
space 
Where our hidden secret lay. 


And the rain had ceased, and the moon- 
beams lit 
The window high in the wall,—— 
Bright beams that on the plank that I 
knew 
Through the painted pane did fall 
And gleamed with the splendor of 
_ Scotland’s crown 
And shield armorial. 


But then a great wind swept up the skies, 
And the climbing moon fell back ; 

And the royal blazon fled from the floor, 
And nought remained on its track ; 

And high in the darkened window-pane 
The shield and the crown were black. 


And what I say next I partly saw 
And partly I heard in sooth, 
And partly since from the murderers’ 
lips 
The torture wrung the truth. 


For now again came the arméd tread 
And fast through the hall it fell ; 

But the throng was less ; and ere I saw, 
By the voice without I could tell 

That Robert Stuart had come with them 
Who knew that chamber well. 


And over the space the Greeme strode 
dark 
With his mantle round him flung ; 
And in his eye was a flaming light 
But not a word on his tongue. 


And Stuart held a torch to the floor, 
And he found the thing he sought ; 
And they slashed the plank away with 

their swords ; 
And O God ! I fainted not! 


And the traitor held his torchin the gap, 
All smoking and smouldering ; 
And through the vapor and fire, beneath 
In the dark crypt’s narrow ring, 
With a shout that pealed to the room’s 
high roof 
They saw their naked King. 


Half naked he stood, but stood as one 
Who yet could do and dare: 


ROSSETTI 


With the crown, the King was stript 
away ,— 
The Knight was reft of his  battle- 
' array,— 
But still the Man was there. 


From the rout then stepped a villain 
forth,— 
Sir John Hall was his name ; 
With a knife unsheathed he leapt to the 
vault 
Beneath the torchlight-flame. 


_ Of his person and stature was the King 
A man right manly strong, 

And mightily by the shoulder-blades 
His foe to his feet he flung. 


Then the traitor’s brother, Sir Thomas 
Hall, 
Sprang down to work his worst ; 
And the King caught the second man 
by the neck 
And flung him above the first. 


And he smote and trampled them 
under him ; , 
And a long month thence they bare 
All black their throats with the grip of 
his hands 
When the hangman’s hand came there. 


And sore he strove to have had their 
knives, 
But the sharp blades gashed his hands. 
Oh James ! so armed, thou hadst battled 
there 
Till help had come of thy bands ; 
And oh! once more thou hadst held our 
throne 
And ruled thy Scottish lands! 


But while the King o’er his foes still 
raged 
With a heart that nought could tame, 
Another man sprang down to the crypt ; 
And with his sword in his hand hard- 
gripp’d 
There stood Sir Robert Graeme. 


(Now shame on the recreant traitor’s 
heart 
Who durst not face his King 
Till the body unarmed was wearied out 
With two-fold combating ! 


Ah! well might the people sing and say, 
As oft ye have heard aright :— 


**O Robert Greeme, O Robert Greme, 


But oh! to succor 


821 


Who slew our King, 
shame!” 
For he slew him not as a knight.) 


God give thee 


And the naked King turned round at bay, 
But his strength had passed the goal, 
And he could but gasp :—‘‘ Mine hour is 
come ; 
thine own soul’s 
doom, 
Let a priest now shrive my soul!” 


And the traitor looked on the King’s 
spent strength, 
And said :—‘*‘ Have I kept my word ?— 
Yea, King, the mortal pledge that I 
rave ? 
No black friar’s shrift thy soul shall save, 
But the shrift of this red sword!” 


With that he smote his King through 
the breast ; 
And all they three in that pen 
Fell on himand stabbed and stabbed him 
there 
Like merciless murderous men. 


Yet seemed 
Greme, 
Ere the King’s last breath was o’er, 
Turned sick at heart with the deadly 
sight 
And would have done no more. 


it now that Sir Robert 


But a cry came from the troop above: 
“Tf him thou do not slay, 

The price of his life that thou dost spare 
Thy forfeit life shall pay !” 


O God! what more did I hear or see, 
Or how should I tell the rest ? 

But there at length our King lay slain 
With sixteen wounds in his breast. 


O God! and now did a bell boom forth, 
And the murderers turned and fled ;— 
Too late, too late, O God, did it sound !— 
And I heard the true men mustering 
round, 
And the cries and the coming tread. 


But ere they came to the black death- 
gap 
Somewise did I creep and steal ; 
And lo! or ever I swooned away, 
Through the dusk I saw where the white 
face lay 
In the Pit of Fortune’s Wheel. 


822 





And now, ye Scottish maids who have 
heard 
Dread things of the days grown old,— 
Even at the last, of true Queen Jane 
May somewhat yet be told, 
And how she dealt for her dearlord’s sake 
Dire vengeance manifold. 


°T was in the Charterhouse of Perth, 
In the fair-lit Death-chapelle, 
That the slain King’s corpse on bier was 
lain 
With chant and requiem-knell. 


And all with royal wealth of balm 
Was the body purified : 
And none could trace on the brow and 


lips 
The death that he had died. 


In his robes of state he lay asleep 
With orb and sceptre in hand ; 

And by the crown he wore on his throne 
Was his kingly forehead spann’d. 


And, girls, *t was a sweet sad thing to see 
How the curling golden hair, 

As in the day of the poet’s youth, 
From the King’s crown clustered there. 


And if all had come to pass in the brain 
That throbbed beneath those curls, 
Then Scots had said in the days to come 
That this their soil was a different home 

And a different Scotland, girls! 


And the Queen sat by him night and day, 
And oft she knelt in prayer, 

All wan and pale in the widow’s veil 
That shrouded her shining hair. 


And Thad got good help of my hurt : 
And only to me some sign 
She made; and save the priests that 
were there 
No face would she see but mine. 


And the month of March wore on apace ; 
And now fresh couriers fared 

Still from the country of the Wild Scots 
With news of the traitors snared. 


And still as I told her day by day, 
Her pallor changed to sight, 


BRITISH POETS 





And the frost grew to a furnace-flame 
That burnt her visage white. 


And evermore as I brought her word, 
She bent to her dead King James, 
And in the cold ear with fire-drawn 
breath 
She spoke the traitors’ names. 


But when the name of Sir Robert Greeme 
Was the one she had to give, 

I ran to hold her up from the floor ; 

For the froth was on her lips, and sore 
I feared that she could not live. 


And the month of March wore nigh to 
its end, 
And still was the death-pall spread ; 
For she would not bury her slaughtered 
lord 
Till his slayers all were dead. 


And now of their dooms dread tidings 
came, 
And of torments fierce and dire ; 
And nought she spake,—she had ceased 
to speak,— 
But her eyes were a soul on fire. 


3ut when I told her the bitter end 
Of the stern and just award, 
She leaned o’er the bier, and thrice 
three times 
She kissed the lips of her lord. 


And then she said,——‘‘ My King, they are 
dead!” 
And she knelt on the chapel-floor, 
And whispered low witha strange proud 
smile,— 
‘‘ James, James, they suffered more ! ” 


Last she stood up to her queenly height, 
But she shook like an autumn leaf, 
As though the fire wherein she burned 
Then left her body, and all were turned 

To winter of life-long grief. 
And ‘‘O James!” she said,—‘t My 
James!” she said,— 
‘** Alas for the woful thing, 
That a poet true and a friend of man, 
In desperate days of bale and ban, 
Should needs be born a King!” 1881. 


MORRIS 
LIST OF REFERENCES 


Ep1ItTIons 


* Poetical Works of William Morris, 11 volumes, Longmans, Green & 
Co., 1896-8. The Earthly Paradise, 1 volume, Reeves & Turner, 1890. 
The Defence of Guenevere, Kelmscott Press, 1892. The Life and Death 
of Jason, Kelmscott Press, 1895. The Earthly Paradise, 8 volumes, 
1896-7. Poems by the Way, Kelmscott Press, 1891. (The four beauti- 
ful editions last mentioned are now practically unobtainable.) 


BioGRAPHY 


* Macxait (J. W.), Life of William Morris, 2 volumes, 1899 (The 
standard biography). WVautitance (Aymer), The late William Morris, 
1896. * VaLuance (Aymer), William Morris; His Art, his Writings and 
his Public Life. A Record, 1897. Cary (E. L.), William Morris: Poet, 
Craftsman, Socialist, 1902. CiarKke (William), William Morris, A Sketch 
of the Man; in F. W. Lee’s William Morris, Poet, Artist, Socialist —A 
Selection from his Writings. See also S.C. Cockerell’s History of the 
Kelmscott Press, Percy H. Bate’s History of the Pre-Raphaelite Move- 
ment, and the other biographical references under Rossetti. 


CRITICISM 


Cazauts (H.) (“Jean Lahor”), William Morris et le Mouvement nou- 
veau de l’Art décoratif. CuEsrertron (G. K.), Twelve Types: William 
Morris and his School. Crane (Walter), William Morris, in Scribner’s 
Magazine, July, 1897. Dowven (E.), Transcripts and Studies: Victorian 
Literature. Forman (H. B.), Our Living Poets. Hewnzerr (M.), Wil- 
liam Morris; in The National Review, August, 1891. * Hupsarp (E.), 
The Philistine, Vol. IX, No. 4. Hussarp (E.), Little Journeys to the 
Homes of English Authors. Lane (A.), The Poetry of Wiliam Morris; 
in the Contemporary Review, August, 1882. Lane (A.), William Morris’s 
Poems; in Longman’s Magazine, October, 1896. Loverr (R. M.), Wil- 
liam Morris,; in the Harvard Monthly, 1891; Vol. XII, p. 149. Macxkarn | 
(J. W.), William Morris: An address. Myers (F. W. H.), William Mor- 
ris and the Meaning of Life; in The Nineteenth Century, January, 1893. 
Norptey (C. H.), Influence of Old Norse Literature upon English Litera- 

823 


824 BRITISH POETS 


ture. Norron (C. E.), The Life and Death of Jason; in The Nation, 
August 22, 1867. Payne (W. M.), in Warner’s Library of the World’s 
Best Literature. * Sarntspury (G.), Corrected Impressions. * Suarp 
(W.), William Morris: The Man and his Work; in The Atlantic Monthly, 
December, 1896. Suaw (G. B.), Morris as Actor and Dramatist ; in The 
Saturday Review, October 10, 1896. Suaw (G. B.), William Morris as a 
Socialist; in The Daily Chronicle, October 6, 1896. StrEpmaw (E. C.), 
Victorian Poets. **Swinpurne (A. C.), Essays and Studies: Morris’s 
Life and Death of Jason. Symons (Arthur), Studies in two Literatures. 
Watrs-Dunton (T.), William Morris; in The Atheneum, October 10, 


1896. 


Wyrzrwa (T. de), Ecrivains étrangers. 


Yeats (W. B.), Ideas of 


Good and Evil; The happiest of the Poets. 


Dawson (W. J.), Makers of Modern English. 


Art of William Morris. 


GaLton (A.), Urbana Scripta. 
garet), The Victorian Age of Literature. 


Day (L. F.), Decorative 
Oxreuant (Mar- 
RiEGEL (Juxrus), Die Quellen 


von William Morris’s Dichtung “The Earthly Paradise,” Erlanger Bei- 


trige zur Englischen Philologie. 


ScuppER (V. D.), Life of the Spirit in 


Modern English Poetry. Suarp (Amy), Victorian Poets. 


BrBLti0oGRAPHY 


* Scorr (Temple), A Bibliography of the Works of William Morris. 
* Forman (IH. B.), The books of William Morris. 


MORRIS 


WINTER WEATHER 


WE rode together 
In the winter weather 
To the broad mead under the hill ; 
Though the skies did shiver 
With the cold, the river > 
Ran, and was never still. 


No cloud did darken 
The night; we did harken 
The hound’s bark far away. 
It was solemn midnight 
In that dread, dread night, 
In the years that have pass’d for aye. 


Two rode beside me, 
My banner did hide me, 
As it drooped adown from my lance ; 
With its deep blue trapping, — 
The mail over-lapping, 
My gallant horse did prance. 


So ever together 
In the sparkling weather 
Moved my banner and lance; 
And its laurel trapping, 
The steel over-lapping, 
The stars saw quiver and dance. 


We met together 
In the winter weather 
By the town-walls under the hill; 
His mail rings came clinking, 
They broke on my thinking, 
For the night was hush’d and still. 


Two rode beside him, 
His banner did hide him, 
As it drooped down straight from his 
lance ; 
With its blood-red trapping, 
The mail over-lapping. 
His mighty horse did prance, 


MORRIS 





And ever together 
In the solemn weather 
Moved his banner and lance; 
And the holly trapping, 
The steel over-lapping, 
Did shimmer and shiver, and dance. 


Back reined the squires 

Till they saw the spires 
Over the city wall ; 

Ten fathoms between us, 

No dames could have seen us 
Tilt from the city wall. 


There we sat upright 
Till the full midnight 
Should be told from the city’s chimes ; 
Sharp from the towers 
Leaped forth the showers 
Of the many clanging rhymes. 


*T was the midnight hour, 
Deep from the tower 

Boom’d the following bell ; 
Down go our lances, 
Shout for the lances! 

The last toll was his knell. 


There he lay, dying : 
He had, for his lying, 
A spear in his traitorous mouth ; 
A false tale made he 
Of my true, true lady ; 
But the spear went through his mouth. 


In the winter weather 
We rode back together 
From the broad mead under the hill ; 
And the cock sung his warning 
As it grew toward morning, 
But the far-off hound was still. 


Black grew his tower 
As we rode down lower, 
Black from the barren hill ; 
And our horses strode 
Up the winding road 
To the gateway dim and still. 


At the gate of his tower, 
In the quiet hour, 

We laid his body there ; 
But his helmet broken, 
We took as a token ; 

Shout for my lady fair! 


We rode back together 
In the wintry weather 
From the broad mead under the hill ; 


825 





No cloud did darken 
The night ; we did harken 
How the hound bay’d from the hill. 
January, 1856.1 


RIDING TOGETHER 


For many, many days together 
The wind blew steady from the East ; 
For many days hot grew the weather, 
About the time of our Lady’s Feast. 


For many days we rode together, 
Yet met we neither friend nor foe ; 
Hotter and clearer grew the weather, 
Steadily did the East wind blow. 


We saw the trees in the hot, bright 
weather, 
Clear-cut, with shadows very black, 
As freely we rode on together 
With helms unlaced and bridles slack. 


And often as we rode together, 
We, looking down the green-bank’d 
stream, 
Saw flowers in the sunny weather, 
And saw the bubble-making bream. 


And in the night lay down together, 
And hung above our heads the rood, 
Or watch'd night-long in the dewy 

weather, 
The while the moon did watch the 
wood. 


Our spears stood bright and thick to- 
gether, 3 
Straight out the banners stream’d 
behind, 
As we gallop’d on in the sunny weather, 
With faces turn’d towards the wind. 


Down sank our threescore spears to- 
gether, 
As thick we saw the pagans ride; 
His eager face in the clear fresh weather, 
Shone out that last time by my side. 


Up the sweep of the bridge we dash’d 
together, 
It rock’d to the crash of the meeting 
spears, 


1The dates for Morris’s poems have been com- 
piled with the help of Mr. Temple Scott’s excel- 
lent Bibliography of the Works of William 
Morris, and Mr, Forman’s The Books of William 
Morris, 


826 


Down rain’d the buds of the dear spring 
weather, 
The elm-tree flowers fell like tears. 


There, as we roll’d and writhed together, 
I threw my arms above my head, 
For close by my side, in the lovely 
weather, 
I saw him reel and fall back dead. 


I and the slayer met together, 
He waited the death-stroke there in 
his place, 
With thoughts of death, in the lovely 
weather, 
Gapingly mazed at my madden’d face. 


Madly I fought as we fought together ; 
In vain: the little Christian band 
The pagans drown’d, as in stormy 
weather, 
The river drowns low-lying land. 


They bound my blood-stain’d hands _ to- 
gether, 
They bound his corpse to nod by my 
side : 
Then on we rode, in the bright March 
weather, 
With clash of cymbals did we ride. 


We ride no more, no more together ; 
My prison-bars are thick and strong, 
I take no heed of any weather, 
The sweet Saints grant I live not long. 
May, 1856. 


THE CHAPEL IN LYONESS 


“SIR OZANA LE CURE HARrpDy. 
GALAHAD. SIR BORS DE GANYS. 


SIR 


Sir Ozana. All day longand every day, 
From Christmas-Eve to Whit-Sunday, 
Within that Chapel-aisle I lay, 

And no man came a-near. 


Naked to the waist was I, 

And deep within my breast did lie, 

Though no man any blood could spy, 
The truncheon of a spear. 


No meat did ever pass my lips 

Those days. Alas! the sunlight slips 

From off the gilded parclose, dips, 
And night comes on apace. 


My arms lay back behind my head ; 
Over my raised-up knees was spread 
A samite cloth of white and red ; 

A rose lay on my face. 


BRITISH POETS 


Many a time I tried to shout ; 

But as in dream of battle-rout, 

My frozen speech would not well out ; 
I could not even weep. 


With inward sigh I see the sun 

Fade off the pillars one by one, 

My heart faints when the day is done, 
Because I cannot sleep. 


Sometimes strange thoughts 
through my head ; 
Not like a tomb is this my bed, 
Yet oft I think that I am dead ; 
That round my tomb is writ, 


pass 


‘‘Ozana of the hardy heart, 
Knight of the Table Round, 

Pray for his soul, lords, of your part ; 
A true knight he was found.” 


Ah! me, I cannot fathom it. [He sleeps. 


Sir Galahad. All day long and every day, 
Till his madness pass’d away, 
I watch’d Ozana as he lay 

Within the gilded screen. 


All my singing moved him not ; 

As Isung my heart grew hot, 

With the thought of Launcelot 
Far away, I ween. 


So I went a little space 
From out the chapel, bathed my face 
In the stream that runs apace 

By the churchyard wall. 


There I pluck’d a faint wild rose, 
Hard by where the linden grows, 
Sighing over silver rows 

Of the lilies tall. 


I laid the flower across his mouth ; 
The sparkling drops seem’d good for 
drouth ; 
He smiled, turn’d round towards the 
south, 
Held up a golden tress. 


The light smote on it from the west ; 

He drew the covering from his breast, 

Against his heart that hair he pressed ; 
Death him soon will bless. 


Sir Bors. I enter’d by the western door; 
I saw a knight’s helm lying there ; 

I raised my eyes from off the floor, 
And caught the gleaming of his hair. 


MORRIS 





I stept full softly up to him ; 

I laid my chin upon his head ; 

I felt him smile ; my eyes did swim, 
I was so glad he was not dead. 


I heard Ozana murmur low. 

‘* There comes no sleep nor any love.” 
But Galahad stoop’d and kiss’d his brow : 
_ He shiver’d ; I saw his pale lips move. 


Sir Ozana. There comes no sleep nor 
any love; 
Ah me! I shiver with delight. 
Iam so weak I cannot move ; 
God move me to thee, dear, to-night ! 
Christ help! I have but little wit : 
My life went wrong ; I see it writ, 


‘* Ozana of the hardy heart, 
Knight of the Table Round, 
Pray for his soul, lords, on your part ; 
A good knight he was found.” 
Now I begin to fathom it. [ He dies. 
Sir Bors. Galahad sits dreamily : 
What strange things may his eyes see, 
Great blue eyes fix’d full on me ? 
On his soul, Lord, have mercy. 


Sir Galahad. Ozana, shall I pray for 
thee ? 
Her cheek is laid to thine ; 
No long time hence, also I see 
Thy wasted fingers twine 


Within the tresses of her hair 
That shineth gloriously, 
Thinly outspread in the clear air 
Against the jasper sea. 
September, 1856. 


SUMMER DAWN 


PRAY but one prayer for me *twixt thy 
closed lips ; 
Think but one thought of me up inthe 
stars. 
The summer night waneth, the morning 
light slips, 
Faint and gray ’twixt the leaves of the 
aspen, betwixt the cloud-bars, 
That are patiently waiting there for the 
dawn : 
Patient and colorless, though Heaven’s 


gold 

Waits to float through them along with 
the sun. 

Far out in the meadows, above the young 
corn, 


827 


The heavy elms wait, and restless and 
cold 
The uneasy wind rises; the roses are 


dun ; 
They pray the long gloom through for 
daylight new born, 
Round the lone house in the midst of 
the corn. 
Speak but one word to me over the 
corn, 
Over the tender, bow’d locks of the 
corn. October, 1856. 


HANDS 


*TWIXxT the sunlight and the shade 
Float up memories of my maid: 
God, remember Guendolen ! 


Gold or gems she did not wear, 
But her yellow rippled hair, 
Like a veil, hid Guendolen ! 


‘Twixt the sunlight and the shade, 
My rough hands so strangely made, 
Folded Golden Guendolen. 


Hands used to grip the sword-hilt hard, 
Framed her face, while on the sward 
Tears fell down from Guendolen. 


Guendolen now speaks no word, 
Hands fold round about the sword : 
Now no more of Guendolen. 


Only ’twixt the light and shade 
Floating memories of my maid 
Make me pray for Guendolen. 
1856. 


GOLD HAIR 


Is it not true that every day 

She climbeth up the same strange way, 

Her scarlet cloak spread broad and gay, 
Over my golden hair ? 


When I undo the knotted mass, 
Fathoms below the shadows pass 
Over my hair along the grass. 
O my golden hair! 
See on the marble parapet, 7 
I lean my brow, strive to forget 
That fathoms below my hair grows wet 
With the dew, my golden hair. 


See on the marble parapet, 

The faint red stains with tears are wet; 

The long years pass, no help comes yet 
To free my golden hair. 


828 


And yet: but Iam growing old, 

For want of love my heart is cold ; 
Years pass, the while I loose and fold 
The fathoms of my hair. 

1858.1 


THE DEFENCE OF GUENEVERE 


But, knowing now that they would have 
her speak, 

She threw her wet hair backward from 
her brow, 

Her hand close to her mouth touching 
her cheek, 


As though she had had there a shameful 
blow, 

And feeling it shameful to feel aught 
but shame 

All through her heart, yet felt her cheek 
burned so, 


She must a little touch it; like one lame 

She walked away from Gauwaine, with 
her head 

Still lifted up; 
flame 


and on her cheek of 


The tears dried quick; she stopped at 
last and said : 

‘*O knights and lords, it seems but little 
skill 

To talk of well-known things past now 
and dead. 


** God wot Iought to say, I have doneill, 

And pray you all forgiveness heartily ! 

Because you must be right, such great 
lords; still 


‘‘Listen, suppose your time were come 
to die, 

And you were quite alone and very 
weak ; 

Yea, laid a dying while very mightily 


‘The wind was ruffling up the narrow 
streak 

Of river through your broad lands run- 
ning well: 

Suppose a hush should come, then some 
one speak : 


‘**One of these cloths is heaven, and one 
is hell, 


* The preceding, poem, Hands, published 
under that title in the Oxford and Cambridge 
Magazine, 1856, and the lyrie stanzas to w hich I 
have here given the title Gold Hair, both form 
part of Rapunzel in the Guenevere volume, 1858. 


BRITISH, POETS 


Now choose one cloth for ever ; which 


they be, 


‘| I will not tell you, you must somehow 


tell 


‘«¢Of your own strength and mightiness ; 
here, see!’ 

Yea, yea, my lord, and you to ope your 
eyes, 

At foot of your familiar bed to see 


“A great God’s angel standing, with 
such dyes, 

Not known on earth, on his great wings, 
and hands, 

Held out two ways, light from the inner 
skies 


‘‘Showing. him well, and making his 
commands 
Seem to be God’s commands, moreover, 


too, 
Holding within his hands the cloths on 
wands ; 


“And one of these strange choosing 
cloths was blue, 
Wavy and long, and one cut short and 


red ; 
No man could tell the better of the two. 


‘« After a shivering half-hour you said : 

‘God help! heaven’s color, the blue ;’ 
and he said, ‘ hell.’ 

Perhaps you would then roll upon your 
bed, 


‘* And cry to all good men that loved 
you well, 

‘Ah Christ! if only I had known, 
known, known ;’ 

Launcelot went away, then I could tell, 


‘‘ Like wisest man how all things would 
be, moan, 

And rolland hurt myself, and long to die, 

And yet fear much to die for what was 
sown. 


‘* Nevertheless you, O Sir Gauwaine, lie, 

Whatever may have happened through 
these years, 

God knows I speak truth, 
you lie.” 


saying that 


Her voice was low at first, being full of 
tears, 

But as it cleared, it grew full loud and 
shrill, 

Growing a windy shriek in all men’s 
ears, 


MORRIS 


A ringing in their startled brains, until 

She said that Gauwaine lied, then her 
voice sunk, 

And her great eyes began again to fill, 


Though still she stood right up, and 
never shrunk, 
But spoke on bravely, glorious lady fair ! 
Whatever tears her full lips may have 
. drunk, 


She stood, and seemed to think, and 
wrung her hair, 

Spoke out at last with no more trace of 
shame, 

With passionate twisting of her body 
there : 


‘** Tt chanced upon a day that Launcelot 


came 

To dwell at Arthur’s court: at Christ- 
mastime 

This happened ; when the heralds sung 
his name, 


‘*Son of King Ban of Benwick, seemed 
to chime 
Along with all the bells that rang that 


ay, 
O’er the white roofs, with little change 
of rhyme. 


** Christmas and whitened winter passed 
away, 

And over me the April sunshine came, 

Made very awful with black hail-clouds, 
yea 


** And in the Summer I grew white with 
flame, 

And bowed my head down: Autumn, 
and the sick 

Sure knowledge things would never be 
the same, 


‘*However often Spring might be most 
thick 

Of blossoms and buds, smote on me, and 
I grew 

Careless of most things, let the clock 
tick, tick, 


“To my unhappy pulse, that beat right 
through 

My eager body ; while I laughed out loud, 

And let my lips curl up at false or true, 


**Seemed cold and shallow without any 
cloud. 


829 


Behold, my judges, then the cloths were 
brought ; 

While I was dizzied thus, old thoughts 
would crowd, 


‘* Belonging to the time ere I was bought 

By Arthur’s great name and his little 
love; 

Must I give up for ever then, I thought, 


“That which I deemed would ever 
round me move 

Glorifying all things ; for a little word, 

Scarce ever meant at all, must I now 
prove 


‘*Stone-cold for ever? Pray you, does 
the Lord 

Will that all folks should be quite happy 
and good ? 

I love God now a little, if this cord 


‘* Were broken, once for all what striving 
could 

Make me love anything in earth or 
heaven ? 

So day by day it grew, as if one should 


‘*Slip slowly down some path worn 
smooth and even, 

Down to a cool sea on a summer day ; 

Yet still in slipping there was some 
small leaven 


‘‘Of stretched hands catching small 
stones by the way, 

Until one surely reached the sea at last, 

And felt strange new joy as the worn 
head lay 


‘*Back, with the hair like sea-weed ; 
yea all past 

Sweat of the forehead, dryness of the lips, 

Washed utterly out by the dear waves 
o’ercast, 


‘“‘In the lone sea, far off from any ships! 
Do I not know now of a day in Spring? 
No minute of that wild day ever slips 


‘From out my memory ; [hear thrushes 
sing, 

And wheresoever I may be, straightway 

Thoughts of it all come up with most 
fresh sting : 


‘*T was half mad with beauty on that 
day, 

And went without my ladies all alone, 

Ina quiet garden walled round every 
way ; 


830 


‘*T wasright joyful of that wall of stone, 

That shut the flowers and trees up with 
the sky, 

And trebled all the beauty: tothe bone, 


‘Yea right through to my heart, grown 
very shy 

With wary thoughts, 
made me glad ; 

Exceedingly glad, and I knew verily, 


it pierced, and 


‘‘ A little thing just then had made me 
mad ; 

I dared not think, as I was wont to do, 

Sometimes, upon my beauty ; If I had 


‘* Held out my long hand up against the 
blue, 

And, looking on the tenderly darken’d 
fingers, 

Thought that by rights one ought to see 
quite through, 


“There, see you, where the soft still 
light yet lingers, 

Round by the edges ; what should I have 
done, 

If this had joined with yellow spotted 
singers, 


‘* And startling green drawn upward by 
the sun ? 

But shouting, loosed out, see now! all 
my hair, 

And trancedly stood watching the west 
wind run 


“With faintest half-heard breathing 
sound : why there 

I lose my head e’en now in doing this ; 

But shortly listen : In that garden fair 


‘“Came Launcelot walking ; this is true, 
the kiss 

Wherewith we kissed in meeting that 
spring day 

I scarce dare talic of the remember’d bliss, 


‘* When both our mouths .went wander- 
ing in one way, 

And aching sorely, met among the 
leaves ; 

Our hands being left behind strained 
far away. 


‘‘Never within a yard of my _ bright 
sleeves 

Had Launcelot come before: 
so nigh! 

After that day why 
grieves ? 


and now 


is it Guenevere 


BRITISH POETS 


‘* Nevertheless you, O Sir Gauwaine, lie, 

Whatever happened on through all 
those years, 

God knows I speak truth, saying that 
you lie. 


‘* Being such a lady could I weep these 
tears 

If this were true ? A great queensuchasI . 

Having sinn’d this way, straight her 
conscience sears ; 

‘* And afterwards she liveth hatefully, 

Slaying and poisoning, certes never 
weeps: 

Gauwaine be friends 
lovingly. 


now, speak me 


‘*Do I not see how God’s dear pity creeps 

All through your frame, and trembles in 
your mouth ? 

Remember in what grave your mother 
sleeps, 


‘Buried in some place far down in the 
south 

Men are forgetting as I speak to you ; 

By her head sever’d in that awful drouth 


‘‘ Of pity that drew Agravaine’s fell blow, 
I pray your pity ! let me not scream out 
Forever after, when the shrill winds blow 


‘Through half your castle-locks! let 
me not shout 

For ever after in the winter night 

When you ride out alone! in battle-rout 


‘Let not my rusting tears make your 
sword light ! 

Ah! God of mercy, how he turns away ! 

So, ever must I dress me to the fight, 


‘*So : let God’s justice work ! Gauwaine, 
I say, 

See me hew down your proofs : 
men know 

Even as you said how Mellyagraunce one 
day, 


‘¢One bitter day in la Fausse Garde, for so 

All good knights held it after, saw : 

Yea, sirs, by cursed: unknightly outrage ; 
though 


yea all 


“You, Gauwaine, held his word without 
a flaw. 


Not so, fair lords, even if the world 
should end 


MORRIS 


“This very day, and you were judges 
here 

Instead of God. Did you see Mellya- 
graunce 

When Launcelot stood by him? what 

: white fear 


“Curdled his blood, and how his teeth 
did dance, 

His side sink in? as my knight cried and 
said : 

‘Slayer of unarm’d men, hereisa chance ! 


** *Setter of traps, I pray you guard your 
head, 

By God I am so glad to fight with you, 

Stripper of ladies, that my hand feels lead 


“For driving weight; hurrah now! 
draw and do, 

For all my wounds are moving in my 
breast, 

And I am getting mad with waiting so.’ 


‘¢He struck his hands together o’er the 
‘beast, 

Who fell down flat, and grovell’d at his 
feet, 

And groan’d at being slain so young: 
‘ At least,’ 


‘*My knight said, ‘ Rise you, sir, who are 
so fleet 
At catching ladies, half-arm’d will I 


My left side all uncovered !’ then I weet, 


‘Up sprang Sit 
great delight 

Upon his knave’s face; not until just 
then 

Did I quite hate him, as I saw my knight 


Mellyagraunce with 


‘** Along the lists look to my stake and 
pen 

With such a joyous smile, it made me 
sigh 

From agony beneath my waist-chain, 
when 


‘*The fight began, and to me they drew 
nigh ; 

Ever Sir Launcelot kept him on the right, 

And traversed warily, and ever high 


‘¢ And fast leapt caitiff’s sword, until my 
knight 

Sudden threw up his sword to his left 
hand, 

Caught it and swung it ; that was all the 


ght ; 


“sethagefellion-me: 


831 


‘* Except a spout of blood on the hot land ; 

For it was hottest summer ; and I know 

I wonder’d how the fire, while I should 
stand, 


‘And burn, against the heat, would 
quiver 80, 

Yards above my head; thus these mat- 
ters went ; 

Which things were only warnings of 
the woe 


Yet Mellyagraunce 
was shent, 

For Mellyagraunce had fought against 
the Lord ; 

Therefore, my lords, take heed lest you 
be blent 


‘* With all his wickedness ; say no rash 
word 

Against me, being so beautiful ; my eyes 

Wept all away to gray, may bring some 
sword 


‘*To drown you in your blood ; see my 
breast rise, 

Like waves of purple sea, as here I stand ; 

And how my arms are moved in won- 
derful wise, 


‘* Yea also at my full heart’s strong com- 
mand, 

See through my long throat how the 
words go up 

In ripples to my mouth ; how in my hand 


‘* The shadow lies like wine within acup 
Of marvellously color’d gold; yea now 
This little wind is rising, look you up, 


‘* And wonder how the light is falling so 

Within my moving tresses : will you dare 

When -you have looked a lttle on my 
brow, 


‘*To say this thing is vile? or will you 
care 

For any plausible lies of cunning woof, 

When you can see my face with no lie 
there 


‘* For ever ? am I not a gracious proof ?— 
‘But in your chamber Launcelot was 


found ’— 

Is there a good knight then would stand 
aloof, 

‘When a queen says with gentle 


queenly sound: 


832 BRITISH POETS 


‘O true as steel, come now and talk with 
me, 
I love to see your step upon the ground 


‘¢* Unwavering, also well I love to see 

That gracious smile light up your face, 
and hear 

Your wonderful words, that all mean 
verily 


‘ceThe thing they seem to mean : 
friend, so dear 

To mein everything, come here to-night, 

Or else the hours will pass most dull and 
drear ; 


good 


‘** Tf you come not, I fear this time I 
might 
Get thinking over much of times gone 


y, 
When I was young, and green hope was 
in sight : 


‘** For no man cares now to know why I 


sigh ; 

And no man comes to sing me pleasant 
songs, 

Nor any brings me the sweet flowers 
that lie 


*** So thick in the gardens; therefore 
one so longs 
To see you, Launcelot; that we may be 


Like children once again, free from all 


wrongs 

*** Just for one night.’ Did he not come 
to me? 

What thing could keep true Launcelot 
away 

If I said, ‘Come?’ there was one less 


than three 


‘¢In my quiet room that night, and we 
were gay ; 

Till sudden I rose up, weak, pale, and 
sick, 

Because a bawling broke our dream up, 
yea 


‘* T looked at Launcelot’s face and could 
not speak, 

For he looked helpless too, fora little 
while ; 

Then I remember how I tried to shriek, 


** And could not, but fell down; 
tile to tile 

The stones they threw up rattled o’er 

my head | while 

made me dizzier; till within a 


from 


And 


‘* My maids were all about me, and my 
head 

On Launcelot’s breast was being soothed 
away 

From its white chattering, until Launce-_ 
lot said as 


‘* By God! I will not tell you more to- 


day, 

Judge any way you will: what matters 
it? 

You know quite well the story of that 
fray, 


‘How Launcelot still’d their bawling, 
the mad fit 

That caught up Gauwaine, all, all, 
verily, 

But just that which would save me; 
these things flit. 


‘* Nevertheless you, O Sir Gauwaine, lie, 

Whatever may have happen’d these long 
years, 

God knows I speak truth, saying that 
you lie! 


‘* All I have said is truth, by Christ’s 
dear tears.’ 
She would not speak another word, but 
stood 
Turn’d sideways ;. listening, like a man 
who hears 

His brother’s trumpet sounding through 
the wood 

Of his foes’ lances. She leaned eagerly, 

And gave a slight spring sometimes, as 
she could 


At last hear something really ; joyfully 

Her cheek grew crimson, as the head- 
long speed 

Of the roan charger drew all men to see, 

The knight who came was Launcelot at 
good need. 1858. 


THE GILLIFLOWER OF GOLD 


A golden gilliflower to-day 

I wore upon my helm alway, 

And won the prize of this tourney. 
Hah! hah! la belle jaune giroflée. 


However well Sir Giles might sit, 

His sun was weak to wither it,  . 

Lord Miles’s blood was dew on it: 
Hah! hah ! la belle jaune giroflée. 


MORRIS 


$33 





Although my spear in splinters flew, 
From John’s steel-coat, my eye was 
true ; 
I wheel’d about, and cried for you, 
Hah! hah! la belle jaune giroflée. 


Yea, do not doubt my heart was good, 

Though my sword flew like rotten wood, 

To shout, although I scarcely stood, 
Hah! hah! la belle jaune giroflée. 


My hand was steady too, to take 

My axe from round my neck, and break 

John’s steel-coat up for my love’s sake. 
Hah ! hah ! la belle jaune giroflée. 


When I stood in my tent again, 

Arming afresh, I felt a pain 

Take hold of me, I was so fain— 
Hah! hah! la belle jaune giroflée— 


To hear: Honneur aux fils des preux ! 
Right in my ears again, and shew 
The gilliflower blossom’d new. 

_ Hah! hah! la belle jaune giroflée. 


The Sieur Guillaume against me came, 

His tabard bore three points of flame 

From a red heart ; with little blame,— 
Hah! hah! la belle jaune giroflée,— 


Our tough spears crackled up like straw ; 

He was the first to turn and draw 

His sword, that had nor speck nor flaw ; 
Hah! hah! la belle jaune giroflée. 


But I felt weaker than a maid, 

_ And my brain, dizzied and afraid, 

Within my helm a fierce tune play’d, 
Hah! hah! la belle jaune giroflée, 


Until I thought of your dear head, 

Bow’d to the gilliflower bed, 

The yellow flowers stain’d with red ; 
Hah! hah ! la belle jaune giroflée. 


Crash! how the swords met: giroflée! 
The fierce tune in my helm would play, 
La belle! la belle! jaune giroflée ! 

Hah ! hah! la belle jaune giroflée. 


Once more the great swords met again : 
** La belle! la belle!” but who fell then ? 
Le Sieur Guillaume, who struck down 
ten ; 
Hah! hah! la belle jaune giroflée. 


And as with mazed and unarm’d face, 
Toward my own crown and the Queen’s 
place, 


53 


They led me at a gentle pace.— 
Hah! hah! la belle jaune giroflée,— 


I almost saw your quiet head 
Bow’d o’er the gilliflower bed. 
The yellow flowers stain’d with red. 
Hah! hah! la belle jaune giroflée. 
1858, 


SHAMEFUL DEATH 


THERE were four of us about that bed ; 
The mass-priest knelt at the side, 

I and his mother stood at the head, 
Over his feet lay the bride ; 

We were quite sure that he was dead, 
Though his eyes were open wide. 


He did not die in the night, 
He did not die in the day, 

But in the morning twilight 
His spirit pass’d away, 

When neither sun nor moon was bright, 
And the trees were merely gray. 


He was not slain with the sword, 
Knight’s axe, or the knightly spear, 
Yet spoke he never a word 
After he came in here; 
I cut away the cord 
From the neck of my brother dear. 


He did not strike one blow, 
For the recreants came behind, 

In a place where the hornbeams grow, 
A path right hard to find, 

For the hornbeam boughs swing so, 
That the twilight makes it blind. 


They lighted a great torch then, 
When his arms were pinion’d fast, 
Sir John the knight of the Fen, 
Sir Guy of the Dolorous Blast, 
With knights threescore and ten, 
Hung brave Lord Hugh at last. 


Iam threescore and ten, 
And my hair is all turn’d gray, 
But I met Sir John of the Fen 
Long ago on a summer day, 
Andam glad to think of the moment 
when 
I took his life away. 


I am threescore and ten, 
And my strength is mostly pass’d, 
But long ago I and my men, 
When the sky was overcast, 
And the smoke roll’d over the reeds of 
the fen, 
Slew Guy of the Dolorous Blast. 


834 


And now, knights all of you, 
I pray you pray for Sir Hugh, 
A good knight and a true, 
And for Alice, his wife, pray too. 
1858. 


THE EVE OF CRECY 


Gop on her head, and gold on her feet, 
And gold where the hems of her kirtle 
meet, 
And a golden girdle round my sweet ; 
Ah! qu'elle est belle La Marguerite. 


Margaret’s maids are fair to see, 

Freshly dress’d and pleasantly ; 

Margaret’s hair falls down to her knee ; 
Ah! qwelle est belle La Marguerite. 


If I were rich I would kiss her feet ; 
I would kiss the place where the gold 
hems meet, 
And the golden kirtle round my sweet: 
Ah! quelle est belle La Marguerite. 


Ah me! I have never touch’d her hand ; 
When the arriére-ban goes through the 
land, 
Six basnets under my pennon stand ; 
Ah! qwelle est belle La Marguerite. 


And many an one grins under his hood: 
Sir Lambert du Bois, with all his men 
good, 
Has neither food nor firewood ; 
Ah ! quelle est belle La Mar guerite. 


If I were rich I would kiss her feet, 
And the golden girdle of my sweet, 
And thereabouts where the gold hems 
meet: 
Ah! qwelle est belle La Marguerite. 


Yet even now it is good to think, 
While my poor varlets grumble and 
drink : 
In my desolate hall, 
sink,— 
Ah! qwelle est belle La Marguerite,— 


where the fires 


Of Margaret sitting glorious there, 

In glory of gold and glory of hair, 

And oS. of glorious face most fair ; 
Ah! qu ’elle est belle La Marguer ite. 


Likewise to-night I make good cheer, 
Because this battle draweth near : 
For what have I to lose or fear ? 

Ah! quwelie est belle La Marguerite. 


BRITISH: POETS 


For, look you, my horse is good to prance 
A right fair measure in this war-dance, 
Before the eyes of Philip of France 

Ah ! qwelle est belle La Marguerite. 


And sometime it may hap, perdie, 
While my new towers stand up three 
and three, 
And my hall gets painted fair to see— 
Ah! quwelle est belle La Marguerite— 


That folks may say: Times change, by 
the rood, 
For Lambert, banneret of the wood, 
Has heaps of food and firewood ; 
Ah! quelle est belle La Marguerite. 


And wonderful eyes, too, under the hood 
Of a damsel of right noble blood. 
St. Ives, for Lambert of the Wood ! 
Ah ! qwelle est belle La Marguerite. 
1858. 


THE SAILING OF THE SWORD 


Across the empty garden-beds, 
When the Sword went out to sea, 

I scarcely saw my sisters’ heads 
Bowed each beside a tree. 

I could not see the castle leads, 
When the Sword went out to sea. 


Alicia wore a scarlet gown, 
When the Sword went out to sea, 
But Ursula’s was russet brown : 
For the mist we could not see 
The scarlet roofs of the good town, 
When the Sword went out to sea. 


Green holly in Alicia’s hand, 
When the Sword went out to sea sy 

With sere oak-leaves did Ursula stand ; 
Oh! yet alas for me! 

I did but bear a peel’d white wand, 
When the Sword went out to sea. 


O, russet brown and scarlet bright, 
When the Sword went out to sea, 

My sisters wore ; I wore but white : 
Red, brown, and white, are three ; 

Three damozels ; ; each had a knight, 
When the Sword went out to sea. 


Sir Robert shouted loud, and said ; 
When the Sword went out to sea, 

‘ Alicia, while I see thy head, 
What shall I bring for thee?’ 

‘*O, my sweet Lord, a ruby red:” 
The Sword went out to sea, 


MORRIS 





Sir Miles said, while the sails hung down, 
When the Sword went out to sea, 
‘*O, Ursula! while I see the town, 
What shall I bring for thee ?” 
“Dear knight, bring back a falcon 
brown: ” 
The Sword went out to Sea. 


But my Roland, no word he said 
When the Sword went out to sea, 
But only turn’d away his head ; 
A quick shriek came from me: 
‘“Come back, dear lord, to your white 
maid !” 
The Sword went out to sea. 


The hot sun bit the garden-beds 
When the Sword came back from sea ; 

Beneath an apple-tree our heads 
Stretched out toward the sea ; 

Gray gleamed the thirsty castle-leads, 
When the Sword came back from sea. 


Lord Robert brought a ruby red, 

W hen the Sword came back from sea ; 
He kissed Alicia on the head: 

‘*f am come back to thee; 


*T is time, sweet love, that we were. 


wed, 
Now the Sword is back from sea !” 


Sir Miles he bore a falcon brown, 
When the Sword came back from sea; 

His arms went round tall Ursula’s gown : 
** What joy, O love, but thee? 

Let us be wed in the good town, 
Now the Sword is back from sea!” 


My heart grew sick, no more afraid, 
W hen the Sword came back from sea ; 
Upon the deck a tall white maid 
Sat on Lord Roland’s knee ; 
His chin was press’d upon her head, 
W hen the Sword came back from sea! 
1858. 


THE BLUE CLOSET 
THE DAMOZELS 


Lapby ALICE, lady Louise, 

Between the wash of the tumbling seas 

We are ready to sing, if so ye please : 

So lay your long hands on the keys ; 
‘Sing, Laudate*pueri.’ 


And ever the great bell overhead 

Boom'd in the wind a knell for the dead, 

Though no one toll’d it, a knell for the 
dead, 


*“* Kneel 


835 


Lapy LOUISE 


Sister, let the measure swell 

Not too loud ; for you sing not well 

If you drown the faint boom of the bell; 
He is weary, so am I. 


And ever the chevron overhead 
Flapp’d on the banner of the dead ; 
(Was he asleep, or was he dead ?) 


LADY ALICE 


Alice the Queen, and Louise the Queen, 

Two damzels wearing purple and green, 

Four lone ladies dwelling here 

From day to day and year to year ; 

And there is none to let us go; 

To break the locks of the doors below, 

Or shovel away the heaped-up snow ; 

And when we die no man will know 

That we are dead; but they give us 
leave, 

Once every year on Christmas-eve, 

To sing in the Closet Blue one song ; 

And we should be so long, so long, 

If we dared, in singing; for dream on 
dream, 

They float on in a happy stream ; 

Float from the gold strings, float from 
the keys 

Float from the open’d lips of Louise ; 

But, alas! the sea-salt oozes through 

The chinks of the tiles of the Closet 
Blue ; 


And ever the great bell overhead 

Booms in the wind a knell for the dead, 

The wind plays on it a knell for the 
dead. 


THEY SING ALL TOGETHER 


How long ago was it, how long ago, 
He came to this tower with hands full of 
snow ? 


down, O love Louise, kneel 
down!” he said, 
And sprinkled the dusty snow over my 


head. 


He watch’d the snow melting, it ran 
through my hair, 

Ran over my shoulders, white shoulders 
and bare. 


‘‘T cannot weep for thee, poor love 
Louise, 

For my tears are all hidden deep under 
the seas ; 


836 


BRITISH POETS 





‘‘TIn a gold and blue casket she keeps all 
my tears, 

But my eyes are no longer blue, asin old 
years ; 


“Yea, they grow gray with time, grow 
small and dry, 
I am so feeble now, would I might die.” 


And in truth the great bell overhead 
Left off his pealing for the dead, 
Perchance, because the wind was dead. 


Will he come back again, or is he dead ? 
O! is he sleeping, my scarf round his 
head ? 


Or did they strangle him as he lay there, 
With the long scarlet scarf I used to 
wear ? 


Only I pray thee, Lord, let him come 
here ! 

Both his soul and his body to me are 
most dear. 


Dear Lord, that loves me, I wait to re- 
ceive 

Either body or spirit this wild Christmas- 
ove.” 


Through the floor shot up a lily red, 

With a patch of earth from the land of 
the dead, 

For he was strong in the land of the dead. 


What matter that his cheeks were pale, 
His kind kiss’d lips all gray ? 

‘*O, love Louise, have you waited long?” 
‘*O, my lord Arthur, yea.” 


What if his hair that brushed her cheek 
Was stiff with frozen rime? 

His eyes were grown quite blue again, 
As in the happy time. 


‘* O, love Louise, this is the key 
Of the happy golden land! 

O, sisters, cross the bridge with me, 
My eyes are full of sand. 

What matter that I cannot see, 
If ye take me by the hand ?” 


And ever the great bell overhead, 

And the tumbling seas mourn’d for the 
dead ; 

For their song ceased, and they were 
dead ! 


THE HAYSTACK IN THE FLOODS 


HAD she come all the way for this, 

To part at last without a kiss ? 

Yea, had she borne the dirt and rain 
That her own eyes might see him slain 
Beside the haystack in the floods ? 


Along the dripping leafless woods, 

The stirrup touching either shoe, 

She rode astride as troopers do ; 

With kirtle kilted to her knee, 

To which the mud splash’d wretchedly ; 
And the wet dripp’d from every tree 
Upon her head and heavy hair, 

And on her eyelids broad and fair ; 

The tears and rain ran down her face. 


By fits and starts they rode apace, 

And very often was his place 

Far off from her; he had to ride 

Ahead, to see what might betide 

When the roads cross’d ; and sometimes, 
when 

There rose a murmuring from his men, 

Had to turn back with promises. 

Ah me! she had but little ease ; 

And often for pure doubt and dread 

She sobb’d, made giddy in the head 

By the swift riding ; while, for cold, 

Her slender fingers scarce could hold 

The wet reins; yea, and scarcely, too, 

She felt the foot within her shoe 

Against the stirrup: all for this, 

To part at last without a kiss 

Beside the haystack in the floods. 


For when they near’d that old soak’d 
hav, 
They saw across the only way 
That Judas, Godmar, and the three 
Red running lions dismally 
Grinn’d from his pennon, under which 
In one straight line along the ditch, 
They counted thirty heads. 
So then 
While Robert turn’d round to his men, 
She saw at once the wretched end, 
And, stooping down, tried hard to rend 
Her coif the wrong way from her head, 
And hid her eyes; while Robert said : 
‘* Nay, love, ’tis scarcely two to one ; 
At Poictiers where we made them run 
So fast—why, sweet my love, good 
cheer, 

The Gascon frontier is so near, 
Nought after us.” 

But : ‘“‘O!” she said, 
‘““My God! my God! I have to tread 


MORRIS 


The long way back without you; then 

The court at Paris; those six men; 

The gratings of the Chatelet ; 

The swift Seine on some rainy day 

Like this, and people standing by, 

And laughing, while my weak hands 
try 

To recollect how strong men swim. 

All this, or else a life with him, 

For which I should be damned at last, 

Would God that this next hour were 
past !” 


He answer’d not, but cried his ery, 
**St. George for Marny !” cheerily ; 
And laid his hand upon her rein. 
Alas! no man of all his train 
Gave back that cheery cry again; 
And, while for rage his thumb beat fast 
Upon his sword-hilt, some one cast 
About his neck a kerchief long, 
And bound him. 
Then they went along 

To Godmar ; who said: *‘ Now, Jehane, 
Your lover’s life is on the wane 
So fast, that, if this very hour 
You yield not as my paramour, 
He will not see the rain leave off: 
Nay, keep your tongue from gibe and 

scoff 
Sir Robert, or I slay you now.” 


She laid her hand upon her brow, 
Then gazed upon the palm, as though 
She thought her forehead bled, and: 
ee No ! ”? 

She said, and turn’d her head away, 
As there was nothing else to say, 
And everything was settled: red 
Grew Godmar’s face from chin to head : 
‘* Jehane, on yonder hill there stands 
My castle. guarding well my lands ; 
What hinders me from taking you, 
And doing that I list to do 
To your fair wilful body, while 
Your knight lies dead ?” 

A wicked smile 
Wrinkled her face, her lips grew thin, 
A long way out she thrust her chin: 
“You know that I should strangle you 
While you were sleeping ; or bite through 
Your throat, by God’s help: ah!” she 

said, 

‘‘Lord Jesus, pity your poor maid ! 
For in such wise they hem me in, 
I cannot choose but sin and sin, 
Whatever happens: yet I think 
They could not make me eat or drink, 
And so should I just reach my rest,” 


837 


‘* Nay, if you do not my behest, 
O Jehane! though I love you well,” 
Said Godmar, ‘*‘ would I fail to tell 
All that I know?” ‘Foul lies,” she 
said. 
‘¢ Eh? lies, my Jehane ? by God’s head, 
At Paris folks would deem them true! 
Do you know, Jehane, they cry for you: 
‘ Jehane the brown! Jehane the brown ! 
Give us Jehane to burn or drown !’ 
Eh !—gag me Robert !—sweet my friend, 
This were indeed a piteous end 
For those long fingers, and long feet, 
And long neck, and smooth shoulders 
sweet ; 

An end that few men would forget 
That saw it. So, an hour yet: 
Consider, Jehane, which to take 
Of life or death!” 

So, scarce awake, 
Dismounting, did she leave that place, 
And totter some yards: with her face 
Turn’d upward to the sky she lay, 
Her head on a wet heap of hay, 
And fell asleep : and while she slept, 
And did not dream, the minutes crept 
Round to the twelve again ; but she, 
Being waked at last, sigh’d quietly, 
And strangely childlike came, and said: 


“JT will not.” Straightway Godmar’s 
head, 

As though it hung on strong wires, 
turn’d 


Most sharply round, and his face burn’d. 
a 


For Robert, both his eyes were dry, 
He could not weep, but gloomily 
He seem’d to watch the rain; yea, too, 
His lips were firm ; he tried once more 
To touch her lips; she reach’d out, sore 
And vain desire so tortured them, 
The poor gray lips, and now the hem | 
Of his sleeve brush’d them. 

With a start 
Up Godmar rose, thrust them apart ; 
From Robert’s throat he loosed the 

bands 
Of silk and mail; withempty hands 
Held out, she stood and gazed, and saw, 
The long bright blade without a flaw 
Glide out from Godmar’s sheath, his 
hand 

In Robert’s hair; she saw him bend 
Back Robert’s head ; she saw him send 
The thin steel down; the blow told well, 
Right backward the knight Robert fell, 
And moaned as dogs do, being half dead, 
Unwitting, as I deem: so then 
Godmar turn’d grinning to his men, 


838 


DRITISHOROETS 





Who ran, some five or six, and beat 
His head to-pieces at their feet. 


Then Godmar turn’d again and said: 
‘*So, Jehane, the first fitte is read ! 
Take note, my lady, that your way 

Lies backward to the Chatelet !” 

She shook her head and gazed awhile 
At her cold hands with a rueful smile, 
As though this thing had made her mad. 


This was the parting that they had 
Beside the haystack in the floods. 
1858. 


TWO RED ROSES ACROSS THE 
MOON 


THERE was a lady lived in a hall, 

. Large of her eyes and slim and tall; 
And ever she sung from noon to noon, 
Two red roses across the moon. 


There was a knight came riding by 

In early spring, when the roads were dry; 
And he heard that lady sing at the noon, 
Two red roses across the moon. 


Yet none the more he stopp’d at all, 
But he rode a-gallop past the hall ; 
And left that lady singing at noon, 
Two red roses across the moon. 


Because, forsooth, the battle was set, 

And the scarlet and blue had got to be 
met, - 

He rode on the spur till the next warm 
noon: 

Two red roses across the moon. 


But the battle was scatter’d from hill 
to hill, 

From the windmill to the watermill ; 

And he said to himself, as it near’d the 
noon, 

Two red roses across the moon. 


You scarce could see for the scarlet and 
blue, 

A golden helm or a golden shoe: 

So he cried, as the fight grew thick at 
the noon, . 

Two red roses across the moon ! 


Verily then the gold bore through 

The huddled spears of the scarlet and 
blue; 

And they cried, as they cut them down 
at the noon, 

Two red roses across the moon! 





I trow he stopp’d when he rode again 

By the hall, though draggled sore with 
the rain ; 

And his lips were pinch’d to kiss at the 
noon 

Two red roses across the moon. 


Under the may she stoop’d to the crown: 
All was gold, there was nothing of brown, 
And the horns blew up in the hallat noon, 
Two red roses across the moon. 1858. 


SIR GILES’ WAR-SONG1 


Ho ! is there any will ride with me, 
Sir Giles, le bon des barriéres ? 


The clink of arms is good to hear, 
The flap of pennons fair to see ; 
Ho! is there any will ride with me, 
Sir Gules, le bon des barriéres ? 


The leopards and lilies are fair to see; 
St. George Guienne ! right good to hear : 
Ho! is there any will ride with me ; 

Sir Giles, le bon des barriéres ? 
I stood by the barrier, 
My coat being blazon’‘d fair to see ; 
Ho! is there any will ride with me, 
Sir Giles, le bon des barriéres ? 


Clisson put out his head to see, 
And lifted his basnet up to hear ; 
I pull’d him through the bars to ME, 
Sir Giles, le bon des barriéres. 
1858. 


NEAR AVALON 


A SHIP with shields before the sun, 
Six maidens round the mast, 

A red-gold crown on every .one, 

A green gown on the last. 


The fluttering green banners there 

Are wrought with ladies’ heads most 
fair, 

And a portraiture of Guenevere 

The middle of each sail doth bear. 


A ship which sails before the wind, 
And round the helm six knights, 


1 Browning wrote to Morris, on the appearance 
of the Earthly Paradise: ‘‘ It is a double delight 
to me to read such poetry, and know you, of all 
the world, wrote it,—you whose songs I used 
to sing while galloping by Fiesole in old days,— 
‘Ho, is there any will ride with me?’ ’—(J. W. 
Mackail’s Life of William Morris, Vol. I., p. 183.) 


MORRIS 


839 





Their heaumes are on, whereby, half 
blind, 
They pass by many sights. 


The tatter’d scarlet banners there, 
Right soon will leave the spear-heads 
bare, 
Those six knights sorrowfully bear, 
In all their heaumes some yellow hair. 
1858. 


IN PRISON 


WEARILY, drearily, 

Half the day long, 

Flap the great banners 
High over the stone ; 
Strangely and eerily 
Sounds the wind’s song, 
Bending the banner-poles. 


While, all alone, 

Watching the loophole’ s spark, 
Lie I, with life all dark, 

Feet tether’d, hands fetter’d 
Fast to the stone, 

The grim wall, square letter’d 
With prison’d men’s groan. 


Still strain the banner-poles 
Through the wind’s song, 

Westward the banner rolls 
Over my wrong. 1858. 


FROM THE LIFE AND DEATH OF 
JASON 


TO THE SEA 


O BITTER sea, tumultuous sea, 
Full many an ill is wrought by thee !— 
Unto the wasters of the land 
Thou holdest out thy wrinkled hand ; 
And when they leave the conquered 
town, 
Whose black smoke makes thy surges 
brown, 
Driven betwixt thee and the sun, 
As the long day of blood is done, 
From many a league of glittering waves 
Thou smilest on them and their slaves. 
The thin bright-eyed Phoenician 
Thou drawest to thy waters wan, 
With ruddy eve and golden morn 
Thou temptest him, until, forlorn, 
Unburied, under alien skies 
Cast up ashore his body lies. 
Yea, whoso sees thee from his door, 
Must ever long for more and more ; 
Nor will the beechen bowl suffice, 


Or homespun robe of little price, 

Or hood well-woven from the fleece 
Undyed, or unspiced wine of Greece ; 
So sore his heart is set upon 
Purple, and gold, and cinnamon ; 

For as thou cravest, so he craves, 
Until he rolls beneath thy waves, 

Nor in some landlocked, unknown bay, 
Can satiate thee for one day. 


Now, therefore, O thou bitter sea, 
With no long words we pray to thee, 
But ask thee, hast thou felt before 


. Such strokes of the long ashen oar ? 


And hast thou yet seen such a prow 
Thy rich and niggard waters plough ? 
Nor yet, O sea, shalt thou be cursed, 
If at thy hands we gain the worst, 
And, wrapt in water, roll about 
Blind-eyed, unheeding song or shout, 
Within thine eddies far from shore, 
Warmed by no sunlight any more. 
Therefore, indeed, we joy in thee, 
And praise thy greatness, and will we 
Take at thy hands both good and ill, 
Yea, what thou wilt, and praise thee still, 
Enduri ing not to sit ‘at home, 
And wait until the last days come, 
When we no more may care to hold 
White bosoms under crowns of gold, 
And our dulled hearts no longer are 
Stirred by the clangorous noise of war, 
And hope within our souls is dead, 
And no joy is remembered. 


So, if thou hast a mind to slay, 
Fair prize thou hast of us to-day ; 
And if thou hast a mind to save, 
Great praise and honor shalt thou have ; 
But whatso thou wilt do with us, 
Our end shall not be piteous, 
Because our memories shall live 
When folk forget the way to drive 
The black keel through the heaped-up 
sea 
And half dried up thy waters be. 1867. 


THE NYMPH’S SONG TO HYLAS} 


I know a little garden close 
Set thick with lily and red rose, 
Where I would wander if I might 
From dewy dawn to dewy night, 
And have one with me wandering. 
And though within it no birds sing, 
And though no pillared house is there, 


1 This song reappears under the title A Garden 
by the Sea in ‘‘ Poems by the Way,’’ 1891, with 
slight variations in the text, the most important 
of which is noted below. 


840 


And though the apple boughs are bare 
Of fruit and blossom, would to God, 
Her feet upon the green grass trod, 
And I beheld them as before. 

There comes a murmur from the shore, 
And in the place two fair streams are, 
Drawn from the purple hills afar, 
Drawn down unto the restless sea ; . 
The hills whose flowers ne’er fed the bee, 
The shore no ship has ever seen, 

Still beaten by the billows green, 
Whose murmur comes unceasingly 
Unto the place for which I cry. 

For which I cry both day and night, 
For which I let slip all delight, 

That maketh me both deaf and blind, 

Careless to win, unskilled to find, 

And quick to lose what all men seek. 
Yet tottering as Iam, and weak, 

Still have I left a little breath 

To seek within the jaws of death 

An entrance to that happy place, 

To seek the unforgotten face 

Once seen, once kissed, once reft from 

me 


Anigh the murmuring of the sea. 1867. 


ORPHEUS’ SONG OF TRIUMPH 


O death, that makest life so sweet, 
O fear, with mirth before thy feet, 
What have ye yet in store for us, 
The conquerors, the glorious ? 
Men say: ‘* For fear that thou shouldst 
die 
To-morrow, let to-day pass by 
Flower-crowned and singing,” yet have 
we 
Passed our to-day upon the sea, 
Or in a poisonous unknown land, 
With fear and death on either hand, 
And listless when the day was done 
Have scarcely hoped to see the sun 
Dawn on the morrow of the earth, 
Nor in our hearts have thought of 
mirth. 
And while the world lasts, scarce again 
Shall any sons of men bear pain 
Like we have borne, yet be alive. 
So surely not in vain we strive 
Like other men for our reward ; 
Sweet peace and deep, the checkered 
sward 
Beneath the ancient mulberry trees, 
The smooth-paved gilded palaces, 


1 a A Garden by the Sea, these three lines 
read : 

Dark hills whose heath-bloom feeds no bee, 

Dark shore no ship has ever seen, 

Tormented by the billows green. 


BRITISH POETS 


Where the shy thin-clad damsels sweet 
Make music with their gold-ringed feet. 
The fountain court amidst of it, 
Where the short-haired slave-maidens 
sit, 
While on the veined pavement lie 
The honied things and spicery 
Their arms have borne from out the 
town. 
The dancers on the thymy down 
In summer twilight, when the earth 
Is still of all things but their mirth, 
And echoes borne upon the wind 
Of others in like way entwined. 
The merchant-town’s fair 
place, 
Where over many a changing face 
The pigeons of the temple flit, 
And still the outland merchants sit 
Like kings above their merchandise, 
Lying to foolish men and wise. 
Ah! if they heard that we were come 
Into the bay, and bringing home 
That which all men have talked about, 
Some men with rage, and some with 
doubt, 
Some with desire, and some with praise ; 
Then would the people throng the ways, 
Nor heed the outland merchandise, 
Nor any talk, from fools or wise, 
But tales of our accomplished quest. 
. What soul within the house shall rest 
When we come home? The wily king 
Shall leave his throne to see the thing ; 
No man shall keep the landward gate, 
The hurried traveller shall wait 
Until our bulwarks graze the quay ; 
Unslain the milk-white bull shall be 
Beside the quivering altar-flame ; 
Scarce shall the maiden clasp for shame 
Over her breast the raiment thin 
The morn that Argo cometh in. 
Then cometh happy life again 
That payeth well our toil and pain 
In that sweet hour, when all our woe 
But as a pensive tale we know, 
Nor yet remember deadly fear ; 
For surely now if death be near, 
Unthought-of is it, and unseen 
When sweet is, that hath bitter been. 
1867. 


SONGS OF ORPHEUS AND THE SIRENS 


market- 


Sirens 


O HAPPY seafarers are ye, 
And surely all your ills are past, 
And toil upon the land and sea, 
Since ye are brought to us at last, 


MORRIS 


841 





To you the fashion of the world, 
Wide lands laid waste, fair cities 


burned, 

And plagues, and kingsfrom kingdoms 
hurled, 

Are nought, since hither ye have 
turned. 


For as upon this beach we stand, 
And o’er our heads the sea-fow! flit, 
Our eyes behold a glorious land, 
And soon shall ye be kings of it. 


Orpheus 


A little more, a little more, 
O carriers of the Golden Fleece, 
A little labor with the oar, 
Before we reach the land of Greece. 


E’en now perchance faint rumors reach 
Men’s ears of this our victory, 

And draw them down unto the beach 
To gaze across the empty sea. 


But since the longed-for day is nigh, 
And scarce a God could stay us now, 

Why do ye hang your heads and sigh, . 
Hindering for nought our eager prow ? 


Sirens 


Ab, had ye chanced to reach the home 
On which your fond desires were set, 

Into what troubles had ye come? 
Short love and joy, and long regret. 


But now, but now, when ye have lain 
Asleep with us a little while 

Beneath the washing of the main, 
How calm shall be your waking smile ! 


For ye shall smile to think of life 
That knows no troublous change or 
fear, 
No unvailing bitter strife, 
That ere its time brings trouble near. 


Orpheus 


Is there some murmur in your ears, 
That all that we have done is nought, 

And nothing ends our cares or fears, 
Till the last fear is on us brought ? 


Sirens 


Alas! and will ye stop your ears, 
In vain desire to do aught, 

And wish to live ’mid cares and fears, 
Until the last fear makes you nought ? 


Orpheus 


Is not the May-time now on earth, 
When close against the city wall 
The folks are singing in their mirth, 
Pea their heads the May-flowers 
allt 


Sirens 


Yes, May is come, and its sweet breath 
Shall well-nigh make you weep to-day, 

And pensive with swift-coming death, 
Shall ye be satiate of the May. 


Orpheus 


Shall not July bring fresh delight, 
As underneath green trees ye sit, 
And o’er some damsel’s body white 
The noontide shadows change and 
flit ? 
Sirens 


No new delight July shall bring 
But ancient fear and fresh desire, 
And spite of every lovely thing, 
Of July surely shall you tire. 


Orpheus 


And now, when August comes on thee, 
And ’mid the golden sea of corn 

The merry reapers thou mayst see, 
Wilt thou still think the earth forlorn ? 


Sirens 


Set flowers upon thy short-lived head, 
And in thine heart forgetfulness 

Of man’s hard toil, and scanty bread, 
And weary of those days no less. 


Orpheus 


Or wilt thou climb the sunny hill, 
In the October afternoon, 

To watch the purple earth’s blood fill 
The gray vat to the maiden’s tune? 


Sirens 


When thou beginnest to grow old, 
Bring back remembrance of thy bliss 

With that the shining cup doth hold, 
And weary helplessly of this. 


Orpheus 


Or pleasureless shall we pass by 
The long cold night and leaden day, 
That song, and tale, and minstrelsy 
Shall make as merry as the May ? 


842 


Sirens 


List then, to-night, to some old tale 
Until the tears o’erflow thine eyes ; 
But what shall all these things avail, . 

When sad to-morrow comes and dies? 


Orpheus 


And when the world is born again, 
And with some fair love, side by side, 
Thou wanderest ‘twixt the sun and rain, 
In that fresh love-begetting tide ; 


Then, when the world is born again, 
And the sweet world before thee lies, 

Shall thy heart think of coming pain, 
Or vex itself with memories ? 


Sirens 


Ah! then the world is born again 
With burning love unsatisfied, 

And new desires fond and vain, 
And weary days from tide to tide. 


Ah! when the world is born again, 
A little day is soon gone by, 

When thou, unmoved by sun or rain, 
Within a cold straight house shalt lie. 


Ah, will ye go, and whither then 
Will ye go from us, soon to die, 

To fill your three-score years and ten, 
With many an unnamed misery ? 


And this the wretchedest of all, 
That when upon your lonely eyes 

The last faint heaviness shall fall 
Ye shall bethink you of our cries. 


Come back, nor grown old, seek in vain 
To hear us sing across the sea. 
Come back, come back, come back again, 
Come back, O fearful Minyae ! 
Orpheus 


Ah, once again, ah, once again, 
The black prow plunges through the 


sea, 
Nor yet shall all your toil be vain, 


Nor yet forgot, O Minyae. 1867. 


INVOCATION TO CHAUCER 


(From the last book of the Life and Death 
of Jason) 


So ends the winning of the Golden 
Fleece— 


BRITISH POETS 


So ends the tale of that sweet rest and 
peace 

That unto Jason and his love befell ; 

Another story now my tongue must tell, 

And tremble in the telling. Would 
thatI - 

Had but some portion of that mastery 

That from the rose-hung lanes of woody 
Kent 

Through these five hundred years such 
songs have sent 

To us, who meshed within this smoky 
net 

Of unrejoicing labor, love them yet. 

And thou, O Master !—Yea, my Master 
still, 

Whatever feet have scaled Parnassus’ 
hill, 

Since like thy measures, clear and sweet 
and strong, 

Thames’ stream scarce fettered drave the 
dace along 

Unto the bastioned bridge, his only 
chain.— 

O Master, pardon me, if yet in vain 

Thou art my Master, and I fail to bring 

Before men’s eyes the image of the thing 

My heart is filled with: thou whose 
dreamy eyes 

Beheld the flush to Cressid’s cheeks arise, 

When Troilus rode up the praising street, 

As clearly as they saw thy townsmen 
meet [stood 

Those who in vineyards of Poictou with- 

The glittering horror of the steel-topped 
wood. 1867. 


AN APOLOGY 
PROLOGUE OF THE EARTHLY PARADISE 


OF Heaven or Hell I have no power to 
sing, 

I cannot ease the burden of your fears, 

Or make quick-coming death a little 
thing, 

Or bring again the pleasure of past years, 

Nor for my words shall ye forget your 
tears, 

Or hope again for aught that I can say, 

The idle singer of an empty day. 


But rather, when aweary of your mirth, 

From full hearts still unsatisfied ye sigh, 

And, feeling kindly unto all the earth, 

Grudge every minute as it passes by, 

Made the more mindful that the sweet 
days die— 

—Remember me a little then I pray, 


| The idle singer of an empty day. 


MORRIS 


The heavy trouble, the bewildering care 

That weighs us down who live and earn 
our bread, 

These idle verses have no power to bear ; 

So let me sing of names remembered, 

Because they, living not, can ne’er be 
dead, 

Or long time take their memory quite 
away 

From us poor singers of an empty day. 


Dreamer of dreams, born out of my due 
time, 

Why should I strive to set the crooked 
straight ? 

Let it suffice me that my murmuring 
rhyme 

Beats with light wing against the ivory 
gate, 

Telling a tale not too importunate 

To those who in the sleepy region stay, 

Lulled by the singer of an empty day. 


Folk say, a wizard to a northern king 


843 


At Christmas-tide such wondrous things 
did show, 

That through one window men beheld 
the spring, 

And through another saw the summer 
glow, 

And through a third the fruited vines 
a-row, 

While still, unheard, but in its wonted 


way, 
Piped the drear wind of that December 
day. 


So with this Earthly Paradise it is, 

If ye will read aright, and pardon me, 

Who ‘strive to build a shadowy isle of 
bliss 

Midmost the beating of the steely sea, 

Where tossed about all hearts of men 
must be ; 

Whose ravening monsters mighty men 
shall slay, 

Not the poor singer of an empty day. 

186 


Ret AAN TAS RACE 
ARGUMENT 


Atalanta, daughter of King Schceneus, not willing to lose her virgin’s estate, made it a law to all 
suitors that they should run a race with her in the public place, and if they failed to over- 
come her should die unrevenged ; and thus many brave men perished. At last came Milanion, 
the son of Amphidamas, who, outrunning her with the help of Venus, gained the virgin and 


wedded her. 


THROUGH thick Arcadian woods a hunter 
went, 

Following the beasts upon a fresh spring 
day ; 

But since his horn-tipped bow but seldom 
bent, 

Now at the noontide nought had happed 
to slay, 

Within a vale he called his hounds away, 

Harkening the echoes of his lone voice 
cling 

About the cliffs and through the beech- 
trees ring. 


But when they ended, still awhile he 
stood, 

And but the sweet familiar thrush could 
hear, 

And allthe day-long noises of the wood, 

And o’er the dry leaves of the vanished 


year 
His hounds’ feet pattering as they drew 
ahear, 


And heavy breathing from their heads 
low hung, 
To see the mighty cornel bow unstrung. 


Then smiling did he turn to leave the 


place, 

But with his first step some new fleeting 
thought 

A shadow cast across his sun-burnt 
face ; 

I think the golden net that April 
brought 


From some warm world his wavering 
soul had caught ; 
For, sunk in vague sweet longing, did he 


go 
Betwixt the trees with doubtful steps 
and slow. 


Yet howsoever slow he went, at last 

The trees grew sparser, and the wood 
was done ; [cast, 

Whereon one farewell backward look he 


844 


Then, turning round to see what place 
was won, 

With shaded eyes looked underneath the 
sun, : 

And o’er green meads and new-turned 
furrows brown 

Beheld the gleaming of King Schceneus’ 
town. 


So thitherward he turned, and on each 
side 

The folk were busy on the teeming 
land, 

And man and maid from the brown fur- 
rows cried, 

Or midst the newly blossomed vines did 
stand, 

And as the‘rustic weapon pressed the 
hand 

Thought of the nodding of the well-filled 


ear, 
Or how the knife the heavy bunch should 
shear. 


Merry it was: about him sung the 
birds, 

The spring flowers bloomed along the 
firm dry road, 

The sleek-skinned mothers of the sharp- 
horned herds 

Now for the barefoot milking-maidens 
lowed ; 

While from the freshness of his blue 
abode, 

Glad his death-bearing arrows to forget, 

The broad sun blazed, nor scattered 
plagues as yet. 


Through such fair things unto the gates 
he came, 

And found them open, as though peace 
were there ; 

Wherethrough, unquestioned of his 
race or name, 

He entered, and along the streets ’gan 


fare, 
Which at the first of folk were well-nigh 
bare ; 
But pressing on, and going more hastily, 
Men hurrying too he ’gan at last to see. 


Following the last of these he still 
pressed on, 

Until an open space he came unto, 

Where wreaths of fame had oft been lost 
and won, 

For feats of strength folks there were 
wont to do. 

And now our hunter looked for some- 
thing new, 


BRITISH POETS 


Because the whole wide space was bare, 
and stilled 

The high seats were, with eager people 
filled, 

o 

There with the others to a seat he gat, 

Whence he beheld a broidered canopy, 

’Neath which in fair array King Shoeneus 
sat 

Upon his throne 
thereby ; 

And underneath his well-wrought seat 
and high, 

He saw a golden image of the sun, 

A silver image of the Fleet-foot One. 


with councillors 


A brazen altar stood beneath their feet 

Whereon a thin flame flicker’d in the 
wind ; 

Nigh this a herald clad in raiment meet 

Made ready even now his horn to wind, 

By whom a huge man held a sword, 
entwin’d 

With yellow flowers; these stood a little 
space 

From off the altar, nigh the starting 
place. 


And there two runners did the sign 
abide, 

Foot set to foot,—a young man slim and 
fair, 

Crisp-hair’d, well knit, with firm limbs 
often tried 

In places where no man his strength may 
spare : 

Dainty his thin coat was, and on his hair 

A golden circlet of renown he wore, 

And in his hand an olive garland bore. 


But on this day with whom shall he con- 
tend ? 

A maid stood by him like Diana clad 

When in the woods she lists her bow to 
bend, 

Too fair for one to look on and be glad, 

Who scarcely yet has thirty summers 


had, 
If he must still behold her from afar ; 
Too fair to let the world live free from 
war. 


She seem’d all earthly matters to forget ; 

Of all tormenting lines her face was 
clear ; 

Her wide gray eyes upon the goal were 
set 

Calm and umov’d as though no soul were 
near, 


MORRIS 


But her foe trembled as a man in fear, 

Nor from her loveliness one moment 
turn’d 

His anxious face with fierce desire that 
burn’d. 


Now through the hush there broke the 
trumpet’s clang 

Just as the setting sun made eventide. 

Then from light feet a spurt of dust 

; there sprang, 

And swiftly were they running side by 
side ; 

But silent did the thronging folk abide 

Until wae turning-post was reach’d at 
ast, 

And round about it still abreast they 
passed. 


But when the people saw how close they 
ran, 

When half-way to the starting-point 
they were, 

A cry of joy broke forth, whereat the 
man 

Headed the white-foot runner, and drew 
near 

Unto the very end of all his fear ; ' 

And scarce his straining feet the ground 
could feel, 

And bliss unhop’d for o’er his heart ’gan 
steal. 


But ’midst the loud victorious shouts he 


heard 

Her footsteps drawing nearer, and the 
sound 

Of fluttering raiment, and _ thereat 
afeared 

His flush’d and eager face he turn’d 
around, 

And even then he felt her past him 
bound 

Fleet as the wind, but scarcely saw her 
there 


Till on the goal she laid her fingers fair. 


There stood she breathing like a little 
child 

Amid some warlike clamor laid asleep, 

For no victorious joy her red lips smil’d, 

Her cheek its wonted freshness did but 
keep ; 

No glance lit up her clear gray eyes and 
deep, 

Though some divine thought soften’d all 
her face 

As once more rang the trumpet through 
the place. 


845 





But her late foe stopp’d short amidst his 
course, 

One moment gaz’d upon her piteously, 

Then with a groan his lingering feet did 
force 

To leave the spot whence he her eyes 
could see ; 

And, changed like one who knows his 
time must be 

But short and bitter, without any word 

He knelt before the bearer of the sword ; 


Then high rose up the gleaming deadly 
blade, 

Bar’d of its flowers, and through the 
crowded place 

Was silence now, and midst of it the 
maid 

Went by the poor wretch at a gentle 


pace, 
And he to hers upturn’d his sad white 
face ; 
Nor did his eyes behold another sight 
Ere on his soul there fell eternal light. 


So was the pageant ended, and all folk 
Talking of this and that familiar thing 
In little groups from that sad concourse 


broke, 

For now the shrill bats were upon the 
wing, 

And soon dark night would slay the 
evening, 


And in dark gardens sang the nightin- 


gale 
Her little-heeded, oft-repeated tale. 


And with the last of all the hunter went, 

Who, wondering at the strange sight he 
had seen, 

Prayed an old man to tell him what it 
meant, 

Both why the vanquished man so slain 
had been, 

And if the maiden were an earthly 
queen, 

Or rather what much more she seemed 
to be, 

No sharer in this world’s mortality. 


‘* Stranger,” said he, ‘‘I pray she soon 
may die 

Whose lovely youth has slain so many 
an one ! 

King Schoeneus’ daughter is she verily, 

Who when her eyes first looked upon the 
sun 

Was fain to end her life but new begun, 


846 


For he had vowed to leave but men 
alone 

Sprung from his loins when he from 
earth was gone. 


‘“‘Therefore he bade one leave her in 
the wood, 

And let wild things deal with her as 
they might, 

But this being done, some cruel god 
thought good 

To save her beauty in the world’s 
despite ; 

Folk say that her, so delicate and white 

As now she is, a rough root-grubbing 


bear 

Amidst her shapeless cubs at first did 
rear. 

‘* In course of time the woodfolk slew 
her nurse, 

And to their rude abode the youngling 
brought, 

And reared her up to be a kingdom’s 
curse ; 

Who grown a woman, of no kingdom 
thought, 


But armed and swift, ’mid beasts de- 
struction wrought, 

Nor spared two shaggy centaur kings to 
slay 

To whom her body seemed an easy prey. 


‘* So to this city, led by fate, she came 

Whom known by _ signs, whereof I 
cannot tell, 

King Schoeneus for his child at last did 
claim. 

Nor otherwhere since that day doth she 
dwell 

Sending too many a noble soul to hell— 

What! thine eyes glisten! what then, 
thinkest thou 

Her shining head unto the yoke to bow ? 


‘** Listen, my son, and love some other 
maid 

For she the saffron gown will never 
wear, 

And on no flower-strewn couch shall 
she be laid, 

Nor shall her voice make glad a lover's 


ear : 
Yet if of Death thou hast not any fear, 
Yea, rather, if thou lov’st him utterly, 
Thou still may’st woo her ere thou 
com’st to die, 


‘* Like him that on this day thou sawest 
lie dead ; 


BRITISH POETS 


For, fearing as I deem the sea-born one, 
The maid has vowed e’en such a man to 


wed 

As in the course her swift feet can out- 
run, 

But whoso fails herein, his days are 
done: 


He came the nighest that was slain to- 


day, 
Although with him I deem she did but 
play. 


‘¢ Behold, such mercy Atalanta gives 

To those that long to win her loveliness ; 

Be wise! besure that many a maid there 
lives ; 

Gentler than she, of beauty little less, 

Whose swimming eyes thy loving words 
shall bless, 

When in some garden, knee set close to 
knee, 

Thou sing’st the song that love may 
teach to thee.” 


So to the hunter spake that ancient man, 

And left him for his own home pre- 
sently : 

But he turned round, and through the 
moonlight wan 


‘Reached the thick wood, and there 


’twixt tree and tree 

Distraught he passed the long night 
feverishly, 

’Twixt sleep and waking, and at dawn 
arose 

To wage hot war against his speechless 
foes. 


There to the hart’s flank seemed his 
shaft to grow, 

As panting down the broad green glades 
he flew, 

There by his horn the Dryads well might 
know 

His thrust against the bear’s heart had 
been true, 

And there Adonis’ bane his javelin slew, 

But still in vain through rough and 
smooth he went, 

For none the more his restlessness was 
spent. 


So wandering, he to Argive cities came, 

And in the lists with valiant men he 
stood, 

And by great deeds he won him praise 
and fame, 

And heaps of wealth for little-valued 
blood ; : 


MORRIS 


847 





But none of all these things, or life, 
seemed good 

Unto his heart, where still unsatisfied 

A ravenous longing warred with fear 
and pride. 


Therefore it happed when but a month 
had gone. 

Since as had left King Schceneus’ city 
old, 

In hunting-gear again, again alone 

The forest-bordered meads did he behold, 

Where still mid thoughts of August’s 
quivering gold 

Folk hoed the wheat, and clipped the 
vine in trust 

Of faint October’s purple-foaming must. 


And once again he passed the peaceful 


gate, 

. While to his beating heart his lips did 
lie, 

That owning not victorious loveand fate, 

Said, half aloud, ‘‘ And here too must I 
try, 

To win of alien men the mastery, 

And gather for my head fresh meed of 
fame 


And cast new glory on my “father’s - 


name.’ 


In spite of that, how beat his heart, 
when first 

Folk said to him, 
to see 

That which still makes our city’s name 
accurst 

Among all mothers for its cruelty ? 

Then know indeed that fate is good to 
thee 

Because to-morrow a new luckless one 

Against the whitefoot maid is pledged 
to run.” 


‘And art thou come 


So on the morrow with no curious eyes 

As once he did, that piteous sight he 
saw, 

Nor did that wonder in his heart arise 

As toward the goal the conquering maid 
’oan draw, 

Nor did he gaze upon her eyes with awe, 


Too full the pain of longing filled his 


heart 
For fear or wonder there to have a part. 


But O, how long the night was ere it 
went ! 

How long it was before the dawn begun 

Showed to the wakening birds the sun’s 
intent 


That not in darkness should the world 
be done! 

And then, and then, how long before 
the sun 

Bade silently the toilers of the earth 

Get forth to fruitless cares or empty 
mirth ! 


And long it seemed that in the market- 
place 

He stood and saw the chaffering folk 
go by, 

Ere from the ivory throne King Schoe- 
neus’ face 

Looked down upon the murmur royally, 

But then came trembling that the time 
was nigh 

When he midst pitying looks his love 
must claim, 

And jeering voices must salute his name. 


But as the throng he pierced to gain the 


throne, 

His alien face distraught and anxious 
told 

What hopeless errand he was bound 
upon, 

And, each to each, folk whispered to 
behold 

His godlike limbs ; nay, and one woman 
old 

As he went by must pluck him by the 
sleeve 

And pray him yet that wretched love to 
leave. 


For sidling up she said, ‘‘ Canst thou 
live twice, 

Fair son? canst thou have joyful youth 
again, 

That thus thou goest to the sacrifice 

Thy self the victim ? nay then, allin vain 

Thy mother bore her longing and her 
pain, 

And one more maiden on the earth must 
dwell 

Hopeless of joy, nor fearing death and 
hell. 


“QO, fool, thou knowest not the compact 
then 

That with the three-formed goddess she 
has made 

To keep her from the loving lips of men, 

And in no saffron gown to be arrayed, 

And therewithal with glory to be paid, 

And love of her the moonlit river sees 

White ’gainst the shadow of the formless 
trees. 


848 


BRITRSAALOE TS 





‘*Come back, and I myself will pray 
for thee 

Unto the sea-born framer of delights, 

To give thee her who on the earth may be 

The fairest stirrer up to death and fights, 

To quench with hopeful days and joyous 


nights 

The flame that doth thy youthful heart 
consume : 

Come back, nor give thy beauty to the 
tomb.” 


How should he listen to her earnest 
speech ? 

Words, such as he not once or twice had 
said 

Unto himself, whose 
could reach 

The firm abode of that sad hardihead— 

He turned about, and through the 


meaning scarce 


marketstead 

Swiftly he passed, until before the 
throne 

In the cleared space he_ stood at last 
alone. 


Then said the King, ‘Stranger, what 
dost thou here ? 

Have any of my folk done ill to thee ? 

Or art thou of the forest men in fear ? 

Or art thou of the sad fraternity 

Who still will strive my daughter’s mates 
to be, 

Staking their lives to win an earthly 
bliss, 

The lonely maid, the friend of Artemis?” 


* O King,” he said ‘‘ thou sayest the 
word indeed ; 

Nor will I quit the strife till I have won 

My sweet delight, or death to end my 
need. 

And know that Iam called Milanion, 

Of King Amphidamas the well-loved 
son: 

So fear not that to thy old name, O King, 

Much loss or Shame my victory will 
bring.” 


‘Nay, Prince,” said Schoeneus, ‘‘ wel- 
come to this land 

Thou wert indeed, if thou wert here to 
try 

Thy strength ’gainst some one mighty 
of his hand; 

Nor would we grudge thee well-won 
mastery. 

But Lae why wilt thou come to me to 
die, 





And at my door lay down thy luckless 
head, 
Swelling the band of the unhappy dead, | 


a ey aes curses even now my heart doth 
ear? 

Lo, Iam old,and know what life can be, 

And what a bitter thing is death anear. 

O, Son! be wise, and harken unto me, 

And if no other can be dear to thee, 

At least as now, yet is the world full 
wide, 

And he in seeming hopeless hearts may 
ride : 


‘But if thou losest life, then all is 
lost.” 

‘* Nay, King,” Milanion said, ‘‘thy words 
are vain. 

Doubt not that I have counted well the 
cost. 

But say, on what day wilt thou that I 
gain ; 
Fulfilled delight, or death to end my 

pain. 
Right glad were I if it could be to-day, 
And all my doubts at rest for ever lay.” 


‘“Nay,” said King Schoeneus, ‘ thus it 
shall not be, 

But rather shalt thou let a month go by, 

And weary with thy prayers for victory 

What god thou know’st the kindest and 
most nigh. 

So doing; still perchance thou shalt not 

le: 

And with my goodwill wouldst thou 
have the maid, 

For of the equal gods I grow afraid. 


** And until then, O Prince, be thou my 
guest, 

And all these troublous things awhile 
forget.” ! 

‘* Nay,” said he, ‘“couldst thou give my 
soul good rest, 

And on mine head a sleepy garland set, 

Then had I ’scaped the meshes of the 
net, [word ; 

Nor shouldst thou hear from me another 

But now, make sharp thy fearful head- 
ing-sword. 


“Yet willI do what son of man may do, 

And promise all the gods may most 
desire, 

That to myself I may at least be true ; 

And on that day my heart and limbs so 
tire, 


MORRIS 


With utmost strain and measureless de- 
sire, 

That, at the worst, I may but fall asleep 

When in the sunlight round that sword 
shall sweep.” 


He went therewith, nor anywhere would 
bide, 

But unto Argos restlessly did wend ; 

And there, as one who lays all hope aside, 

Because the leech has said his lfe must 
end, 

Silent farewell he bade to foe and friend, 

And took his way unto the restless sea, 

For there he deemed his rest and help 
might be. 


Upon the shore of Argolis there stands 

A temple to the goddess that he sought, 

That, turned unto the lion-bearing lands, 

Fenced from the east, of cold winds hath 
no thought, 

Though to no homestead there the 
sheaves are brought, 

No groaning press torments the close- 
clipped murk, 

Lonely the fane stands, far from all men’s 
work. 


Pass through a close, set thick with 
myrtle-trees, 

Through the brass doors that guard the 
holy place, 

And entering, hear the washing of the 
seas 

That twice a-day rise high above the base, 

And with the south-west urging them, 


embrace 

The marble feet of her that standeth 
there 

That shrink not, naked though they be 
and fair. 


Small is the fane through which the sea- 
wind sings ; 

About Queen Venus’ well-wrought image 
white, 

But hung around are many precious 
things, 

The gifts of those who, longing for de- 
light, 

Have hung them there within the.god- 
dess’ sight, 

And in return have taken at her hands 

The living treasures of the Grecian lands. 


And thither now has come Milanion, 
And showed unto the priests’ wide open 
eyes 
54 


849 
Gifts fairer than all those that there 
have shone, 
Silk cloths, inwrought with Indian 
fantasies, 
And bowls inscribed with sayings of the 
wise 


Above the deeds of foolish living things ; 
And mirrors fit to be the gifts of kings. 


And now before the Sea-born One he 
stands, 

By the sweet veiling smoke made dim 
and soft, 

And while the incense trickles from his 
hands, 

And while the odorous smoke-wreaths 
hang aloft, 

Thus doth he pray to her: ‘‘O Thou, 
who oft 

Hast holpen man and maid in their dis- 
tress 

Despise me not for thismy wretchedness ! 


‘*O goddess, among us who dwell below, 

Kings and great men, great for a little 
while, 

Have pity on the lowly heads that bow, 

Nor hate the hearts that love them with- 
out guile ; 

Wilt thou be worse than these, and is 
thy smile 

A vain device of him who set thee here, 

An empty dream of some artificer ? 


‘‘O great one, some men love, and are 
ashamed ; 

Some men are weary of the bonds of love ; 

Yea, and by some men lightly art thou 
blamed, 

That from thy toils their lives they can- 
not move, 

And ’mid the ranks of men their man- 
hood prove. 

Alas! O goddess, if thou slayest me 

What new immortal can I serve but thee ? 


‘Think then, will it bring honor to thy 
head 
If folk say, ‘ Everything aside he cast 
And to all fame and honor was he dead, 
And to his one hope now is dead at last, 
Since all unholpen he is gone and past : 
Ah, the gods love not man, for certainly, 
He to his helper did not cease to cry.’ 


‘* Nay, but thou wilt help ; they who died 
before 

Not single-hearted as I deem came here, 

Therefore unthanked they laid their 
gifts before ; 


850 


Thy stainless feet, still shivering with 
their fear, 

Lest in their eyes their true thought 
might appear, 

Who sought to bethe lords of that fair 
town, 

Dreaded of men and winners of renown. 


**O Queen, thou knowest I pray not for 
this : 

O set us down together in some place 

Where not a voice can break our heaven 
of bliss, 

Where nought but rocks and I can see 
her face, 

Softening beneath the marvel of thy 
grace, 

Where not a foot our vanished steps can 
track— 

The golden age, the golden age come 
back! 


‘“O fairest, hear me now who do thy | 


will, 
Plead for thy rebel that she be not slain, 
But live and love and be thy servant 
still ; 
Ah, give her joy and take away my pain, 
And thus two long-enduring servants 
gain. : 
An easy thing this is to do for me, 
What need of my vain words to weary 
thee. 


‘* But none the less, this place will I not 
leave 

Until I needs must go my death to meet, 

Or at thy hands some happy sign receive 

That in great joy we twain may one day 
greet 

Thy presence here and kiss thy silver feet, 

Such as we deem thee, fair beyond all 
words, 

Victorious o’er our servants and our 
lords.” 


Then from the altar back a space he 


drew, 
sut from the Queen turned not his face 
away, 


But ’gainst a pillar leaned, until the blue 
That arched the sky, at ending of the 


day, 

Was turned to ruddy gold and changing 
gray, 

And clear, but low, the nigh-ebbed 
windless sea a 

In the still evening murmured cease- 
lessly. 


BRITISH ORTS 


And there he stood when all the sun was 
down, 

Nor had he moved, when the dim golden 
light, 

Like the far lustre of a godlike town, 

Had left the world to seeming hopeless 
night, 

Nor would he move the more when wan _ 
moonlight 

Streamed through the pillars for a little 
while, 

And lighted up the white Queen’s change- 
less smile. 


Nought noted he the shallow-flowing sea 

As step by step it set the wrack a-swim ; 

The yellow torchlight nothing noted he 

Wherein with fluttering gown and half- 
bared limb 

The temple damsels sung their midnight 
hymn ; 

And nought the doubled stillness of the 
fane 

When they were gone and all was hushed 
again. 


But when the waves had touched the 
marble base, 

And steps the fish swim over twice a-day, 

The dawn beheld him sunken in his 
‘place 

Upon the floor; and sleeping there he 


lay, 

Not heeding aught the little jets of spray 

The roughened sea brought nigh, across 
him cast, 

For as one dead all thought from him 
had passed. 


Yet long before the sun had showed his 
head, 

Long ere the varied hangings on the 
wall 

Had gained once more their blue and 
green and red, 

He rose as one some well-known sign 
doth call 

When war upon the city’s gates doth 
fall, 

And searce like one fresh risen out of 
sleep, 

He’gan again his broken watch to keep. 


Then he turned round ; not for the sea- 


gull’s cry { 
That wheeled above the temple in his 
flight, 


Not for the fresh south wind that lov- 
ingly 


P MORRIS 





Breathed on the new-born day and dying 
night, 

But some strange hope ’twixt fear and 
great delight 

Drew round his face, now flushed, now 
pale and wan, 

And still constrained his eyes the sea to 
scan. 


Now a faint light lit up the southern sky 
Not sun or moon, for all the world was 


gray, 

But this a bright cloud seemed, that 
drew anigh, 

Lighting the dull waves that beneath it 
lay , 

As toward the temple still it took its 
way, 

And still grew greater, till Milanion 

Saw nought for dazzling light that round 

him shone. 


But as he staggered with his arms out- 
spread, 

Delicious unnamed 
around, 

For languid happiness he bowed his head, 

And with wet eyes sank down upon the 
ground, 

Nor wished for aught, nor any dream he 
found 

To give him reason for that happiness, 

Or make him ask more knowledge of his 
bliss. 


At last his eyes were cleared, and he 
could see 

-. Through happy tears the goddess face to 
face 

With that faint image of Divinity, 

Whose well-wrought smile and dainty 
changeless grace 

Until that morn so gladdened all the 
place ; 

Then he, unwitting cried aloud her name 

And covered up his eyes for fear and 
shame. 


odors breathed 


But through the stillness he her voice 
could hear 

Piercing his heart with joy scarce bear- 
able, 

That said, ‘‘ Milanion, wherefore dost 
thou fear, 

Iam not hard to those who love me 
well ; 

List to what I a second time will tell, 

And thou mayest hear perchance, and 
live to save 

The cruel maiden from a loveless grave. 


851 





‘See, by my feet three golden apples 


le— é 
Such fruit among the heavy roses falls, 
Such fruit my watchful damsels care- 
full 
Store up within the best loved of my 
walls, 
Ancient Damascus, where the lover calls 
Above my unseen head, and faint and 
light 
The rose-leaves flutter round mein the 
night. 


‘* And note, that these are not alone most 


fair 

With heavenly gold, but longing strange 
they bring 

Unto the hearts of men, who will not 
care 

Beholding these, for any once-loved thing 

Till round the shining sides their fingers 
cling. 

And thou shalt see thy well-girt swift- 
foot maid 

By sight of these amidst her glory stayed. 


‘‘For bearing these within a scrip with 
thee, 

When first she heads thee from the 
starting-place 

Cast down the first one for her eyes to 


see, 
And when she turns aside make on 
apace, 


And if again she heads thee in the race 

Spare not the other two to cast aside 

If she not long enough behind will bide, 
\ 


‘Farewell, and when has come the 
happy time 

That she Diana’s raiment must unbind 

And all the world seems blessed with 
Saturn’s clime, 

And thou with eager arms about her 
twined 

Beholdest first her gray eyes growing 
kind, 

Surely, O trembler, thou shalt scarcely 
then 

Forget the Helper of unhappy men.” 


Milanion raised his head at this last 
word 

For now so soft and kind she seemed to 
be 

No longer of her Godhead was he feared ; 

Too late he looked ; for nothing could 


he see 
But the white image glimmering doubt- 
fully 


852 


In the departing twilight cold and gray, 
And those three apples on the step that 
lay. 


These then he caught up quivering with 
delight, 

Yet fearful lest it all might be a dream ; 

And though aweary with the watchful 
night, 

And sleepless nights of longing, still did 
deem 

He could not sleep ; 
sunbeam 

That smote the fane across the heaving 
deep 

Shone on him laid in calm, untroubled 
sleep. 


but yet the first 


But little ere the noontide did he rise, 

And Wey he felt so happy scarce could 
tel 

Until the gleaming apples met his eyes. 

Then leaving the fair place where this 
befell 

Oft he looked back as one who loved it 
well, 

Then homeward to the haunts of men, 
’gan wend 

To bring all things unto a happy end. 


Now has the lingering month at last 
gone by, 

Again are all folk round the running 
place, 

Nor other seems the dismal pageantry 

Than heretofore, but that another face 

Looks o’er the smooth course ready for 
the race, 

For now, beheld of all, Milanion 

Stands on the spot he twice has look’d 
upon. 


But yet—what change is this that holds 
the maid? 

Does she indeed see in his glittering eye 

More than disdain of the sharp shearing 
blade, 

Some happy hope of help and victory ? 

The others seem’d to say, ‘*‘ We come to 
die ; 

Look down upon us for a little while, 

That, dead, we may bethink us of thy 
smile.” 


But he—what look of mastery was this 

He cast on her? why were histlips so red ; 

Why was his face so flush’d with hap- 
piness? 


’ BRITISH? POETS 





So looks not one who deems himself but 
dead, 

BK’en if to death he bows a willing head ; 

So rather looks a god well pleas’d to find 

Some ease damsel fashion’d to his 
mind. 


Why must she drop her lids before his 
gaze, 

And even as she casts adown her eyes 

Redden to note his eager glance of praise, 

And wish that she were clad in other 
guise ? 

Why must the memory to her heart arise 

Of things unnoticed when they first were 

heard, 

lover’s song, some answering 
maiden’s word ? 


Some 


What makes these longings, 
without a name, 

And this vain pity never felt before, 

This sudden languor, this contempt of 
fame, 

This tender sorrow for the time past o’er, 

These doubts that grow each minnte 
more and more ? 

Why does she tremble as ie time grows 
near, 

And weak defeat and woeful victory 
fear ? 


vague, 


But while she seem’d to hear her beat- 
ing heart, 

Above their heads the trumpet blast rang 
out 

And forth they sprang, and she must | 
play her part ; 

Then flew her white feet, knowing nota 
doubt, 

Though, slackening once, she turn’d her 
head about, 

But then she cried aloud and faster fled 

Than e’er before, and all men deemed 
him dead. 


But with no sound he raised aloft his 


hand, 

And thence what seemed a ray of light 
there flew 

And past the maid rolled on along the 
sand ; 

Then trembling she her feet together 
drew 

And in her heart a strong desire there 
grew 

To have the toy ; some god she thought 
had given [heaven. 


That gift to her, to make of eartha 


MORRIS 


i 


Then from the course with eager steps 
she ran, 

And in her odorous bosom laid the gold. 

But when she turned again, the great- 
limbed man, 

Now well ahead she failed not to behold, 

And mindful of her glory waxing cold, 

Sprang up and followed him in hot 
pursuit, 

Though with one hand she touched the 
golden fruit. 


Note too, the bow that she was wont to 


bear 

She laid aside to grasp the glittering 
prize, 

And o’er her shoulder from the quiver 
fair 


Three arrows fell and lay before her eyes 
Unnoticed, as amidst the people’s cries 
She sprang to head the strong Milanion, 
- Who now the turning-post had well-nigh 
won. 


But as he set his mighty hand on it 
White fingers underneath his own were 


laid, ‘ 

And white limbs from his dazzled eyes | 
did flit, 

Then he the second fruit cast by the 
maid: 


She ran awhile, and then as one afraid 
- Wavered and stopped, and turned and 
made no stay, 
Until the globe with its bright fellow 


lay. 


Then, as a troubled glance she cast 
around, 

Now far ahead the Argive could she see, 

And in her garment’s hem one hand she 


wound 
To keep the double prize, and stren- 
uously 


Sped o’er the course, and little doubt 
had she 

To win the day, though now but scanty 
space 

Was left betwixt him and the winning 
place. 


Short was the way unto such winged 
feet, 

Quickly she gained upon him till at last 

He turned about her eager eyes to meet 

And from his hand the third fair apple 
cast. 

She wavered not, but turned and ran so 
fast 


The saffron 


853 


After wer the prize that should her bliss ful- 
b 
That in her hand it lay ere it was still. 


Nor did she rest, but turned about to 
win 

Once more, an unblest woeful victory— 

And y et—and yet—why does her breath 
begin 

To fail her, and her feet drag heavily ? 

Why fails she now to see if far or nigh 

The goal is? why do her gray eyes grow 
dim ? 

Why do these tremors run through every 
limb ? 


She spreads her arms abroad some stay 


to find 

Else must she fall, indeed, and findeth 
this, 

A strong man’s arms about her body 
twined. 

Nor may she shudder now to feel his 
kiss, 

So wrapped she is in new unbroken 
bliss : 

Made happy that the foe the prize hath 
won, 

She weeps glad tears for all her glory 
done. 


SHATTER the trumpet, hew adown the 
posts ! 

Upon the brazen altar break the sword, 

And scatter incense to appease the 
ghosts 

Of those who died here by their own 
award. 

Bring forth the image of the mighty 
Lord, 

And her who unseen o’er the runners 
hung, 

And did a deed for ever to be sung. 


Here are the gathered folk; make no 
delay, 

Open King Schoeneus’ well-filled trea- 
sury, 

Bring out the gifts long hid from light 
of day, 

The golden bowls 
imagery, 
Gold chains, and 

from over sea, 
gown the old Phoenician 
brought, 
Within the temple of the Goddess 
wrought. 


oerwrought with 


unguents brought 


854 


O ye, O damsels, who shall never see 

Her, that Love’s servant bringeth now 
to you, 

Returning from another victory, 

In some cool bower do all that now is 
due! 

Since she in token of her service new 

Shall give to Venus offerings rich enow, 

Her maiden zone, her arrows and her 
bow. 1868. 


SONG FROM THE STORY OF CUPID 
AND PSYCHE 


O PENSIVE, tender maid, downcast and 
shy, 

Who turnest pale e’en at the name of 
love, 

And with flushed face must pass the 
elm-tree by, 

Ashamed to hear the passionate gray 
dove 

Moan to his mate, thee too the god 
shall move, 

Thee too the maidens shall ungird one 
day, 

And with thy girdle put thy shame 

. away. 

What, then, and shall white winter 
ne’er be done 

Because the glittering frosty morn is 
fair ? 

Because against the early-setting sun 

Bright show the gilded boughs, though 
waste and bare? 

Because the robin singeth free from 
care ? 

Ah! these are memories of a better day 

When on earth’s face the lips of sum- 


mer lay. 

Come, then, beloved one, for such as 
thee 

Love loveth, and their hearts he know- 
eth w ell, 


Who hoard their moments of felicity, 

As misers hoard the medals that they 
tell, 

Lest on the earth but paupers they 
should dwell: 

‘* We hide our love to bless another day ; 

The world is hard, youth passes quick,” 
they say. 


Ah, little ones, but if ye could forget 

Amidst your outpoured love that you 
must die, [querors yet, 

Then ye, my servants, were death’s con- 


BRITISH POETS 


And love to you should be eternity, 

How quick soever might the days 20 by: 

Yes, ye are made immortal on the day 

Ye cease the dusty grains of time to 
weigh. 

Thou harkenest, love? O make no 
semblance then — 

That thou art loved, but as thy custom 
is 

Turn thy gray eyes away from eyes of 
men. 

With hands down-dropped, that tremble 
with thy bliss, 

With hidden eyes, take thy first lover’s 
kiss ; 

Call this eternity which is to-day, 

Nor dream that this our love can pass 
away. 1868. 


JUNE 


O JuNE, O June, that we desired so, 

Wilt ons not make us happy on this 
day 

Across a. river thy soft breezes blow 

Sweet with the scent of beanfields far 
away, 

Above our heads rustle the aspens gray, 

Calm is the sky with harmless clouds 
beset, 

No thought of storm the morning vexes 
yet. 


See, we have left our hopes and fears be- 
hind 

To give our very hearts up unto thee ; 

What better place than this then could 
we find 

By this sweet stream that knows not of 
the sea, 

That guesses not the city’s misery, 

This little stream whose hamlets scarce 
have names, 

This far-off, lonely mother of the 
Thames ? 


Here then, O June, thy kindness will 
. we take ; 

And if indeed but pensive men we seem, 

What should we do? thou wouldst not 
have us wake 

From out the arms of this rare happy 
dream 

And wish to leave the murmur of the 
stream, 

The rustling boughs, the twitter of the 
birds, 

And all thy thousand peaceful happy 
words. 1868. 


MORRIS 


AUGUST 


Across the gap made by our English 
hinds, ; 

Amidst the Roman’s handiwork, behold 

Far off the long-roofed church; the 
shepherd binds 

_ The withy round the hurdles of his fold, 

Down in the foss the river fed of old, 

That through long lapse’of time has 
grown to be 

The little grassy valley that you see. 


Rest here awhile, not yet the eve is 
still, 

The bees are wandering yet, and you 
may hear 

The barley mowers on the trenchéd hill, 

The sheep-bells, and the restless chang- 
ing weir, 

All little sounds made musical and clear 

Beneath the sky that burning August 


gives, 
While yet the thought of glorious Sum- 
mer lives. 


Ah, love! such happy days, such days 
as these, 

Must we still waste them, craving for 
the best, 

Like lovers o’er the painted images 

Of those who once their yearning hearts 

- have blessed ?. 
Have we been happy on our day of 


rest ? 
Thine eyes say ‘‘ yes,”—but if it came 
again, 
. Perchance its ending would not seem so 
vain, 1868. 


SONG FROM OGIER THE DANE 


HALC 


In the white-flowered hawthorn brake, 
Love, be merry for my sake ; 

Twine the blossoms in my hair, 

_ Kiss me where I am most fair— 

Kiss me, love! for who knoweth 
What thing cometh after death ? 


ILLE 


Nay, the garlanded gold hair 

Hides thee where thou art most fair ; 
Hides the rose-tinged hills of snow— 
Ah, sweet love, I have thee now ! 
Kiss me, love! for who knoweth 
What thing cometh after death? 


855 


H AGC 


Shall we weep for a dead day, 

Or set Sorrow in our way ? 

Hidden by my golden hair, 

Wilt thou weep that sweet days wear? 
Kiss me, love! for who knoweth 
What thing cometh after death? 


ILLE 


Weep, O Love, the days that flit, 
Now, while I can feel thy breath ; 
Then may I remember it 
Sad and old, and near my death. 
Kiss me, love! for who knoweth 
What thing cometh after death? 1868. 


SONG FROM THE STORY OF ACON- 
TIUS AND CYDIPPE 


Fair is the night and fair the day, 
Now April is forgot of May, 

Now into June May falls away ; 
Fair day, fair night, O give mie back 
The tide that all fair things did lack 
Except my love, except my sweet ! 


|| Blow back, O wind! thou art not kind, 


Though thou art sweet; thou hast no 
mind 

Her hair about my sweet to wind ; 

O flowery sward, though thou art bright, 

I praise thee not for thy delight, 

Thou hast not kissed her silver feet. 


Thou know’st her not, O rustling tree, 
What dost thou then to shadow me, 
Whose shade her breast did never see? 
O flowers, in vain ye bow adown! 

Ye have not felt her odorous gown 
Brush past your heads my lips to meet. 


Flow on, great river—thou mayst deem 
That far away, a summer stream, 

Thou sawest her limbs amidst thee gleam 
And kissed her foot, and kissed her knee, 
Yet get thee swift unto the sea ! 

With nought of true thou wilt me greet. 


And thou that men call by my name, 

O helpless one, hast thou no shame 
That thou must even look the same, 

As while agone, as while agone, 

When thou and she were left alone, 
And hands, and lips, and tears did meet ? 


Grow weak and pine, lie down to die, 
O body in thy misery, 
Because short time and sweet goes by ; 


856 


BRITISH POETS 





O foolish heart, how weak thou art! 
Break, break, because thou needs must 


part 
From thine own love, from thine own 
sweet ! 1870. 


L’ENVOI 


THE EARTHLY PARADISE 


HERE are we for the last time face to 


face, 
Thou and I, Book, before I bid thee speed 
Upon thy perilous journey to that place 
For which I have done on thee pilgrim’s 
weed, 
Striving to get thee all things for thy 
need— 
—I love thee, whatso time or men may 


say 
Of the poor singer of an empty day. 


Good reason why I love thee, e’en 
if thou 

Be mocked or clean forgot as time wears 
on; 


For ever as thy fashioning did grow, 

Kind word and praise because of thee I 
won 

From those without whom were my 
world all gone, 

My hope fallen dead, 
away, 

And I set soothly in an empty day. 


my singing cast 


I love thee ; yet this last time must it be 

That thou must hold thy peace and I 
must speak, 

Lest if thou babble I begin to see 

Thy gear too thin, thy limbs and _ heart 
too weak, 

To find the land thou goest forth to 
seek— 

—Though what harm if thou die upon 
the way, 

Thou idle singer of an empty day ? 


But though this land desired thou never 
reach, 

Yet folk who know it mayst thou meet, 
or death ; 

Therefore a word unto thee would I teach 

To answer these, who, noting thy weak 


breath, 

Thy wandering eyes, thy heart of little 
faith, 

May BARE thy fond desire a sport and 
play 


Mocking the singer of an empty day. 


That land’s name, say’st thou? and the 
road thereto? 

Nay, Book, thou mockest, saying thou 
know’st it not; 

Surely no book of verse I ever knew 

But ever was the heart within him hot 

To gain the Land of Matters Unforgot— 

—There, now we both laugh—as the 
whole world may, 

At us poor singers of an‘empty day. 

Nay, let it pass, and harken! Hast 
thou heard 

That therein I believe I have a friend, 

Of whom for love I may not be afeared ? 

It is to him indeed I bid thee wend ; 

Yea, he perchance may meet thee ere 

' thou end, : 
Dying so far off from the hedge of bay, 
Thou idle singer of an empty day! 


Well, think of him,I bid thee, on the 
road, 

And if it hap that midst of thy defeat, 

Fainting beneath thy follies’ heavy load, 

My Master, GEOFFREY CHAUCER, thou 
do meet, 

Then shalt thou win a space of rest full 
sweet ; 

Then be thou bold, and speak the words 
I say, 

The idle singer of an empty day! 


‘*O Master, O thou great of heart and 
tongue, 

Thou well mayst ask me why I wander 
here, 

In raiment rent of stories oft besung ! 

But of thy gentleness draw thou anear, 

And then the heart of one who held thee 
dear 

Mayst thou behold ! Se nearas that Ilay ~ 

Unto the singer of an empty day. 


‘* For this he ever said, who sent me 
forth 

To seek a place amid thy company ; 

That howsoever little was my worth, 


Yet was he worth e’en just so much as 


I; 
He said that rhyme hath little skill to 
lie ; 
Nor feigned to cast his worser part away; 
In idle singing for an empty day. 


‘*T have beheld him tremble oft enough 

At things he could not choose ous trust 
to me, 

Although he knew the world was wise 
and rough ; 


MORRIS 


857 





And never did he fail to let me see 
His love,—his folly and faithlessness, 
maybe ; 
And still in turn I gave him voice to pray 
Such prayers as cling about an empty 


day. 


‘““Thou, keen-eyed, reading me, mayst 
read him through, 

For surely little is there left behind ; 

No power great deeds unnameable to ‘do ; 

No knowledge for which words he may 
not find, 

No love of things as vague as autumn 
wind— 

—Earth of the earth lies hidden by my 
clay, 

The idle singer of an empty day! 


‘Children we twain are, saith he, late 
made wise 

In love, but in all else most childish 
still, 

And seeking still the pleasure of our eyes, 

And what our ears with sweetest sounds 
may fill; 

Not fearing Love, lest these things he 
should kill ; 

Howe’er his pain by pleasure doth he lay, 

Making a strange tale of an empty day. 


‘“‘Death have we hated, knowing not 
what it meant ; 

Life have we loved, through green leaf 
and through sere, 

Though still the less we knew of its in- 
“tent ; 

The Earth and Heaven through countless 
year on year, 

Slow changing, were to us but curtains 
fair, 

Hung round about a little room, where 
play 

Weeping and laughter of man’s empty 


day. 
**O Master, if thine heart could love us 


yet, 
Spite of things left undone, and wrongly 


done, 

Some place in loving hearts then should 
we get, 

For thou, sweet-souled, didst never 


stand alone, 

But knew’st the joy and woe of many an 
one— 

—By lovers dead, who live through thee, 
we pray, 

Help thou us singers of anempty day !” 


Fearest thou, Book, what answer thou 
mayst gain 
Lest he should scorn thee, and thereof 


thou die ? 

Nay, it shall not be.—Thou mayst toil 
in vain, 

And never draw the House of Fame 
anigh ; 

Yet he at his shall know whereof we 


cry, 
Shall si ‘it not ill done to strive to lay 
The ghosts that crowd about life’s 
empty day. 


Then let the others go! and if indeed 

In some old garden thou and I have 
wrought, 

And made fresh flowers spring up from 
hoarded seed, 

And fragrance of old days and deeds 
have brought 

Back to folk weary; all was not for 
nought. 

—No little part it was for me to play— 

The idle singer of an empty day. 1870. 


THE SEASONS 


Spring. Spring am I, too soft of heart 
Much to speak ere I depart : 

Ask the Summer-tide to prove 

The abundance of my love. 


Summer. Summer looked for long am 1; 
Much shall change or e’er I die 

Prithee take it not amiss 

Though I weary thee with bliss. 


Autumn. Laden Autumn here I stand 
Worn of heart, and weak of hand: 
Nought but rest seems good to me, 
Speak the word that sets me free. 


Winter. Iam Winter, that do keep 
Longing safe amidst of sleep : 

Who shall say if I were dead 

What should be remembered? 1871. 


ERROR AND LOSS } 


UPON an eye I sat me down and wept, 
Because the world to me seemed nowise 


good ; 

Still autumn was it, and the meadows 
slept, 

The misty hills dreamed, and the silent 
wood [mood : 


Seemed listening to the sorrow of my 


' Originally with the title The Dark Wood, 


858 





I knew not if the earth with me did 
grieve, 
Or if it mock’d my grief that bitter eve. 


Then ’ twixt my tears a maiden did I see, 

Who drew anigh me on the leaf-strewn 
grass, 

Then stood and gazed upon me pitifully 

With grief-worn eyes, until my woe did 
pass 

From me to her, and tearless now I was, 

And she mid tears was asking me of one 

She long had sought unaided and alone. 


I knew not of him, and she turned away - 


Into the dark wood, and my own great 
pain 

Still held me there, till dark had slain 
the day, 

And perished at the gray dawn’s hand 
again ; 

Then from the wood a voice cried : 
in vain, 

In vain I seek thee, O thou bitter-sweet ! 

In what lone land are set thy longed-for 
feet?” 


fan. 


Then I looked up, and lo, a man there 
came 

From midst the trees, and stood regard- 
ing me 

Until my tears were dried for very 
shame ; 

Then he cried out: ‘‘O mourner, where 
is she 

Whom I have sought o’er every land and 
sea ? 

I love her and she loveth me, and still 

We meet no more than green hill meet- 
eth hill.” 


With that he passed on sadly, and I knew 

That these had met and missed in the 
dark night, 

Blinded by blindness of the world untrue, 

That hideth love and maketh wrong of 
right. 

Then midst my pity for their lost delight, 

Yet more with barren longing I grew 


weak, 
Yet more I mourred that I had none to 
seek. 1871. 


THE DAY OF LOVE 
(From LOVE IS ENOUGH) 


DAwN talks to-day 
Over dew-gleaming flowers, 


BRITISHAPOETS | ; 


Night flies away 
Till the resting of hours: 
Fresh are thy feet 
And with dreams thine eyes glis- 
tening, 
Thy still lips are sweet 
Though the world is a-listening. 
O Love, set a word in my mouth for our 
meeting, 
Cast thine arms round about me to stay 
my heart’s beating ! 
O fresh day, O fair day, O long day 
made ours! 


Morn shall meet noon 
While the flower-stems yet move, 
Though the wind dieth soon 
And the clouds fade above. 
Loved lips are thine 
As I tremble and harken ; 
Bright thine eyes shine, 
Though the leaves thy brow darken. 
O Love, kiss me into silence, lest no word 
avail me 
Stay my head with thy bosom lest breath 
and life fail me! ; 
O sweet day, O rich day, made long for 
our love! 


Late day shall greet eve, 
And the full blossoms shake, 
For the wind will not leave 
The tall trees while they wake. 
Eyes soft with bliss, 
Come nigher and nigher ! 
Sweet mouth I kiss, 
-Tell me all thy desire! 
Let us speak, love, together some words 
of our story, 
That our lips as they part may remember 
the glory! 
O soft day, O calm day, made clear for 
our sake ! 


Eve shall kiss night, 
And the leaves stir like rain 
As the wind stealeth hight 
O’er the grass of the plain. 
Unseen are thine eyes 
Mid the dreamy night’s sleeping, 
And on my mouth there lies 
The dear rain of thy weeping. 
Hold, silence, love, speak not of the 
sweet day departed, 
Cling close to me, love, lest I waken sad 
hearted ! 
O kind day, O dear day, short day, 
come again ! 1873, 


MORRIS 


FINAL CHORUS 


(From LOVE IS ENOUGH) 


LOVE is enough: ho ye who seek saving, 
Go no further; .come hither; there 
have been who have found it, 
And these know the House of Fulfilment 
of Craving ; 
These know the Cup with the roses 
around it, 
These know the World’s Wound and 
the balm that hath bound it: 
Cry out, the World heedeth not, ‘‘ Love, 
lead us home!” 


He leadeth, He harkeneth, He cometh 
to you-ward ; 
Set your faces as steel to the fears that 
assemble 
Round his goad for the faint, and his 
scourge for the froward : 
Lo his lips, how with tales of last kisses 
they tremble ! 
Lo his eyes of all sorrow that may not 
dissemble ! 
Cry out, for he heedeth, ‘‘ O Love, lead 
us home!” 


O harken the words of his voice of com- 
passion : 
**Come cling round about me, ye faith- 
ful who sicken | 
Of the weary unrest and the world’s 
passing fashion ! 
As the rain in mid-morning your 
troubles shall thicken, 
But surely within you some Godhead 
doth quicken, 
As ye cry to me heeding, and leading 
you home. 


‘*Come—pain ye shall have, and be blind 
to the ending! 
Come—fear ye shall have, mid the 
sky’s overcasting ! 
Come—change ye shall have, for far are 
ye wending ! 
Come—no crown ye shall have for your 
thirst and your fasting, 
But the kissed lips of Love and fair 
life everlasting ! 
Cry out, for one heedeth, who leadeth 
you home! ” 


Is he gone? was he with us?—ho ye 
who seek saving, 

Go no further ; come hither ; for have 
we not found it? 


859 


Here is the House of Fulfilment of Crav- 
ing ; 
Here is the Cup with the roses around 
Te 
The Werld’s Wound well healed, and 
the balm that hath bound it: 
Cry out! for he heedeth, fair Love that 
led home. 1873. 


THE VOICE OF TOIL 


I HEARD men saying, Leave hope and 
praying, 

All days shall be as all have been ; 

To-day and to-morrow bring fear and 
sorrow, 

The never ending toil between. 


When Earth was younger mid toil and 
hunger, 

In hope we strove, and our hands were 
strong ; 

Then great men led us, with words they 
fed us, 

And bade us right the earthly wrong. 


Go read in story their deeds and glory, 


Their names amidst the nameless dead ; 
Turn then from lying to us slow-dying 
In that good world to which they led ; 


Where fast and faster our iron master, 

The thing we made, for ever drives, 

Bids us grind treasure and fashion pleas- 
ure 

For other hopes and other lives. 


Where home is a hovel and dull we 
grovel, 

Forgetting that the world is fair ; 

Where no babe we cherish, lest its very 
soul perish ; 

Where mirth is crime, and love a snare. 


Who now shall lead us, what god shall 
heed us 

As we lie in the hell our hands have won ? 

For us are no rulers but fools and be- 
foolers, 

The great are fallen, the wise men gone. 


I heard men saying, Leave tears and 
praying, 

The sharp knife heedeth not the sheep ; 

Are we not stronger than the rich and 
the wronger, 

When day breaks over dreams and sleep ? 


860 


BRITISH POETS 





shoulder to Sau ULGor ere the 
world grows older ! 

Help lies in nought but thee and me: 

Hope is before us, the long years that 

bore us 


Bore leaders more than men may be. 


Come, 


Let dead hearts tarry and trade and 
marry, 

And trembling nurse their dreams of 
mirth, 

While we the living our lives are giving 

To bring the bright new world to birth. 


Come, shoulder to shoulder, ere earth 
grows older ! 
The cause spreads over land and sea ; 


Now the world shaketh, and fear 
awaketh, 
And joy at last for thee and me. 
1884. 
NO MASTER 


Saith man to man, We’ve heard and 
known 

That we no master need 

To live upon this earth our own, 
In fair and manly deed. 

The grief of slaves long passed away 
For us hath forged the chain, 

Till now each worker’s patient day 
Builds up the House of Pain. 


And we, shall we too, crouch and quail, 
Ashamed, afraid of strife, 

And lest our lives untimely fail 
Embrace the Death in Life? 

Nay, cry aloud, and have no fear, 
We few against the world ; 

Awake, arise! the hope we bear 
Against the curse is hurled. 


It grows and grows—are we the same, 
The feeble band, the few ? 

Or what are these with eyes aflame, 
And hands to deal and do? 

This is the host that bears the word, 
‘*“NO MASTER HIGH OR LOW ”’— 

A lightning flame, a shearing sword, 
A storm to overthrow. 1884. 


THE DAY IS COMING 


Come hither, lads, and harken, for a tale 
there is to tell, 

Of the wonderful days a- coming, when 
all shall be better than well. 


And the tale shall be told of a country, 
a land in the midst of the sea, 

And folk shall call it England in the 
days that are going to be. 


There more than one in a thousand in 
the days that are yet to come, 

Shall have some hope of the morrow, 
some joy of the ancient home. 


For then, laugh not, but listen to this 
strange tale of mine, 

All folk that are in England shall be 
better lodged than swine. 


Then a man shall work and bethink him, 
and rejoice in the deeds of his 
hand, 

Nor yet come home in the even too faint 
and weary to stand. 


Men in that time a-coming shall work 
and have no fear 

For to-morrow’s lack of earning and the 
hunger- wolf anear. 


I tell you this for a wonder, that no 
man then shall be glad 

Of his fellow’s fall and mishap to snatch 
at the work he had. 


For that which the worker winneth shall 
then be his indeed, 

Nor shall half be reaped for nothing by 
him that sowed no seed. 


O strange new wonderful justice! But 
for whom shall we gather the gain? 

For ourselves and for each of our fellows, 
and no hand shall labor in vain. 


Thenall Mine and all Thine shall be Ours, 
and no more shall any man crave 

For riches that serve for nothing but to 
fetter a friend for a slave. 


And what wealth then shall be left us 
when none shall gather gold 

To buy his friend in the market, and 
pinch and pine the sold ? 


Nay, what save the lovely city, and the 
little house on the hill, 

And the wastes and the woodland beauty, 
and the happy fields we till ; 


And the homes of ancient stories, the 
tombs of the mighty dead ; 

And the wise men seeking out marvels, 
and the poet’s teeming head ; 


MORRIS ; 


And the painter’s hand of wonder; and 
the marvelous fiddle-bow, 

And the banded choirs of music: all 
those that do and know. 


For all these shall be ours and all men’s; 
nor shall any lack a share 

Of the toil and the gain of living in the 
days when the world grows fair. 


Ah! suchare the days that shall be! But 
what are the deeds of to-day, 

In the days of the years we dwell in, 
that wear our lives away ? 


Why, then, and for what are we wait- 
ing? There are three words to 
speak ; 

WE WILL IT, and what is the foeman 
but the dream-strong wakened 
and weak ? 


O why and for what are we waiting? 
while our brothers droop and die, 

And onevery wind of the heavens a 
wasted life goes by. 


How long shall they reproach us where 
crowd on crowd they dwell, 

Poor ghosts of the wicked city, the gold- 
crushed, hungry hell ? 


Through squalid life they labored, in 
sordid grief they died, 

Those sons of a mighty mother, those 
props of England’s pride. 


They are gone; there is none can undo 
it, nor save our souls from the 
curse ; 

But many a million’ cometh, and shall 
they be better or worse ? 


It is we must answer and hasten, and 
open wide the door 

For the rich man’s hurrying terror, and 
the slow-foot hope of the poor. 


Yea, the voiceless wrath of the 
wretched, and their unlearned dis- 
content, 


We must give it voice and wisdom till 
the waiting-tide be spent. 


Come, then, since all things call us, the 
living and the dead, 

And o’er the weltering tangle a glim- 
mering light is shed. 


861 





Come, then, let us cast off fooling, and 
put by ease and rest, 

For the Cause alone is worthy till the 
good days bring the best. 


Come, join in the only battle wherein no 
man can fail, 

Where whoso fadeth and dieth, yet his 
deed shall still prevail. 


Ah! come, cast off all fooling, for this, 
at least, we know : 

That the Dawn and the Day is coming, 
and forth the Banners go. 1885. 


THE DAYS THAT WERE 
(MOTTO OF THE HOUSE OF THE WOLFINGS) 


WHILES in the early winter eve 

We pass amid the gathering night 
Some homestead that we had to leave 
Years past: and see its candles bright 
Shine in the room beside the door 
Where we were merry years agone, 
But now must never enter more, 

As still the dark road drives us on. 
E’en so the world of men may turn 
At even of some hurried day 


‘And see the ancient glimmer burn 


Across the waste that hath no way ; 

Then, with that faint light in its eyes, 

Awhile I bid it linger near 

And nurse in waving memories 

The bitter sweet of days that were. 
1889. 


THE DAY OF DAYS 


EACH eve earth falleth down the dark, 
As though its hope were o’er ; 

Yet lurks the sun when day is done 
Behind to-morrow’s door. 


Gray grows the dawn while men-folk 
sleep, 

Unseen spreads on the light, 

Till the thrush sings to the colored 
things, 

And earth forgets the night. 


No otherwise wends on our Hope: 
E’en as a tale that’s told 

Are fair lives lost, and all the cost 
Of wise and true and bold. 


We’ve toiled and failed; we spake the 
word ; 

None harkened ; dumb we lie; 

Our Hope is dead, the seed we spread 

Fell o’er the earth to die. 


862 


What’s this ?° 
still, 

_ And life is loved and dear, 

The lost and found the Cause hath 
crowned, 

The Day of Days is here. 


For joy our hearts stand 


1890. 


THE BURGHERS’ BATTLE 


THICK rise the spear-shafts o’er the land 

That erst the harvest bore ; 

The sword is heavy in the hand, 

And we return no more. 

The light wind waves the Ruddy Fox, 

Our banner of the war, 

And ripples in the Running Ox, 

And we return no more. 

Across our stubble acres now 

The teams go four and four ; 

But out-worn elders guide the plough, 

And we return no more. 

And now the women heavy-eyed 

Turn through the open door 

From gazing down the highway wide, 

Where we return no more. 

The shadows of the fruited close 

Dapple the feast-hall floor ; 

There lie our dogs and dream and doze, 

And we return no more. 

Down from the minster tower to-day 

Fall the soft chimes of yore 

Amidst the chattering jackdaws’ play : 

And we return no more. 

But underneath the streets are still ; 

Noon, and the market’s o’er! 

Back go the goodwives o’er the hill ; 

For we return no more. 

What merchant to our gates shall come ? 

What wise man bring us lore? 

What abbot ride away to Rome, 

Now we return no more ? 

What mayor shall rule the hall we built ? 

Whose scarlet sweep the floor? 

What judge shall doom the robber’s 
guilt, 

Now we return no more ? 

New houses in the streets shall rise 

Where builded we before, 

Of other stone wrought other wise ; 

For we return no more. 

And crops shall cover field and hill 

Unlike what once they bore, 

And all be done without our will, 

Now we return.no more. 

Look up! the arrows streak the sky, 

The horns of battle roar ; 

The long spears lower and draw nigh, 

And we return no more. 

Remember how beside the wain, 


BRITISH POETS 





We spoke the word of war, 

And sowed this harvest of the plain, 
And we return no more. 

Lay spears about the Ruddy Fox ! 
The days of old are o’er ; 

Heave sword about the Running Ox} 
For we return no nore. 1891. 


AGNES AND THE HILL-MAN 
TRANSLATED FROM THE DANISH 


AGNES went through the meadows a- 
weeping, 

Fowl are a-singing. 

There stood the hill-man heed thereof 
keeping. 

Agnes, fair Agnes ! 

‘*Come to the hill, fair Agnes, with me, 

The reddest of gold will I "give unto 
thee 1.” 


Twice went Agnes the hill round about, 
Then wended within, left the fair world 
without. 


In the hillside bode Agnes, three years 
thrice told o’er, 

For the green earth sithence fell she 
longing full sore. 


There she sat, and lullaby sang in her 
singing, 

And she heard how the bells of England 
were ringing. 


Agnes before her true-love did stand : 
‘* May I wend to the church of the Eng- 
lish Land ?” 


‘*To England’s Church well mayst thou 
be gone, 

So that no hand thou lay the red gold 
upon. 


‘So that when thou art come the church- 
yard anear 
Thou cast not abroad thy golden hair. 


‘So that when thoustandest the church 
within 
To thy mother on bench.thou never win. 


‘So that when thou hearest the high 
God’s name, 

No knee unto earth thou bow to the 
same.” 


Hand she laid on all gold that was there, 
And cast abroad her golden hair. 


tt 


MORRIS 





863 


And when the church she stood within But that there ’mid the gray grassy dales 


‘To her mother on bench straight did she 
win, 


And when she heard the high God’s 
name, . 
Knee unto earth she bowed to the same. 


When all the mass was sung to its end 
Home with her mother dear did she 
wend. 


*“* Come, Agnes, into the hillside to me, 
For thy seven small sons greet sorely for 
thee!” 


‘Let them greet, let them greet, as 
they will have to do; © 
For never again will I hearken thereto ! ” 


Weird laid he on her, sore sickness he 
wrought, 
Fowl are a-singing. 
That self-same hour to death was she 
- brought. 


Agnes, fair Agnes. 1391; 


ICELAND FIRST SEEN 


Lo from our loitering shipa new land at 
last to be seen ; 
Toothed rocks down the side of the firth 
on the east guard a weary wide lea, 
And ‘black slope the hill-sides above, 
striped adown with their desolate 
green : 

And a peak rises up on the west from 
the meeting of cloud and of sea, 

Foursquare from base unto point like 
the building of Gods that have been, 

The last of that waste of the mountains 
all cloud-wreathed and snow-flecked 
and gray, 

And bright with the dawn that began 
just now at the ending of day. 


Ah! what came we forth for to see that 
our hearts are so hot with desire ? 

Is it enough for our rest the sight of this 
desolate strand, 

And the mountain-waste voiceless as 


death but for winds that may sleep not. 


nor tire? 


Why do we long to wend forth through 
the length and breadth of a land, 

Dreadful with grinding of ice, 
record of scarce hidden fire, 


and 


sore scarred by the ruining streams 
Lives the tale of the Northland of old 
and the undying glory of dreams? 


O land, as some cave by the sea where 
the treasures of old have been laid, 

The sword it may be of a king whose 
name was the turning of fight ; 

Or the staff of some wise of the world 
that many things made and unmade. 
Or the ring of a woman maybe whose 

woe is grown wealth and delight. 
No wheat and no wine grows above it, 
no orchard for blossom and shade ; 
The few ships that sail by its blackness 
but deem it the mouth of a grave ; 
Yet sure when the world shall awaken, 
this too shall be mighty to save. 
& 


Or rather, O land, if a marvel it seemeth 
that men ever sought 

Thy wastes for a field anda garden ful- 
filled of all wonder and doubt, 

And feasted amidst of the winter when 
the fight of the year had been fought, 

Whose plunder all gathered together 
was little to babble about : 

Cry aloud from thy wastes, O thou 
land, ‘‘ Not for this nor for that was I 
wrought 

Amid waning of realms and of riches 
and death of things worshipped and 
sure, 

IT abide here the spouse of a God, and I 
made and I make and endure.” 


O Queen of the grief without know- 
ledge, of the courage that may not 
avail, 

Of the longing that may not attain, of 
the love that shall never forget, 

More joy than the gladness of laughter 
thy voice hath amidst of its wail: 

More hope than of pleasure fulfilled 
amidst of thy blindness is set ; 

More glorious than gaining of all, thine 
unfaltering hand that shall fail : 

For what is the mark on thy brow but 
the brand that thy Brynhild doth 
bear ? 

Lone once, and loved and undone by a 
love that no ages outwear. 


Ah! when thy Balder comes back, and 
bears from the heart of the Sun, 

Peace and the healing of pain, and the 
wisdom that waiteth no more; 

And the lilies are laid on thy brow 


864 


BRITISH~ POETS 





*‘mid the crown of the deeds thou 
hast done ; 

And the roses spring up by thy feet that 
the rocks of the wilderness wore. 

Ah! when thy Balder comes back and 
we gather the gains he hath won, 

Shall we not linger a little to talk of thy 
sweetness of old, 

Yea, turn back awhile to thy travail 
whence the gods stood aloof to be- 
hold ? 1891, 


TO THE MUSE OF THE NORTH 
O MUSE that swayest the sad Northern 


Song, 

Thy right hand full of smiting and of 
wrong, 

Thy left hand holding pity; andg thy 
breast 

Heaving with hope of that so certain 
rest : 

Thou, with the gray eyes kind and un- 
afraid, 

The soft lips trembling not, though they 
have said 

The doom of the World and those that 
dwell therein. 

The lips that smile not though thy 
children win 

The fated Love that draws the fated 
Death. 

O, borne adown the fresh stream of thy 
breath, 

Let some word reach my ears and touch 
my heart, 

That, if it may be, I may have a part 


In that great sorrow of thy children 
dead 

That vexed the brow, and bowed adown 
the head, 

Whitened the hair, made life a won- 
drous dream, 

And death the murmur of a _ restful 
stream, 

But left no stain upon those souls of 
thine 

Whose greatness through the tangled 
world doth shine, 

O Mother, and Love and Sister all in 
one, 

Come thou; for sure Iam enough alone 

That thou thine arms about my heart 
shouldst throw, 

And wrap ime in the grief of long ago. 

1891. 


DRAWING NEAR THE LIGHT 


Lo, when we wade the tangled wood, 
In haste and hurry to be there, 
Nought seem its leaves and blossoms 


good, 
For all that they be fashioned fair. 


But looking up, at last we see 

The glimmer of the open light, 

From o’er the place where we would be; 
Then grow the very brambles bright. 


So now, amidst our day of strife, 
With many a matter glad we play, 
When once we see the light of life 
Gleam through the tangle of to-day. 
1891, 


SWINBURNE 


LIST OF REFERENCES 
EpITIONS 


The first * collected edition of Swinburne, in 12 volumes, is now being 
published (1904), and is issued in America by Harper & Bros. The best 
editions of single works are published by Chatto & Windus, London. There 
are many cheap American reprints of the poems, none of them complete. 


BroGRAPHY 


See the International Encyclopedia, etc.; Wraristaw (T.), Algernon 
Charles Swinburne, a Study, 1900 (English Writers of To-day) ; and the 
biographical references under Rossetti and Morris. 


CRITICISM 


Apams (Francis), Essays in Modernity: The Poetry and Criticism ot 
Mr. Swinburne. Austin (A.), Poetry of the Period. BucHanan (R.), The 
-Fleshly School of Poetry, 1871. Courrnry (W. L.), Studies New and 
Old. Forman (H. B.), Our Living Poets. *Gossr (E.) in The Century 
Magazine, Vol. XLII, p. 101, May, 1902. Haxtarp (J. H.), Gallica and 
other Essays. Lowe:t (J. R). My Study Windows: Swinburne’s Tra- 
gedies. OnipHant (Margaret), Victorian Age of Literature. ParTrmore 
(C)); Principle in Art, Payne (W. M.), in Warner’s Library of the 
World’s Best Literature. Rosserr1 (W. M.), Swinburne’s Poems and 
Ballads: A Criticism, 1866. Saryrsspury (G.), Corrected Impressions. 
SHarp (W.), In Pall Mall Magazine, Vol. XXV, p. 25, December, 1901. 
*StepMan (KE. C.), Victorian Poets. Swinsurne, Notes on Poems and 
Reviews (a reply to the early criticisms of Poems and Ballads, first series), 
1866. Swinpurne, Under the Microscope (a reply to Buchanan), 1872. 
Wo.tiarGEerR, Studien iiber Swinburne’s poetischen Stil. Wratistaw 
(T.), Algernon Charles Swinburne (English Writers of To-day). 

Curnry (J. V.), Golden Guess. Dawson (W.J.), Makers of Modern 
English. FRranKE (W.), Algernon Charles Swinburne als Dramatiker. 
Frisweii (J. H.), Modern Men of Letters honestly Criticized. Sarrazin 
(G.), Poétes modernes de l’Angleterre. Scupprer (V. D.), Life of the 
Spirit. 

BIBLIOGRAPHY 


Nrcorz (W. R.) and Wiss (T. J.), in Literary Anecdotes of the Nine- 
teenth Century. *SnepHEerp (R. H.), The Bibliography of Swinburne, 
1887. 


55 865 


SWINBURNE 


A SONG IN TIME OF ORDER 
LS52 


PusH hard across the sand, 

For the salt wind gathers breath ; 
Shoulder and wrist and hand, 

Push hard as the push of death. 


The wind is as iron that rings, 
The foam-heads loosen and flee ; 
It swells and welters and swings, 
The pulse of the tide of the sea. 


And up on the yellow cliff 

The long corn flickers and shakes ; 
Push, forthe wind holds stiff, 

And the gunwale dips and rakes. 


Good hap to the fresh fierce weather, 
The quiver and beat of the sea! 
While three men hold together 
The kingdoms are less by three. 


Out to the sea with her there, 
Out with her over the sand, 
Let the kings keep the earth for their 
share ! 
We have done with the sharers of 
land. 


They have tied the world in a tether, 
They have bought over God with a 
fee ; 
While three men hold together, 
The kingdoms are less by three. 


We have done with the kisses that sting, 
The thief’s mouth red from the feast, 

The blood on the hands of the king, 
And the lie at the lips of the priest. 


Will they tie the winds in a tether, 
Put a bit in the jaws of the sea? 
While three men hold together, 
The kingdoms are less by three. 


Let our flag run out straight in the wind! 
The old red shall be floated again 





When the ranks that are thin shall be 
thinned, 

When the names that were twenty 
are ten; 


When the devil’s riddle is mastered 
And the galley-bench creaks with a 
Pope, 
We shall see Buonaparte the bastard 
Kick heels with his throat in a rope. 


While the shepherd sets wolves on his 
sheep 
And the emperor halters his Kine, 
While Shame is a watchman asleep 
And Faith is a keeper of swine. 


Let the wind shake our flag like a | 
feather, 
Like the plumes of the foam of the 
sea ! ‘ 
While three men hold together, 
The kingdoms are less by three. 


All the world has its burdens to bear, 
From Cayenne to the Austrian 
whips ; . 
Forth, with the rain in our hair 
And the salt sweet foam in our lips: 


In the teeth of the hard glad weather, 
In the blown wet face of the sea ; 
While three men hold together, 
The kingdoms are less by three. 
1862. 


CHORUSES FROM ATALANTA IN 
CALYDON 


THE YOUTH OF THE YEAR 


WHEN the hounds of spring are on 
winter’s traces, 
The mother of months in meadow or 
plain 
Fills the shadows and windy places 
With lisp of leaves and ripple of rain 5 


866 


SWINBURNE 


And the brown bright nightingale amor- 
ous 
Is half assuaged for Itylus, 
For the Thracian ships and the foreign 
faces, 
The tongueless vigil, and all the pain. 


Come with bows bent and with emptying 
of quivers, 
Maiden most perfect, lady of light, 
With a noise of winds and many rivers, 
With a clamor of waters, and with 
might ; 
Bind on thy sandals, O thou most fleet, 
Over the splendor and speed of thy feet ; 
For the faint east quickens, the wan 
west shivers, 
Round the feet of the day and the feet 
of the night. 


Where shall we find her, how shall we 
sing to her, 
Fold our hands round her knees, and 
cling? 
O that man’s heart were as fire and could 
spring to her, 
Fire, or the strength of the streams 
that spring ! 
For the stars and the winds are unto her 
As raiment, as songs of the harp-player ; 
For the risen stars and the fallen cling 
to her, 
And the southwest-wind and the west- 
wind sing. 


For winter’s rains and ruins are over, 
And all the season of snowsand sins; 
The days dividing lover and lover, 
The light that loses, the night that 
wins ; 
And time remembered is grief forgotten, 
And frosts are slain and flowers begotten, 
And in green underwood and cover 
Blossom by blossom the spring begins. 


The full streams feed on flower of rushes, 
Ripe grasses trammela travelling foot, 
The faint fresh flame of the young year 
flushes 
From leaf to flower and flower to fruit ; 
And fruit and leaf are as gold and fire, 
And the oat is heard above the lyre, 
And the hooféd heel of a satyr crushes 
The chestnut-husk at the chestnut 
root. 


And Pan by noon and Bacchus by night, 

Fleeter of foot.than the fleet-foot kid, 

Follows with dancing and fills with de- 
light 





867 





The Meenad and the Bassarid ; 
And soft as lips that laugh and hide 
The laughing leaves of the trees divide, 
And screen from seeing and leave in 
sight 
The god pursuing, the maiden hid. 


The ivy falls with the Bacchanal’s hair 
Over her eyebrows hiding her eyes ; 


The wild vine slipping down leaves 
bare 

Her bright breast shortening into 
sighs ; 


The wild vine slips with the weight of 
its leaves, 
But the berried ivy catches and cleaves 
To the limbs that glitter, the feet that 
scare 
The wolf that follows, the fawn that 
flies. 


THE LIFE OF MAN 


Before the beginning of years, 

There came to the making of man 
Time, witha gift of tears ; 

Grief, with a glass that ran ; 
Pleasure, with pain for leaven ; 

Summer, with flowers that fell ; 
Remembrance fallen from heaven, 

And madness risen from hell ; 
Strength without hands to smite ; 

Love that endures for a breath ; 
Night, the shadow of hght, 

And life, the shadow of death. 


And the high gods took in hand 
Fire, and the falling of tears, 
Anda measure of sliding sand 
From under the feet of the years ; 
And froth and drift of the sea ; 
And dust of the laboring earth ; 
And bodies of things to be 
In the houses of death and of birth ; 
And wrought with weeping and laughter 
And fashioned with loathing and love, 
With life before and after 
And death beneath and above, 
For a day and a night and a morrow, 
That his strength might endure fora 
span 
With travail and heavy sorrow, 
The holy spirit of man. 


From the winds of the north and the 
south 
They gathered as unto strife ; 
They breathed upon his mouth, 
They filled his body with life ; 


868 


Eyesight and speech they wrought 
For the veils of the soul therein, 
A time for labor and thought, 
A time to serve and to sin; 
They gave him light in his ways, 
And love, and a space for delight, 
And beauty and length of days, 
And night, and sleep in the night. 
His speech is a burning fire ; 
With his lips he travaileth ; 
In his heart is a blind desire, 
In his eyes foreknowledge of death ; 
He weaves, and is clothed with derision; 
Sows, and he shall not reap ; 
His life is a watch or a vision 
Between a sleep anda sleep. 


LOVE AND LOVE’S MATES 


We have seen thee, O Love, thou art 
fair ; thou art goodly, O Love ; 

Thy wings make light in the air as the 
wings of a dove. 

Thy feet are as winds that divide the 
stream of the sea; 

Karth is thy covering to hide thee, the 
garment of thee. 

Thou art swift and subtle and blind asa 
flame of fire; 

Before thee the laughter, behind thee the 
tears of desire ; 

And twain go forth beside thee, a man 
with a maid; 

Her eyes are the eyes of a bride whom 
delight makes afraid ; 

As the breath in the buds that stir is her 
bridal breath : 

But Fate is the name of her; and his 
name is Death. 


NATURE 


O that I now, I too were 

By deep wells and water-floods, 
Streams of ancient hills, and where 
All the wan green places bear 
Blossoms cleaving to the sod, 
Fruitless fruit, and grasses fair, 

Or such darkest ivy-buds 

As divide thy yellow hair, 

Bacchus, and their leaves that nod 
t<ound thy fawnskin brush the bare 
Snow-soft shoulders of a god; 
There the year is sweet, and there 
Earth is full of secret springs, 

And the fervent rose-cheeked hours 
Those that marry dawn and noon, 
There are sunless, there look pale 
In dim leavesand hidden air, 


? 





BRITISH POETS 


Pale as grass or latter flowers, 

Or the wild vine’s wan wet rings 
Full of dew beneath the moon, 

And all day the nightingale 

Sleeps, and all night sings ; 

There in cold remote recesses 

That nor alien eyes assail, 

Feet, nor imminence of wings, 

Nor a wind nor any tune, 

Thou, O queen and holiest, 

Flower the whitest of all things, 
With reluctant lengthening tresses 
And with sudden splendid breast 
Save of maidens unbeholden, 

There art wont to enter, there 

Thy divine swift limbs and golden 
Maiden growth of unbound hair, 
Bathed in waters white, 

Shine, and many a maid’s by thee 
In moist woodland or the hilly 
Flowerless brakes where wells abound 
Out of all men’s sight ; 

Or in lower pools that see 

All their marges clothed all round 
With the innumerable lily, 

Whence the golden-girdled bee 
Flits through flowering rush to fret 
White or duskier violet, 

Fair as those that in far years 

With their buds left luminous 

And their little leaves made wet 
From the warmer dew of tears, 
Mother’s tears in extreme need, 

Hid the limbs of Iamus, 

Of thy brother’s seed ; 

For his heart was piteous 

Toward him, even as thine heart now 
Pitiful toward us ; 
Thine, O goddess, turning hither 

A benignant blameless brow ; 
Seeing enough of evil done 

And lives withered as leaves wither 
In the blasting of the sun ; 

Seeing enough of hunters dead, 
Ruin enough of all our year, 

Herds and harvest slain and shed, 
Herdsmen stricken many an one, 
Fruits and flocks consumed together, 
And great length of deadly days. 
Yet with reverent lips and fear 
Turn we toward thee, turn and praise 
For this lightening of clear weather 
And prosperities begun. 

For not seldom, when all air 

As bright water without breath 
Shines, and when men fear not, fate 
Without thunder unaware 

Breaks, and brings down death. 
Joy with grief ye great gods give, 


SWINBURNE 


Good with bad, and overbear 
Ali the pride of us that live, 

All the high estate, 

As ye long since overbore, 

As in old time long before, 
Many a strong man anda great, 
All that were. 

But do thou, sweet, otherwise, 
Having heed of all our prayer, 
Taking note of all our sighs ; 
We beseech thee by thy light, 
By thy bow, and thy sweet eyes, | 
And the kingdom of the night, 
Be thou favorable and fair ; 

By thine arrows and thy might 
And Orion overthrown ; 

By the maiden thy delight, 

By the indissoluble zone 

And the sacred hair. 


FATE 


Not as with sundering of the earth 
Nor as with cleaving of the sea 
Nor fierce foreshadowings of a birth 
. Nor flying dreams of death to be, 
Nor loosening of a large world’s girth 
And quickening of the body of night, 
And sound of thunder in men’s ears 
And fire of lightning in men’s sight, 
Fate, mother of desires and fears, 
Bore unto men tlie law of tears ; 
But sudden, an unfathered flame, 
And broken out of night, she shone, 
She, without body, without name, 
In days forgotten and foregone ; 
And heaven rang round her as she came 
Like smitten cymbals, and lay bare ; 
Clouds and great stars, thunders and 
snows, 
The blue sad fields and folds of air, 
The life that breathes, the life that 


grows, 
All wind, all fire. that burns or blows, 
Even all these knew her: for she is great; 
The daughter of doom, the mother of 
death, 
The sister of sorrow ; a lifelong weight 
That no man’s finger lighteneth, 
Nor any god can lighten fate ; 
A landmark seen across the way 
Where one race treads as the other 
trod ; 
An evil sceptre, an evil stay, 
Wrought for astaff, wrought for arod, 
The bitter jealousy of God. 


For death is deep as the sea, 
And fate as the waves thereof, 


869 


Shall the waves take pity on thee 
Or the south-wind offer thee love ? 
Wilt thou take the night for thy day 
Or the darkness for light on thy way 
Till thou say in thine heart, Enough? 


Behold, thou art over fair, thou art 
over wise ; 

The sweetness of spring in thine hair, 
and the light in thine eyes. 

The light of the spring in thine eyes, 
and the sound in thine ears ; 

Yet thine heart shall wax heavy with 
sighs and thine eyelids with tears. 

Wilt thou cover thine hair with gold ; 
and with silver thy feet? 
Hast thou taken the purple to fold thee, 
and made thy mouth sweet ? 
Behold, when thy face is made bare, he 
that loved thee shall hate ; 
Thy face shall be no more fair at the 
fall of thy fate. 

For thy life shall fall asa leaf and be 
shed as the rain ; 

And the veil of thine head shall be grief ; 
and the crown shall be pain. 


THE DEATH OF MELEAGER 


Meleager. Let your hands meet 
Round the weight of my head, 
Lift ye my feet 
As the feet of the dead ; 
For the flesh of my body is molten, the 
limbs of it molten as lead. 


Chorus. O thy luminous face, 
Thine imperious eyes ! 
O the grief, O the grace, 
As of day when it dies! 
Who is this bending over thee, lord, with 
tears and suppression of sighs! 


Meleager. Is a bride so fair? 
Is a inaid so meek ? 
With unchapleted hair, 
With unfilleted cheek, 
Atalanta, the pure among women, whose 
name is as blessing to speak. 


Atalanta. I would that with feet, 
Unsandalled, unshod, 
Overbold, overfleet, 
I had swum not nor trod 
From Arcadia to Calydon, northward, a 
blast of the envy of God. 


Meleager. Unto each man his fate ; 
Unto each as he saith 


870 


In whose fingers the weight 
Of the world is as breath ; 
Yet I would that in clamor of battle 
mine hands had laid hold upon 
death. 


Chorus. Not with cleaving of shields 
And their clash in thine ear, 

When the lord of fought fields 
Breaketh spearshaft from spear, 
Thou art broken, our lord, thou art 
broken, with travail and labor 

and fear. 


Meleager. Would God he had found me 
Beneath fresh boughs ! 
Would God he had bound me 
Unawares in mine house, 
With light in mine eyes and songs in my 
lips, and a crown on my brows! 


Chorus. Whence art thou sent from us? 
Whither thy goal? 
How art thou rent from us, 
Thou that wert whole, 
As with severing of eyelids and eyes, as 
with sundering of body and soul! 


Meleager. My heart is within me 
As an ash in the fire; 
Whosoever hath seen me, 
Without lute, without lyre, 
Shall sing of me grievous things, even 
things that were ill to desire. 


Chorus. Who shall raise thee 
From the house of the dead ? 
Or what man praise thee 
That thy praise may be said? 
Alas thy beauty! alas thy body! alas 
thine head ! 


Meleager. But thou, O mother, 
That dreamer of dreams, 
Wilt thou bring forth another 
To feel the sun’s beams 
When I move among shadows a shadow, 
and wail by impassable streams ? 


CGneus. What thing wilt thou leave me 
Now this thing is done? 
A man wilt thou give me, 
A son for my son, 
For the light of mine eyes, the desire of 
my life, the desirable one? 


Chorus. Thou wert glad above others, 
Yea, fair beyond word ; 
Thou wert glad among mothers ; 


BRITISH POETS 





For each man that heard 
Of thee, praise there was added unto thee, 
as wings to the feet of a bird. - 


CGineus. Who shall give back 
Thy face of old years, 
With travail made black, 
Grown gray among fears, 
Mother of sorrow, mother of cursing, 
mother of tears? 


Meleager. Though thou art as fire 
Fed with fuel in vain, 
My delight, my desire, 
Is more chaste than the rain, 
More pure than the dewfall, more holy 
than stars are that live without 
stain. 


Atalanta. I would that as water 
My life’s blood had thawn, 
Or as winter’s wan daughter 
Leaves lowland and lawn 
Spring-stricken, or ever mine eyes had 
beheld thee made dark in thy 
dawn. 


Chorus. When thou dravest the men 
Of the chosen of Thrace, 
None turned him again 
Nor endured he thy face 
Clothed round with the blush of the 
battle, with light from a terrible 
place. 


Cneus. Thou shouldst die as he dies 
For whom none sheddeth tears ; 
Filling thine eyes 
And fulfilling thine ears, 
With the.brilliance of battle, the bloom 
and the beauty, the splendor of 
spears. 


Chorus. In the ears of the world 
It is sung, it is told, 
And the light thereof hurled 
And the noise thereof rolled 
From the Acroceraunian snow to the 
ford of the fleece of gold. 


Meleager. Would God ye could carry me 
Forth of all these ; 
Heap sand and bury me 
By the Chersonese, 
Where the thundering Bosphorus an- 
swers the thunder of Pontic seas. 


(Eneus. Dost thou mock at our praise 
And the singing begun 


SWINBURNE 


And the men of strange days 
Praising my son 
In the folds of the hills of home, high 
places of Calydon? 


Meleager. For the dead man no homeis ; 
Ah, better to be 
What the flower of the foam is 
In fields of the sea, 
That the sea-waves might be as my rai- 
ment, the gulf-stream a garment 
for me. 


Chorus. Who shall seek thee and bring 
And restore thee thy day, 
When the dove dipped her wing, 
And the oars won their way 
Where the narrowing Symplegades 
whitened the straits of Propontis 
with spray ? 


Meleager. Will ve crown me my tomb 
Or exalt me my name, 
Now my spirits consume, 
Now my flesh is a flame? 
Let the sea slake it once, and men speak 
of me sleeping to praise me or 
shame. 


Chorus. Turn back now, turn thee, 
As who turns him to wake; 
Though the life in thee burn thee, 
Couldst thou bathe it and slake 
Where the sea-ridge of Helle hangs 
heavier, and east upon west waters 
break ? 


Meleager. Would the winds blow me 
back 
Or the waves hurl me home? 
Ah, to touch in the track 
Where the pine learnt to roam 
Cold girdles and crowns of the sea-gods, 
cool blossoms of water and foam ! 


Chorus. The gods may release 
That they made fast ; 
Thy soul shall have ease 
In thy limbs at the last ; 
But what shall they give thee for life, 
sweet life that is overpast ? 


Meleager. Not the life of men’s veins, 
Not of flesh that conceives ; 
But the grace that remains, 
The fair beauty that cleaves 
To the life of the rains in the grasses, the 
life of the dews on the leaves. 


871 


Chorus. Thou wert helmsman and chief ; 
Wilt thou turn in an hour, 
Thy limbs to the leaf, 
Thy face to the flower, 
Thy blood tothe water, thy soul to the 
gods who divide and devour? 


Meleager. The years are hungry, 
They wail all their days ; 
The gods wax angry 
And weary of praise ; 
And who shall bridle their lips? and 
who shall straighten their ways? 


Chorus. The gods guard over us 
With sword and with rod; 
Weaving shadow to cover us, 
Heaping the sod, 
That law may fulfil herself wholly, to 
darken man’s face before God. 


FINAL CHORUS 


Who shall contend with his lords 
Or cross them or do them wrong? 
Who shall bind them as with cords ? 
Who shall tame them as with song ? 
Who shall smite them as with swords ? 
For the hands of their kingdom are 
strong. 1865. 


SONGS FROM CHASTELARD 
MARY BEATON’S SONG} 


Le navire 
Est a eau ; 
Entends rire 
Ce gros flot 
Que fait luire 
Et bruire 

Le vieux sire 
Aquilo. 


Dans lespace 

Du grand air 

Le vent passe 
Comme un fer ; 
Siffle et sonne, 
Tombe et tonne ; 
Prend et donne 
A la mer. 


1 Probably no excuse is needed for including 
here some examples of Swinburne’s French verse, 
both for its own light and exquisite beauty, and 
because it so characteristically represents him. 
One of his chief distinctions is that of being per- 
haps the only Englishman who ever really un- 
derstood and appreciated French poetry. 


872 


BRITISH POETS 





Vois, la brise 
Tourne au nord, 
Kt la bise 
Souffle et mord 
Sur ta pure 
Chevelure 

Qui murmure 
Et se tord. 


Le navire 
Passe et luit, 
Puis chavire 

A grand bruit ; 
Et sur l’onde 
La plus blonde 
Téte au monde 
Flotte et fuit. 


Moi, je rame, 

Et Vamour, 
C’est ma flamme, 
Mon grand jour, 
Ma chandelle 
Blanche et belle, 
Ma chapelle 

De séjour. 


Toi, mon ame 
Et ma foi, 
Sois ma dame 
Et ma loi; 
Sois ma mie, 
Sois Marie, 
Sois ma vie, 
Toute a moi! 


LOVE AT EBB 


Between the sunset and the sea 

My love laid hands and lips on me; 

Of sweet came sour, of day came night, 
Of long desire came brief delight : 

Ah love, and what thing came of thee 
Between the sea-downs and the sea? 


Between the sea-mark and the sea 

Joy grew to grief, grief grew to me; 

Love turned to tears, and tears to fire, 

And dead delight to new desire ; 

Love’s talk, love’s touch there seemed to 
be 

Between the sea-sand and the sea. 


Between the sundown and the sea 

Love watched one hour of love with me; 
Then down the all-golden water-ways 
His feet flew after yesterday’s ; 

IT saw them come and saw them flee 
Between the sea-foam and the sea. 


Between the sea-strand and the sea 
Love fell on sleep, sleep fell on me; 
The first star saw twain turn to one 
Between the moonrise and the sun ; 
The next, that saw not love, saw me 
Between the sea-banks and the sea. 


THE QUEEN’S SONG 


J’ai vu faner bien des choses, 

Mainte feuille aller au vent. 

En songeant aux vieilles roses, 
J’ai pleuré souvent. 


Vois-tu dans les roses mortes 

Amour qui sourit cache ? 

O mon amant, a nos portes 
L’as-tu vu couche? 


As-tu vu jamais au monde 

Venus chasser et courir ? 

Fille de V’onde, avec l’onde 
Doit-elle mourir ? 


Aux jours de neige et de givre 
L’amour s’effeuille et s’endort ; 
Avec mai doit-il revivre, 

Ou bien est-il mort? 


Qui sait ou s’en vont les roses ? 

Qui sait ou s’en va le vent? 

En songeant a telles choses, 
J’ai pleuré souvent. 1865. 


HYMN TO PROSERPINE 


(AFTER THE PROCLAMATION IN ROME OF 
THE CHRISTIAN FAITH) 


Vicisti, Galilee 


I HAVE lived long enough, having seen 
one thing, that love hath an end; 

Goddess and maiden and queen, be near 
me now and befriend. 

Thou art more than the day or the mor- 
row, the seasons that laugh or that 
Weep 5 } 

For these give joy and sorrow ; but thou, 
Proserpina, sleep. 

Sweet is the treading of wine, and sweet 
the feet of the dove ; 

But a goodlier gift is thine than foam 
of the grapes or love. 

Yea, is not even Apollo, with hair and 
harpstring of gold, 

A bitter God to follow, a beautiful God 
to behold ? 

IT am sick of singing ; the bays burn deep 
and chafe; I am fain 


SWINBURNE 





To rest a little from praise and grievous 
pleasure and pain. 

For the Gods we know not of, who give 
us our daily breath, 

We know they are cruel as love or life, 
and lovely as death. 

O Gods dethroned and deceased, cast 
forth, wiped out in a day! 

From your wrath is the world released, 
redeemed from your chains, men 
sa 

New Gods are crowned in the city, their 
flowers have broken your rods ; 

They are merciful, clothed with pity, 
the young compassionate Gods. 

But for me their new device is barren, 
the days are bare ; 

Things long past over suffice, and men 
forgotten that were. 

Time and the Gods are at strife: ye 
dwell in the midst thereof, 
Draining a little life from the barren 

breasts of love. 

I say to you, cease, take rest; yea, I say 
to you all, be at peace, 

Till the bitter milk of her breast and the 
barren bosom shall cease. 

Wilt thou yet take all, Galilean? but 
these thou shalt not take, 

The laurel, the palms and the pan, 
the breast of the nymphs in the 
brake ; 

Breasts more soft than a dove’s, that 
tremble with tenderer breath ; 

And all the wings of the Loves, and all 
the joy before death ; 

All the feet of the hours that sound as 
a single lyre, 

Dropped and deep in the flowers, w ith 
strings that flicker like fire. 

More than these wilt thou give, things 
fairer than all these things ? 

Nay, fora little we live, and life hath 
mutable wings. 

A little while and we die; shall life not 
thrive as it may? 

For no man under the sky lives twice, 
outliving his day. 

And grief is a grievous thing, and a man 
hath enough of his tears : 

Why should he labor, and bring fresh 
grief to blacken his years? 

Thou hast conquered, O pale Galilean ; 
the world has grown gray from 
thy breath : 

We have drunken of things Lethean, 
and: fed on the fulness of death. 

Laurel is green for a season, and love is 
sweet fora day ; 


873 


But love grows bitter with treason, and 
laurel outlives not May. 

Sleep, shall we sleep after all? for the 
world is not sweet in the end; 

For the old faiths loosen and fall, the 
new years ruin and rend. 

Fate is a sea without shore, and the soul 
is a rock that abides ; 

But her ears are vexed with the roar and 
her face with the foam of the tides. 

O lips that the live blood faints in, the 
leavings of racks and rods! 

O ghastly glories of saints, dead limbs of 
gibbeted Gods ! 

Though all men abase them before you 
in spirit, and all knees bend, 

I kneel not, neither adore you, 
standing, look to the end. 

All delicate days and pleasant, all spirits 
and sorrows are cast 

Far out with the foam of the present that 
sweeps to the surf of the past: 

Where beyond the extreme sea-wall, and 
between the remote sea-gates, 

Waste water washes, and tall ships 
founder, and deep death waits : 

Where, mighty with deepening sides, 
clad about with the seas as with 
wings, 
And impelled of invisible tides, and ful- 
filled of unspeakable things, 
White-eyed and poisonous-finned, shark- 
toothed and serpentine-curled, 

Rolls, under the whitening wind of the 
future, the wave of the world. 

The depths stand naked in sunder behind 
it, the storms flee away ; 

In the hollow before it the thunder is 
taken and snared as a prey ; 

In its sides is the north-wind bound ; and 
its salt is of all men’s tears ; 

With light of ruin, and sound of changes, 
and pulse of years: 

With travail of day after day, and with 
trouble of hour upon hour ; 

And bitter as blood is the spray ; and the 
crests are as fangs that devour : 

And its vapor and storm of its steam as 
the sighing of spirits to be ; 

And its noise as the noise in a dream : 
and its depth as the roots of thesea : 

And the height of its headsas the height 
of the utmost stars of the air : 

And the ends of the earth at the might 
thereof tremble, and time is made 


but 


bare. 

Will ye bridle the deep sea with reins, 
will ye chasten the high sea with 
rods ? 


874 


Will ye take her to chain her with chains, 
who is older than all ye Gods? 

All ye as a wind shall go by, as a fire 
shall ye pass and be past: 

Ye are Gods, and behold ye shall die, and 
the waves be upon you at last. 

In the darkness of time, in the deeps of 
the years, in the changes of things, 

Ye shall sleep as a slain man sleeps, and 
the world shall forget you for 
kings. 

Though the feet of thine high priests 
tread where thy lords and our 
forefathers trod, 

Though these that were Gods are dead, 
and thou being dead art a God, 

Though before thee the throned Cythe- 
rean be fallen, and hidden her 
head, 

Yet thy kingdom shall pass, Galilean, thy 
dead shall go down to thee dead. 

Of the maiden thy mother, men sing asa 
goddess with grace clad around ; 

Thou art throned where another was 
king; where another was queen 
she is crowned. 

Yea, once we had sight of another: but 
now she is queen, say these. 
Notas thine, not as thine was our mother, 
a blossom of flowering seas, 
Clothed round with the world’s desire as 

with raiment, and fair as the foam, 

And fleeter than kindled fire, and a god- 
dess and mother of Rome. 

For thine came pale and a maiden, and 
sister to sorrow ; but ours, 

Her deep hair heavily laden with odor 
and color of flowers, 

White rose of the rose-white water, a 
silver splendor, a flame, 

Bent down unto us that besought her, 
and earth grew sweet with her 
name. 

For thine came weeping, a slave among 
slaves, and rejected ; but she 
Came flushed from the full-flushed wave, 

and imperial, her foot on the sea, 

And the wonderful waters knew her, the 
winds and the viewless ways, 

And the roses grew rosier, and bluer the 
sea-blue stream of the bays. 

Ye are fallen, our lords by what token? 
we wist that ye should not fall. 

Ye were all so fair that are broken ; and 
one more fair than ye all. 

But I turn to her still, having seen she 
shall surely abide in the end ; 

Goddess and maiden and queen, be near 
me now and befriend. 


BRITISH POETS 


O daughter of earth, of my mother, her 
crown and blossom of birth, 

Iam also, I also, thy brother; I go as I 
came unto earth. 

In the night where thine eyes are as 
moons are in heaven, the night 
where thou art, 

Where the silence is more than all tunes, 
where sleep overflows from the 
heart, 

Where the poppies are sweet as the rose 
in our world, and the red rose is 
white, 

And the wind falls faint as it blows with 
the fume of the flowers of the 
night, 

And the murmur of spirits that sleep in 
the shadow of Gods from afar 

Grows dim in thine ears and deep as the 
deep dim soul of a star, 

In the sweet low light of thy face, un- 
der heavens untrod by the sun, 

Let my soul with their souls find place, 
and forget what is done and un- 
done. 

Thou art more than the Gods who 
number the days of our temporal 
breath ; 

For these give labor and slumber; but 
thou, Proserpina, death. 

Therefore now at thy feet I abide for a 
season in silence. I know 

I shall die as my fathers died, and sleep 
as they sleep; even so. 

For the glass of the year is brittle 
wherein we gaze for a span ; 

A little soul for a little bears up this 
corpse which is man.! 

So long I endure, no longer ; and laugh 
not again, neither weep. 

For there is no God found stronger than 
death ; and death isa sleep. 1866. 


A MATCH 


Ir love were what the rose is, 
And I were like the leaf, 

Our lives would grow together 

In sad or singing weather, 

Blown fields or flowerful closes, 
Green pleasure or gray grief ; 

If love were what the rose is, 
And I were like the leaf. 


If I were what the words are, 
And love were like the tune, 

With double sound and single 

Delight our lips would mingle, 


1 Wuxaptov ct Baotagsoyv vexpov, EPICTETUS. 





With kisses glad as birds are 
That get sweet rain at noon ; 

If I were what the words are 
And love were like the tune. 


If you were life, my darling, 
And I your love were death, 


SWINBURNE 875 
A burden without fruit in child- 
bearing ; 
Between the nightfall and the dawn 
threescore, 
Threescore between the dawn and 
evening. 
The shuddering in thy lips, the shud- 
dering 


We'd shine and snow together 
Ere March made sweet the weather 
With daffodil and starling 
And hours of fruitful breath ; 
If you were life, my darling, 
And I your love were death. 


If you were thrall to sorrow, 
And I were page to joy, 
We'd play for lives and seasons 
With loving looks and treasons 
And tears of night and morrow 
And laughs of maid and boy ; 
_If you were thrall to sorrow, 
And I were page to joy. 


If you were April’s lady, 
And I were Jord in May, 
We'd throw with leaves for hours 
And draw for days with flowers, 
Till day like night were shady 
And night were bright like day ; 
If you were April’s lady, 
And I were lord in May. 


If you were queen of pleasure, 
And I were king of pain, 

We’d hunt down love together, 

Pluck out his flying-feather, 

And teach his feet a measure, 
And find his mouth a rein; 

If you were queen of pleasure, 
AndI were king of pain. 1866. 


A BALLAD OF BURDENS 


THE burden of fairwomen. Vaindelight, 
And love self-slain in some sweet 
shameful way, 
And sor ae old age that comes by 
night 
As a thief comes that has no heart by 
ay, 
And change that finds fair cheeks and 
leaves them gray, 
And weariness that keeps awake for hire, 
And grief that says what pleasure used 
to say ; 
This is the end of every man’s desire. 


The burden of bought kisses. 
sore, 


This is 


The burden of long living. 


In thy sad eyelids tremulous like fire, 
Makes love seem shameful and a 
wretched thing. 
This is the end of every man’s desire. 


The burden of sweet speeches. 
kneel down, 
Cover thy head, and wee); for verily 
These market-men that buy thy white 
and brown 
In the last days shall take no thought 
for thee. 
In the last days like earth thy face 
shall be, 
Yea, like sea-marsh made thick with 
brine and mire, 
Sad with sick leavings of the sterile 
sea. 
This is the end of every man’s desire. 


Nay, 


Thou shalt 
fear 
Waking, and sleeping mourn upon thy 
bed; 
And say at night, 
were here,” 
And say at dawn ‘* Would God the day 
were dead.” 
With weary days thou shalt be clothed 
and fed, 
And wear remorse of heart for thine 
attire, 
Pain for thy girdle and sorrow upon 
thine head ; 
This is the end of every man’s desire. 


‘“Would God the day 


The burden of bright colors. Thou shalt 
see 
Gold tarnished, and the gray above tlie 
green ; 
And as the thing thou seest thy face 
shall be, 
And no more as the thing beforetime 
seen. 
And thou shalt say of mercy ‘It hath 


been, 
And living, watch the old lips and loves 
expire, 
And talking, tears shall take thy 
breath between. 
This is the end of every man’s desire, 


876 


BRITISH "POETS 





The burden of sad sayings. In that day 
Thou shalt tell all thy days and hours, 
and tell 
Thy times and ways and words of love, 
and say 
How one was dear and one desirable, 
And sweet was life to hear and sweet 
to smell, 
But now with lights reverse the old hours 


retire 
And the last hour is shod with fire from 
hell. 
This is the end of every man’s desire. 
The burden of four seasons. Rain in 
spring, 
White rain and wind among the tender 
trees ; 


A summer of green sorrows gathering, 
Rank autumn in a mist of miseries, 
With sad face set towards the year, 

that sees 

The charred ash drop out of the dropping 

pyre, 
And winter wan with many maladies ; 

This is the end of every man’s desire. 


The burden of dead faces. Out of sight 
And out of love, beyond the reach of 
hands, 
Changed in the changing of the dark and 
light, 
They walk and weep about the barren 
lands 
Where no seed isnor any garner stands, 
Where in short breaths the doubtful days 
respire, 
And time’s turned glass lets through 
the sighing sands ; 
This is the end of every man’s desire. 


The burden of much gladness. Life and 
lust [light ; 
Forsake thee, and the face of thy de- 
And underfoot the heavy hour strews 
dust ; 
And overhead strange weathers burn 
and bite ; 
And where the red was, lo, the blood- 
less white, 
And where truth was, the likeness of a 
liar, 
And where day was, the likeness of 
the night ; 
This is the end of every man’s desire. 


ENVOI 


Princes, and ye whom pleasure quick- 
eneth, 


Heed well this rhyme before your 
pleasure tire ; 

For life is sweet, but after life is death. 

This is the end of every man’s desire. 

1866. 


RONDEL 


KIssinG her hair I sat against her feet, 

Wove and unwove it, wound and found 
it sweet 

Made fast therewith her hands, drew 
down her eyes, 

Deep as deep flowers and dreamy like 
dim skies ; 

With her own tresses bound and found 
her fair, 

Kissing her hair. 


Sleep were no sweeter than her face to 
me, 


‘Sleep of cold sea-bloom under the cold 


Sea ; 

What pain could get between my face 
and hers ? 

What new sweet thing would love not 
relish worse ? 

Unless, perhaps, white death had kissed 
me there, 

Kissing her hair? 1866. 


IN MEMORY OF WALTER SAVAGE 
LANDOR. 


Back to the flower-town, side by side, 
The bright months bring. 

New-born, the bridegroom and the bride, 
Freedom and spring. 


The sweet land laughs from sea to sea, 
Filled full of sun ; 
All things come back to her, being 
free,— 
All things but one. 


In many a tender wheaten plot 
Flowers that were dead 

Live, and old suns revive ; but not 
That holier head. 


By this white wandering waste of sea, 
Far north, I hear 

One face shall never turn to me 
As once this year ; 


Shall never smile and turn and rest _ 
On mine as there, 

Nor one most sacred hand be pressed 
Upon my hair, 


SWINBURNE 877 


_— 





I came as one whose thoughts half lin- 


ger, 
Half run before ; 
The youngest to the oldest singer 
That England bore. 


I found him whom I shall not find 
Till all grief end, 
In holiest age our mightiest mind, 

Father and friend. 


But thou, if anything endure, 
If hope there be, 

O spirit that man’s life left pure, 
Man’s death set free, 


Not with disdain of days that were 
Look earthward now : 

Let dreams revive the reverend hair, 
The imperial brow ; 


Come back in sleep, for in the life 
Where thou art not 
We find none like thee. 
strife 
And the world’s lot 


Time and 


Move thee no more; but love at least, 
And reverent heart, 

May move thee, royal and released 
Soul, as thou art. 


And thou, his Florence, to thy trust 
Receive and keep, 

Keep safe his dedicated dust, 
His sacred sleep. 


So shall thy lovers, come from far, 
Mix with thy name 

As morning-star with evening-star 
His faultless fame. 


THE GARDEN OF PROSERPINE 


Hers, where the world is quiet, 
Here, where all trouble seems 
Dead winds’ and spent waves’ riot 
In doubtful dreams of dreams ; 

I watch the green field growing 

For reaping folk and sowing, 

For harvest time and mowing, 
A sleepy world of streams. 


IT am tired of tears and laughter, 
And men that laugh and weep 
Of what may come hereafter 
For men that sow to reap: 
Tam weary of days and hours, 
Blown buds of barren flowers, 
Desires and dreams and powers 
And everything but sleep. 





$$ 


Here life has death for neighbor, 
And far from eye or ear 

Wan waves and wet winds labor, 
Weak ships and spirits steer ; 

They drive adrift, and whither 

They wot not who make thither ; 

But no such winds blow hither, 
And no such things grow here. 


No growth of moor or coppice, 


No heather-flower or vine, 
But bloomless buds of poppies, 
Green grapes of Proserpine, 
Pale beds of blowing rushes 
Where no leaf blooms or blushes, 
Save this whereout she crushes 
For dead men deadly wine. 


Pale, without name or number, 
In fruitless fields of corn, 

They bow themselves and slumber 
All night till light is born ; 

And like a soul belated, 

In hell and heaven unmated, 

By cloud and mist abated 
Comes out of darkness morn. 


Though one were strong as seven, 
He too with death shall dwell, 
Nor wake with wings in heaven, 
Nor weep for pains in hell ; 
Though one were fair as roses, 
His beauty clouds and closes ; 
And well though love reposes, 
In the end it is not well. 


Pale, beyond porch and portal, 

Crowned with calm leaves, she 
stands 

Who gathers all things mortal 
With cold immortal hands ; 

Her languid lips are sweeter 

Than love’s who fears to greet her 

To men that mix and meet her 
From many times and lands. 


She waits for each and other, 
She waits for all men born ; 
Forgets the earth her mother, 
The life of fruits and corn ; 
And spring and seed and swallow 
Take wing for her and follow 
Where summer song rings hollow 
And flowers are put to scorn. 


There go the loves that wither, 
The old loves with wearier wings ; 
And all dead years draw thither, 
And all disastrous things ; 
Dead dreams of days forsaken 


878 


Blind buds that snows have shaken, 
Wild leaves that winds have taken, 
Red strays of ruined springs. 


We are not sure of sorrow, 
And joy was never sure; 
To-day will die to-morrow 
Time stoops to no man’s lure ; 
And love, grown faint and fretful 
With lips but half regretful 
Sighs, and with eyes forgetful 
Weeps that no loves endure. 


From too much love of living, 
From hope and fear set free, 

We thank with brief thanksgiving 
Whatever gods may be 

That no life lives for ever ; 

That dead men rise up never ; 

That even the weariest river 
Winds somewhere safe to sea. 


Then star nor sun shall waken, 
Nor any change of light: 
Nor sound of waters shaken, 
Nor any sound or sight : 
Nor wintry leaves nor vernal, 
Nor days nor things diurnal ; 
Only the sleep eternal 
In an eternal night. 1866. 


LOVE AT SEA 


WE are in love’s land to-day ; 
Where shall we go? 

Love, shall we start or stay, 
Or sail or row? 

There’s many a wind and way, 

And never a May but May ; 

We are in love’s hand to-day ; 
Where shall we go? 


Our landwind is the breath 
Of sorrows kissed to death 
And joys that were: 
Our ballast is a rose; 
Our way lies where God knows 
And love knows where. 
We are in love’s hand to-day— 


Our seamen are fledged Loves, 
Our masts are bills of doves, 
Our decks fine gold ; 
Our ropes are dead maids’ hair, 
Our stores are love-shafts fair 
And manifold. 
We are in love’s land to-day— 


Where shall we land you, sweet ? 
On fields of strange men’s feet, 


BRITISH POETS 


Or fields near home ? 
Or where the fire-flowers blow, 
Or where the flowers of snow 
Or flowers of foam ? 
We are in love’s hand to-day— 


Land me, she says, where love 
Shows but one shaft, one dove, 
One heart, one hand. 
—A shore like that, my dear, 
Lies where no man will steer, 
No maiden land. 
Imitated from Théophile Gautier. 


SAPPHICS 


ALL the night sleep came not upon my 
eyelids, 
Shed not dew, nor shook nor unclosed a 
feather, 
Yet with lips shut close and with eyes of 
iron 
Stood and beheld me. 


Then to me so lying awake a vision 
Came without sleep over the seas and 
touched me, 
Softly touched mine eyelids and lips ; 
and I too, 
Full of the vision, 


Saw the white implacable Aphrodite, 
Saw the hair unbound, and the feet un- 
sandalled 
Shine as fire of sunset on western waters ; 
Saw the reluctant 


Feet, the straining plumes of the doves 
that drew her, 
Looking always, looking with necks re- 
verted, 
Back to Lesbos, back to the hills where- 
under 
Shone Mitylene ; ° 


Heard the flying feet of the Loves be- 
hind her 
Make a sudden thunder upon the waters, 
As the thunder flung from the strong | 
unclosing 
Wings of a great wind. 


So the goddess fled from her place, with 
awful 
Sound of feet and thunder of wings 
around her; 
While behind a clamor of singing women 
Severed the twilight. 


SWINBURNE 


Ah the singing, ah the delight, the pas- 
sion ! 
All the Loves wept, listening ; sick with 
anguish, 
Stood the crowned nine Muses about 
Apollo ; 
Fear was upon them, 


While the tenth sang wonderful things 
they knew not. 
Ah, the tenth, the Lesbian! the nine 
. were silent, 
None endured the sound of her song for 
weeping ; 
Laurel by laurel, 


_ Faded all their crowns ; but about her 


forehead, 

Round her woven tresses and ashen 
temples 

White as dead snow, paler than grass in 
summer, 


Ravaged with kisses, 


Shone a light of fire asacrown for ever. 
Yea, almost the implacable Aphrodite 
Paused, and almost wept ; such a song 
- was that song ; 
Yea, by her name too 


Called her, saying, ‘‘ Turn to me, O my 
Sappho ;” 
Yet she turned her face from the Loves, 
she saw not 
Tears or laughter darken immortal eye- 
lids, 
Heard not about her. 


Fearful fitful wings of the doves depart- 


ing, 
Saw not how the bosom of Aphrodite 
Shook with weeping, saw not her shaken 
raiment, 
Saw not her hands wrung ; 


Saw the Lesbians kissing across their 
smitten 
Lutes with lips more sweet than the 
sound of lute-strings, 
Mouth to mouth and hand upon hand, 
her chosen, 
Fairer than all men ; 


Only saw the beautiful lips and fingers, 

Full of songs and kisses and little whis- 
pers, 

Full of music ; only beheld among them 

' Soar, as a bird soars 


879 


Newly fledged, her visible song, a mar- 
vel, 
Made of perfect sound and exceeding 
passion, 
Sweetly shapen, terrible, full of thun- 
ders, 
Clothed with the wind’s wings. 


Then rejoiced she, laughing with love, 
and scattered 
Roses, awful roses of holy blossom ; 
Then the Loves thronged sadly with 
hidden faces 
Round Aphrodite, 


Then the Muses, stricken at heart, were 
silent ; 
Yea, the gods waxed pale; such a song 
was that song. 
All reluctant, all with a fresh repulsion, 
Fled from before her. 


All withdrew long since, and the land 
was barren, 
Full of fruitless women and music only. 
Now perchance, when winds are as- 
suaged at sunset, 
Lulled at the dewfall, 


By the gray sea-side, unassuaged, un- 
heard of, 
Unbeloved, unseen in the ebb of twi- 
light, 
Ghosts of outcast women return lament- 
ing, 
Purged not in Lethe, 


Clothed about with flame and with tears, 
and singing 

Songs that move the heart of the shaken 
heaven, 

Songs that break the heart of the earth 
with pity, 

Hearing, to hear them. 1866. 
DEDICATION 


[POEMS AND BALLADS, FIRST SERIES] 


THE sea gives her shells to the shingle, 
The earth gives her streams to the sea ; 
There are many, but my gift is single, 
My verses, the first-fruits of me. 
Let the wind take the green and the gray 
leaf 
Cast forth without fruit upon air ; 
Take rose-leaf and vine-leaf and bay- 
leaf 
Blown loose from the hair, 


880 


BRITISH POETS 





The night shakes them round me in 
legions, 
Dawn drives them 
dreams ; 
Time sheds them like snows on strange 
regions, 
Swept shoreward on infinite streams ; 
Leaves pallid and sombre and ruddy, 
Dead fruits of the fugitive years ; 
Some stained as with: wine and made 
bloody, 
And some as with tears. 


before her like 


Some scattered in seven years’ traces, 
As they fell from the boy that was 
then ; 
Long left among idle green places, 
Or gathered but now among men ;. 
On seas full of wonder and peril, 
Blown white round the capes of the 
north ; > 
Or in islands where myrtles are sterile 
And loves bring not forth. 


O daughters of dreams and of stories 
That life is not wearied of yet, 
Faustine, Fragoletta, Dolores, 
Felise and Yolande and Juliette, 
Shall I find you not still, shall I miss 
you, 
When sleep, that is true or that seems, 
Comes back to me hopeless to kiss you, 
O daughters of dreams ? 


They are past as a slumber that passes, 
As the dew of a dawn of old time; 

More frail than the shadows on glasses, 
More fleet than a wave or a rhyme. 

As the waves after ebb drawing sea- 


ward, 
When their hollows are full of the 
night, 
So the birds that flew singing to me- 
ward 


Recede out of sight. 


The songs of dead seasons, that wander 
On wings of articulate words ; 
Lost leaves that the shore-wind may 
squander, 
Light flocks of untameable birds ; 
Some sang to me dreaming in class time 
And truant in hand as in tongue; 
For the youngest were born of boy’s pas- 
time, 
The eldest are young. 


Is there shelter while life in them 
lingers, 
Is there hearing for songs that recede, 


Tunes touched from a harp with men’s 
fingers, ‘ 
Or blown with boy’s mouth in a reed ? 
Is there place in the land of your labor, 
Is there room in your world of de- 
light, 
pphencs change has not sorrow for neigh- 
or 


And day has not night? 


In their wings though the sea-wind 
yet quivers, 
Will you spare not a space for them 
there 
Made green with the running of rivers 
And gracious with temperate air ; 
In the fields and the turreted cities 
That cover from sunshine and rain 
Fair passions and bountiful pities 
And loves without stain ? 


In a land of clear colors and stories, 
In a region of shadowless hours, 
Where earth has a garment of glories 
And a murmur of musical flowers ; 
In woods where the spring half un- 
covers 
The flush of her amorous face, 
By the waters that listen for lovers, 
For these is there place ? 
For the song-birds of 
muffle 
Their music as clouds do their fire: 
For the storm-birds of passion, that 
ruffle 
Wild wings in a wind of desire ; 
In the stream of the storm as it settles 
Blown seaward, borne far from the 
sun, 
Shaken loose on the darkness like petals 
Dropped one after one? 


sorrow, that 


Though the world of your hands be more 
gracious 
And lovelier in lordship of things 
Clothed round by sweet art with the 
spacious 
Warm heaven of her imminent wings, 
Let them enter, unfledged and nigh 
fainting, 
For the love of old loves and lost. 
times; 
And receive in your palace of painting 
This revel of rhymes. 


Though the seasons of man full of losses 
Make empty the years full of youth, 
If but one thing be constant in crosses, 

Change lays not her hand upon truth; 


SWINBURNE 


881 





Hopes die, and their tombs are for token 
That the grief as the joy of them ends 

Ere time that breaks all men has broken 
The faith between friends. 


Though the many lights dwindle to one 
light, 
There is help if the heaven has one; 
Though the skies be discrowned of the 
sunlight 
And the earth dispossessed of the sun, 
They have moonlight and sleep for re- 
payment, 
When, refreshed as a bride and set 
free, 
With stars and sea-winds in her raiment, 
Night sinks on the sea. 1866. 


AN APPEAL 


ART thou indeed among these, 
Thou of the tyrannous crew, 

The kingdoms fed upon blood, 

O queen from of old of the seas, 
England, art thou of them too 
That drink of the poisonous flood, 
That hide under poisonous trees ? 


Nay, thy name from of old, 
Mother, was pure, or we dreamed ; 
Purer we held thee than this, 
Purer fain would we hold ; 

So goodly a glory it seemed, 

A fame,so bounteous of bliss, 

So more precious than gold. 


A praise so sweet in our ears, 

That thou in the tempest of things 

As a rock for a refuge shouldst stand, 
In the blood-red river of tears 

Poured forth for the triumph of kings ; 
A safeguard, a sheltering land, 

In the thunder and torrent of years. 


Strangers came gladly to thee, 
Exiles, chosen of men, 

Safe for thy sake in thy shade, 

Sat down at thy feet and were free. 
So men spake of thee then ; 

Now shall their speaking be stayed? 
Ah, so let it not be! 


Not for revenge or affright, 

Pride, or a tyrannous lust, 

Cast from thee the crown of thy praise. 
Mercy was thine in thy might ; 

Strong when thou wert, thou wert just ; 
Now, in the wrong-doing days, 

Cleave thou, thou at least, to the right. 


56 





How should one charge thee, how 
sway, 

Save by the memories that were ? 

Not thy gold nor the strength of thy 
ships, 

Nor the might of thine armies at bay, 

Made thee, mother, most fair ; 

But a word from republican lips 

Said in thy name in thy day. 


Hast thou said it, and hast thou forgot ? 
Is thy praise in thine ears as a scoff ? 
Blood of men guiltless was shed, 
Children, and souls without spot, 

Shed, but in places far off ; 

Let slaughter no more be, said 

Milton ; and slaughter was not. 


Was it not said of thee too, 

Now, but now, by thy foes, 

By the slaves that had slain their France 
And thee would slay as they slew— 

** Down with her walls that enclose 
Freemen that eye us askance, 
Fugitives, men that are true!” 


This was thy praise or thy blame 
From bondsman or freeman—to be 
Pure from pollution of slaves, 
Clean of their sins, and thy name 
Bloodless, innocent, free ; 
Now if thou be not, thy waves 
Wash not from off thee thy shame. 


Freeman he is not, but slave, 
Whoso in fear for the State 

Cries for surety of blood, 

Help of gibbet and grave ; 
Neither is any land great 

Whom, in her fear-stricken mood, 
These things only can save. 


Lo ! how fair from afar, 

Taintless of tyranny, stands 

Thy mighty daughter, for years 
Who trod the winepress of war,— 
Shines with immaculate hands; 
Slays not a foe, neither fears ; 
Stains not peace with a scar. 


Be not as tyrant or slave, 

England ; be not as these, 

Thou that wert other than they. 

Stretch out thine hand, but to save ; 

Put forth thy strength, and release : 

Lest there arise, if thou slay, 

Thy shame as a ghost from the grave. 
November, 1867. 


HERTHA 


I AM that which began ; 
Out of me the years roll ; 
Out of me God and man ; 
Iam equal and Whole; 
God changes, and man, and the form of 
them bodily ; I am the soul. 


Before ever land was, 
Before ever the sea, 
Or soft hair of the grass, 
Or fair limbs of the tree, 
Or the flesh-colored fruit of my branches, 
I was, and thy soul was in me, 


First life on my sources 
First drifted and swam ; 
Out of me are the forces 
That save it or damn; 
Out of me man and woman, and wild- 
beast and bird; before God was, I 
am. 


Beside or above me 
Nought is there to go ; 
Love or-unlove me, 
Unknow me or know, 
Iam that which unloves me and loves; 
Iam stricken, and I am the blow. 


I the mark that is missed 
And the arrows that miss, 
I the mouth that is kissed 
And the breath in the kiss, 
The search, and the sought, and the 
seeker, the soul and the body that is. 


Iam that thing which blesses 
My spirit elate; 
That which caresses 
With hands uncreate 
My limbs unbegotten that measure the 
length of the measure of fate. 


But what thing dost thou now, 
Looking Godward, to cry 
‘Tam I, thou art thou, 
TI am low, thouart high ?” 
Tam thou, whom thou seekest to find 
him; find thou but thyself, thou 
art I. 


I the grain and the furrow, 
The plough-cloven clod 
And the _ ploughshare 
thorough, 
The germ and thesod, 
The deed and the doer, the seed and the 
sower, the dust which is God. 


drawn 


BRITISH POETS 


Hast thou known how I fashioned 
thee, 
Child, underground ? 
Fire that impassioned thee, 
Iron that bound, 
Dim changes of water, what thing of all 
these hast thou known of or found ? 


Canst thou say in thine heart 
Thou has seen with thine eyes 
With what cunning of art 
Thou wast wrought in what 


wise, 

By what force of what stuff thou wast 
shapen, and shown on my breast to 
the skies ? 


Who hath given, who hath sold it 
thee, 
Knowledge of me? 
Hath the wilderness told it thee ? 
Hast thou learnt of the sea ? 
Hast thou communed in spirit with 
night ? have the winds taken coun- 
sel with thee? 


Have I set such a star 
To show light on thy brow 
That thou sawest from afar 
What I show to thee now ? 
Have ye spoken as brethren together, 
the sun and the mountains and thou ? 


What is here, dost thou know it? 
What was, hast thou known? 
Prophet nor poet 
Nor tripod nor throne 
Nor spirit nor flesh can make answer, 
but only thy mother alone. 


Mother not maker, 
Born, and not made ; 

Though her children forsake her, 
Allured or afraid, 
Praying prayers to the God of their 
fashion, she stirs not for all that 

have prayed. 


A creed is a rod, 
And a crown is of night ; 
But this thing is God, 
To be man with thy might, 
To grow straight in the strength of thy 
spirit, and live out thy life as the 
light. 


I am in thee to save thee, 
As my soul in thee saith, 

Give thou as I gave thee, 
Thy life-blood and breath, 


SWINBURNE 


883 





Green leaves of thy labor, white flowers 
of thy thought, and red fruit of thy 
death. 


Be‘the ways of thy giving 
As mine were to thee ; 
The free life of thy living, 
Be the gift of it free ; 
Not as servant to lord, nor as master to 
slave, shalt thou give thee to me. 


O children of banishment, 
Souls overcast, 
Were the lights ye see vanish 
meant 
Alway to last, 
Ye would know not the sun overshining 
the shadows and stars overpast. 


I that saw where ye trod 
The dim paths of the night 
Set the shadow called God 
In your skies to give light ; 
But the morning of manhood is risen, and 
the shadowless soul is in sight. 


The tree many-rooted 
That swells to the sky 
With frondage red-fruited, 
The life-tree am I; 
In the buds of your lives is the sap of my 
leaves: ye shall live and not die. 


But the Gods of your fashion 
That take and that give, 
In their pity and passion 
That scourge and forgive, 
They are worms that are bred in the 
bark that falls off: they shall die 
and not live. 


My own blood is what stanches 
The wounds in my bark : 
Stars caught in my branches 
Make day of the dark, 
And are worshipped as suns till the sun- 
rise shall tread out their fires as a 
spark. 


Where dead ages hide under 
The live roots of the tree, 
In my darkness the thunder 
Makes utterance of me; 
In the clash of my boughs with each 
other ye hear the waves sound of 
the sea. 


That noise is of Time, 
As his feathers are spread 
And his feet set to climb 


Through the boughs overhead, 
And my foliage rings round him and 
rustles, and branches are bent with 
his tread. 


The storm-winds of ages 
Blow through me and cease, 
The war-wind that rages, 
The spring-wind of peace, 
Ere the breath of them roughen my 
tresses, ere one of my blossoms in- 
crease. 


All sounds of all changes, 
All shadows and lights 
On the world’s mountain-ranges 
And stream-riven heights, 
Whose tongue is the wind’s tongue and 
language of storm-clouds on earth- 
shaking nights ; 


All forms of all faces, 
All works of all hands 
In unsearchable places 
Of time-stricken lands, 
All death and all life, and all reigns and 
all ruins, drop through me as sands. 


Though sore be my burden 
And more than ye know, 
And my growth have no guerdon 
But only to grow, 
Yet I fail not of growing for lightnings 
above me or death worms below. 


These too have their part in me, 
As I too in these ; 
Such fire is at heart in me, 
Such sap is this tree’s, 
Which hath in it all sounds and all 
secrets of infinite lands and of seas. 


In the spring-colored hours 
When my mind was as May’s, 
There brake forth of me flowers 
By centuries of days, 
Strong blossoms with perfume of man- 
hood, shot out from my spirit as rays. 


And the sound of them springing 
And smell of their shoots 
Were as warmth and sweet singing 
And strength to my roots ; 
And the lives of my children made per- 
fect with freedom of soul were my 
fruits. 


I bid you but be ; 
I have need not of prayer ; 
I have need of you tree 


884 


As your mouths of mine air ; 
That my heart may be greater within 
me, beholding the fruits of me fair. 


More fair than strange fruit is 
Of faith ye espouse ; 
In me only the root is 
That blooms in your boughs ; 
Behold now your God that ye made you, 
to feed him with faith of your vows. 


In the darkening and whitening 
Abysses ador’d, 
With dayspring and lightning 
For lamp and for sword, 
God thunders in heaven, and his angels 
are red with the wrath of the Lord. 


O my sons, O too dutiful 
Toward Gods not of me, 
Was not I enough beautiful? 
Was it hard to be free? 
For behold, Iam with you, am in you 
and of you; look forth now and see. 


Lo, wing’d with world’s wonders, 
With miracles shod, 
With the fires of his thunders 
For raiment and rod, 
God trembles in heaven, and his angels 
are white with the terror of God. 


For his twilight is come on him, 
His anguish is here ; 
And his spirits gaze dumb on him, 
Grown gray from his fear ; 
And his hour taketh hold on him 
stricken, the last of his infinite year. 


Thought 
him, 
Truth slays and forgives ; 
But to you, as time takes him, 
This new thing it gives, 
Even love, the beloved Republic, that 
feeds upon freedom and lives. 


made him and breaks 


For truth only is living, 
Truth only is whole, 
And the love of his giving 
Man’s polestar and pole ; 
Man, pulse of my centre, and fruit of 
my body, and seed of my soul. 


One birth of my bosom ; 
One beam of mine eye; 
One topmost blossom 
That scales the sky ; 
Man, equal and one with me, man that 
is made of me, man thatisI. 1871. 


BRITISH!) "POETS 


THE PILGRIMS . 


‘WHO is your lady of love, O ye that 
pass ‘ 
Singing? and is it for sorrow of that 

which was 
That ye sing sadly, or dream of what 
shall be? 
For gladly at once and sadly it seems 
ye sing.” 
—‘‘Our lady of love by you is unbe- 
holden 
For hands she hath none, nor eyes, nor 
lips, nor golden 
Treasure of hair, nor face nor form; 
But we 
That love. we know her more fair 
than any thing.” 


—‘‘ Js she a queen, having great gifts to 
ive?” 
—‘* Yea, these: that whoso hath seen’ 
her shall not live 
Except he serve her sorrowing, with 
strange pain, 
Travail and bloodshedding and bit- 
terer tears ; 
And when she bids die he shall surely 


die. 
And he shall leave all things under the 
sky, 
And go forth naked under sun and 
rain, 
And work ‘and wait and watch out 
all his years.” 


—‘* Hath she on earth no place of habi- 
tation?” | 
—‘* Age to age calling, nation answer- 
ing nation, 
Cries out, Where is she? and there is 
none to say ; 
For if she be not in the spirit of men, 
For if in the inward soul she hath no 
place, 
In vain they cry unto her, seeking her 
face, 
In vain their mouths make much of 
her ; for they 
Cry with vain tongues, till the heart 
lives again.” 


—‘‘O ye that follow, and have ye no 
repentance ? 
For on your brows is written a mortal 
sentence, 
An hieroglyph of sorrow, a fiery sign, 
That in your lives ye shall not pause 
or rest, 


SWINBURNE 


Nor have the sure sweet common love, 
nor keep 
Friends and safe days, nor joy of life 
nor sleep.” 
—‘‘ These have we not, who have one 
thing, the divine 
Face and clear eyes of faith and 
fruitful breast.” 


—‘‘ And ye shall die before your thrones 
be won.” 
—‘‘ Yea, and the changed world and the 
liberal sun 
Shall move and shine without us, and 
we lie 
Dead ; but if she too move on earth, 
and live, 
But if the old world with all the old 
irons rent 
Laugh and give thanks, shall we be not 
content ? 
Nay, we shall rather live, we shall not 
ie, 
Life being so little, and death so 
good to give.” 


—‘* And these men shall forget you.”— 
“Yea, but we 
Shall be a part of the earth and the an- 
cient sea, 
And heaven- -high air august, and aw- 
ful fire 
And all oes good ; and no man’s 
heart shall beat 
But: somewhat in it of our blood once 
shed 
Shall quiver and quicken, as now in us 
the dead 
Blood of men slain and the old same 
life’s desire 
Plants in their fiery footprints our 
fresh feet.” 


—‘* But ye that might be clothed with 
all things pleasant, 
Ye are foolish that put off the fair soft 
present, 
That clothe yourselves with the cold 
future air; 
When mother and father and ten- 
der sister and brother 
And the old live love that was shall be 
as ye, 
Dust, atl no fruit of loving life shall 
be’ 
—‘* She shall be yet who is more than 
all these were, 
Than sister or wife or father unto us 
or mother,” 


885 


—‘‘Ts this worth life, is this, to win for 
wages ? 
Lo, the dead mouths of the awful gray- 
grown ages, 
The venerable, in the past that is their 
prison, 

In the outer darkness, 
opening grave, 
Laugh, knowing how many as ye now 

say have said, 
How many, and all are fallen, are fallen 
and dead : 
Shall ye dead rise, and these dead have 
not risen?” 
—‘*‘ Not we but she, who is tender, 
and swift to save.” 


in the un- 


—‘‘ Are ye not weary and faint not by 


the way, 
Seeing night by night devoured of day 
by day, 
Seeing hour by hour consumed in sleep- 
less fire ? 


Sleepless ; and ye too, when shall ye 
too sleep?” 
—‘* We are weary in heart and head, in 
hands and feet, 
And surely more than all things sleep 
were sweet,— 
Than all things save the inexorable 
desire 
Which whoso knoweth shall neither 
faint nor weep.” 


—‘‘Ts this so sweet that one were fain 
to follow ? 
Is this so sure where all men’s hopes are 
hollow, 
Even this your dream, that by much 
tribulation 
Ye shall make whole flawed hearts, 
and bowed necks straight ?” 
—‘* Nay, though our life were blind, our 
death were fruitless, 
Not therefore were the whole world’s 
high hope rootless ; 
But man to man, nation would turn to 
nation, 
And the old life live, and the old 
great word be great.” 


—‘‘ Pass on, then, and pass by us, and 
let us be, 
For what light think ye after life to 
see f 
And if the world fare better will ye 
know ? 
Andif man triumph who shall seek 
youand say?” 


BRITISH POETS 





—‘* Knough of light is this for one life’s | With the world-wide wind, with the 


886 
span, 

That all men born are mortal, but not 
man ; 


And we men bring death lives by 
night to sow, 
That men may reap and eat and 
live by day.” doe 1: 


TO WALT WHITMAN IN AMERICA 


SEND but a song oversea for us, 
Heart of their hearts who are free, 
Heart of their singer, to be for us 
More than our singing can be ; 
Ours, in the tempest at error, 
With nolight but the twilight of terror ; 
Send us a song oversea ! 


Sweet-smelling of pineleaves and 
grasses, 

And blown as a tree through and 
through 

With the winds of the keen mountain- 
passes, 


And tender as sun-smitten dew ; 
Sharp-tongued as the winter that shakes 
The wastes of your limitless lakes, 

Wide-eyed as the sea-line’s blue. 


O strong-winged soul with prophetic 
Lips hot with the bloodbeats of song, 

With tremor of heartstrings magnetic, 
With thoughts as thunders in throng, 

With consonant ardors of chords 

That pierce men’s souls as with swords 
And hale them hearing along. 


Make us, too, music, to be with us 
As a word from a world’s heart warm, 

To sail the dark as a sea with us, 
Full-sailed, outsinging the storm, 

A song to put fire in our ears 

Whose burning shall burn up tears, 
Whose sign bid battle reform ; 


A note in the ranks of a clarion, 
A word in the wind of cheer, 

To consumeas with ightning the carrion 
That makes time foul for us here ; 

In the air that our dead things infest 

A blast of the breath of the west, 
Till east way as west way is clear. 


Out of the sun beyond sunset, 
From the evening whence morning 
shall be, ; 
With the rollers in measureless onset, 
With the van of the storming sea, 


breath 
That breaks ships driven upon death, 
With the passion of all things free, 


With the sea-steeds footless and frantic, 
White myriads for death to bestride 
In the charge of the ruining Atlantic 
Where deaths by regiments ride, 
With clouds and clamors of waters, 
With along note shriller than slaughter’s 
On the furrowless fields world-wide, 


With terror, with ardor and wonder, 

With the soul of the season that wakes 
When the weight of a whole year’s 

thunder 

In the tidestream of autumn breaks, 
Let the flight of the wide-winged word 
Come over, come in and be heard, 

Take form and fire for our sakes. 


For a continent bloodless with travail 
Here toils and brawls as it can, 

And the web of it who shall unravel 
Of all that peer on the plan ; 

Would fain grow men, but they grow 

not, 

And fain be free, but they know not 

One name for freedom and man? 


One name, not twain for division ; 

One thing, not twain, from the birth; 
Spirit and substance and vision, 

Worth more than worship is worth ; 
Unbeheld, unadored, undivined, 
The cause, the centre, the mind, 

The secret and sense of the earth. 


Here as a weakling in irons, 
Here as a weanling in bands 
Asa prey that the stake-net environs, 
Our life that we looked for stands ; 
And the man-child naked and dear, 
Democracy, turns on us here 
Eyes trembling, with tremulous hands, 


It sees not what season shall bring to it 
Sweet fruit of its bitter desire ; 

Few voices it hears yet sing to it, 
Few pulses of hearts reaspire : 

Foresees not time, nor forehears 

The noises of imminent years, 
Earthquake, and thunder, and fire: 


When crowned and weaponed and curb- 
less 
It shall walk without helm or shield 
The bare burnt furrows and herbless 


SWINBURNE 


Of war’s last flame-stricken field, 
Till godlike, equal with time, 
It stand in the sun sublime, 

In the godhead of man revealed. 


Round your people and over them 
Light like raiment is drawn, 
Close as a garment to cover them 
Wrought not of mail nor of lawn: 
Here, with hope hardly to wear, 
Naked nations and bare 
Swim, sink, strike out for the dawn. 


Chains are here, and a prison, 
Kings, and subjects, and shame: 
If the God upon you be arisen, 
How should our songs be the same ? 
How in confusion of change, 
How shall we sing, in a strange 
Land songs praising his name? 


God is buried and dead to us, 
Even the spirit of earth, 

Freedom: so have they said to us, 
Some with mocking and mirth, 

Some with heartbreak and tears : 

And a God without eyes, without ears, 
Who shall sing of him, dead in the 

birth? 


The earth-god Freedom, the lonely 
Face lightening, the footprint unshod. 
Not as one man crucified only 
Nor scourged with but one life’s rod : 
The soul that is substance of nations, 
Reincarnate with fresh generations ; 
The great god Man, which is God. 


But in weariest of years and obscurest 
Doth it live not at heart of all things 

The one God and one spirit, a purest 
Life, fed from unstanchable springs ? 

Within love, within hatred it is, 

And its seed in the stripe as the kiss, 
And in slaves is the germ, and in 

kings. 


Freedom we call it, for holier 

Name of the soul’s there is none ; 
Surelier it labors, if slowlier, 

Than the metres of star or of sun ; 
Slowlier than life unto breath, 
Surelier than time unto death, 

It moves till its labor be done. 


Till the motion be done and the measure 
Circling through season and clime, 

Slumber and sorrow and pleasure, 
Vision of virtue and crime ; 

Till consummate with conquering eyes, 


887 


A soul disembodied, it rise 
From the body transfigured of time. 


Till it rise and remain and take station 
With the stars of the world that re- 


joice ; 
_ Till the voice of its heart’s exultation 


Be as theirs an invariable voice, 

By no discord of evil estranged, 

By no pause, by no breach in it changed, 
By no clash in the chord of its choice. 


It is one with the world’s generations, 
With the spirit, the star, and the sod: 
With the kingless and king-stricken 


nations, 
With the cross, and the chain, and 
the rod ; 
The most high, the most secret, most 
lonely, 


The earth-soul Freedom, that only 
Lives, and that only is God. — 1871. 


FROM MATER TRIUMPHALIS 
[TO LIBERTY ] 


Iam thine harp between thine hands, 
O mother ! 
All my strong chords are strained 
with love of thee. 
We grapple in love and wrestle, as each 
with other 
Wrestle the wind and the unreluctant 
sea. 


Iam no courtier of thee sober-suited, 
Who loves a little for a little pay. 

Me not thy winds and storms, nor 

thrones disrooted, 
molten crowns, nor 

sins, dismay. 


Nor thine own 


Sinned hast thou sometime, therefore 
art thou sinless ; 
Stained hast thou been, who art there- 
fore without stain ; 
Even as man’s soul is kin to thee, but 
kinless 
Thou, in whose womb Time sows the 
all-various grain. 


I do not bid thee spare me, O dreadful 


mother ! 
I pray thee that thou spare not, of thy 
grace. 
How were it with me then,if ever 
another 


Should come to stand before thee in 
this my place? 


888 


Tam the trumpet at thy lips, thy clarion, 
Full of thy cry, sonorous with thy 
breath ; 
The graves of souls born worms, and 
creeds grown carrion 
Thy blast of judgment fills with fires 
of death. 


Thou art the player whose organ-keys 
are thunders, 
And I, beneath thy foot, the pedal 
pressed ; 
Thou art the ray whereat the rent night 
sunders, 
And I the cloudlet borne upon thy 
‘ breast. 


I shall burn up before thee, pass and 
perish, 
As haze in sunrise on the red sea-line ; 


But thou from dawn to sunsetting shalt — 


cherish 
The thoughts that led and souls that 
lighted mine. 


Reared between night and noon and 
truth and error, 
Each twilight-travelling bird that 
trills and screams 
Sickens at midday, nor 
terror 
The imperious 
extremes. 


can face for 


heaven’s inevitable 


I have no spirit of skill with equal 


fingers 
At sign to sharpen or to slacken 
strings ; 
I keep no time of song with gold-perched 
singers 
And chirp of linnets on the wrists of 
kings. 
Iam thy storm-thrush of the days that 
darken, 
Thy petrel in the foam that bears thy 
bark 


To port through night and tempest : if 
thou hearken, 
My voice is in thy heaven before the 
lark. 


My song is in the mist that hides thy 
morning, 
My cry isup before the day for thee ; 
Ihave heard thee and beheld thee and 
give warning, 
Before thy wheels divide the sky and 
sea. 


BRITISH POETS 


Birds shall wake with thee voiced and 
feathered fairer, 
To.see in summer what I see in spring ; 
Ihave eyes and heart to endure thee, 
O thunder-bearer, 
And they shall be who shall have 
tongues to sing. 


I have love at least, and have not fear, 
and part not 
From thine unnavigable and wingless 
way; 
Thou tarriest, and I have not said thou 
art not, 
Nor e thy night long have denied thy 
ay. 


Darkness to daylight shall lift up thy 
pean, 
Hill to hill thunder, vale cry back to 


vale, 
With wind-notes as of eagles Aitschy- 
lean, 
And Sappho singing in the nightin- 
gale. 


Sung to by mighty sons of dawn and 
daughters, 
Of this night’s songs thine ear shall 
keep but one,— 
That supreme song which shook the 
channelled waters, 
And called thee skyward as God calls 
the sun. 


Come, though all heaven again be fire 
above thee ; 
Though death before thee come to 
clear thy sky ; 
Let us but see in his thy face who love 


thee ; 
Yea, though thou slay us, arise, and 
let us die. 1871. 


COR CORDIUM 
[SHELLEY ] 
O HEART of hearts, the chalice of love’s 


fire, 

Hid round with flowers and all the 
bounty of bloom ; 

O wonderful and perfect heart, for whom 

The lyrist liberty made life a lyre ; ; 

O heavenly heart, at whose most dear 
desire 

Dead love, living and singing, cleft his 
tomb, 


SWINBURNE 


And with him risen and regent in death’s 
room 

All day thy choral pulses rang full choir ; 

O heart whose beating blood was run- 
ning song, 

O sole thing sweeter than thine own 
songs were, 

Help us for thy free love’s sake to be 
free, 

True for thy truth’s sake, for 
strength’s sake strong, 

Till very liberty make clean and fair 

The nursing earth as the sepulchral sea. 

1871. 


thy 


*‘*NON DOLET.” 


It does not hurt. 
knife 
Smiling, and watched the thick drops 
mix and run 

Down the sheer blade; not that which 
had been done 

Could hurt the sweet sense of the Roman 
wife, 

But that which was to do yet ere the 
strife 

Could end for each forever, and thesun: 

Nor was the palm yet nor was peace yet 
won 

While pain had power upon her hus- 
band’s life. 

It does not hurt, Italia. Thou art more 

Than bride to bridegroom; how shalt 
thou not take 

The gift love’s blood has reddened for 


She looked along the 


thy sake ? 

Was not thy lifeblood given for us be- 
fore? 

And if love’s heartblood can avail thy 
need, 

And thou not die, how should it hurt 
indeed ? 1871. 


THE OBLATION 


ASK nothing more of me, sweet, 
All I can give you I give. 
Heart of my heart, were it more, 
More would be laid at your feet : 
Love that should help you to live, 
Song that should spur you to soar. 


All things were nothing to give 
Once.to have sense of you more, 
Touch you and taste of you, sweet, 
Think you and breathe you and live, 
Swept of your wings as they soar, 
Trodden by chance of your feet. 


889 


I that have love and no more 
Give you but love of you, sweet: 
He that hath more, let him give ; 
He that hath wings, let him soar ; 
Mine is the heart at your feet 
Here, that must love you to live. 
1871. 


A FORSAKEN GARDEN 


In a coign of the cliff between lowland 
and highland, 
At the sea-down’s edge between wind- 
ward and lee, 
Walled round with rocks as an inland 
island, 
The ghost of a garden fronts the sea. 
A girdle of brushwood and thorn en- 
closes 
The steep square slope of the blos- 
somless bed 
Where the weeds that grew green from 
the graves of its roses 
Now lie dead. 


The fields fall southward, abrupt and 
broken, 
To the low last edge of the long lone 
land. 
If a step should sound or a word be 
spoken, 
Would a ghost not rise at the strange 
guest’s hand ? 
So long have the gray bare walks lain 
guestless, 
Through branches and briars if a man 
make way, 
He shall find no life but the sea-wind’s, 
restless 
Night and day. 


The dense hard passage is blind and 
stifled 
That crawls by a track none turn to 
climb 
To the strait waste place that the years 
have rifled 
Of all but the thorns that are touched 
not of time. 
The thorns he spares when the rose is 
taken ; 
The rocks are left when he wastes the 
plain ; 
The wind that wanders, the weeds wind- 
shaken, 
These remain. 


Nota flower to be pressed of the foot that 
falls not ; [plots are dry ; 
As the heart of a dead man the seed- 


890 


BRITISH POETS 





From the thicket of thorns whence the 
nightingale calls not, 
Could she call, there were never a rose 
to reply. 
Over the meadows that blossom and 
wither, 
Rings but the note of a sea-bird’s song. 
Only the sun and the rain come hither 
All year long. 


The sun burns sear, and the rain dishev- 
els 
One gaunt bleak blossom of scentless 
breath. 
Only the wind here hovers and revels 
In a round where life seems barren as 
death. 
Here there was laughing of old, there 
was weeping, 
Haply, of lovers none ever will know, 
Whose eyes went seaward a hundred 
sleeping 
Years ago. 


Heart handfast in heart as they stood, 
‘* Look thither,” 
Did he whisper? ‘‘ Look forth from 
the flowers to the sea ; 
For the foam-flowers endure when the 
rose-blossoms wither, 
And men that love lightly may die— 
But we ?” 
And the same wind sang, and the same 
waves whitened, 
And or ever the garden’s last petals 
were shed, 
In the lips that had whispered, the eyes 
that had lightened, 
Love was dead. 


Or they loved their life through, and 
then went whither ? 
And were one to the end—but what 
end who knows? 
Love deep as the sea as a rose must 
wither, 
As the rose-red seaweed that mocks 
the rose. 
Shall the dead take thought for the dead 
to love them ? 
What love was ever as deepasa grave? 
They are loveless now as the grass above 
them 
Or the wave. 


All are at one now, roses and lovers, 
Not known of the cliffs and the fields 
and the sea. . 
Not a breath of the time that has been 
hovers 


In the air now soft with a summer to 


e. 
Not a breath shall there sweeten the 
seasons hereafter 
Of the flowers or the lovers that laugh 
now or weep, 
When, as they that are free now of weep- 
ing and laughter, 
We shall sleep. 


Here death may deal not again forever ; 
Here change may come not till all 
change end. 
From the graves they have made they 
shall rise up never, 
Who have left naught living to rav- 
age and rend. 
Earth, stones, and thorns of the wild 
ground growing, 
When the sun and the rain live, these 
shall be ; 
Till a last wind’s breath upon all these 
blowing 
Roll the sea. 


Till the slow sea rise and the sheer cliff 
crumble, 
Till terrace and meadow the deep 
gulfs drink, 
Till thestrength of the waves of the high 
tides humble 
The fields that lessen, the rocks that 
shrink, 
Here now in his triumph where all things 
falter, 
Stretched out on the spoils that his 
own hand spread, 
As a god self-slain on his own strange 
altar, 
Death lies dead..: 
July, 1876. 


A BALLAD OF DREAMLAND 


I HID my heart in a nest of roses, 
Out of the sun’s way, hidden apart ; 
In asofter bed than the soft white snow’s 
is, 
Under the roses I hid my heart. 
Why would it sleep not? why should 
it start, 
When never a leaf of the rose-tree stirred? 
What made sleep flutter his wings and 
part ? 
Only the song of a secret bird. 


Lie still, I said, for the wind’s wing closes,’ 
And mild leaves muffle the keen sun’s 
dart ; 


SWINBURNE 


891 


Lie still, for the wind on the warm seas 
dozes, 
And the wind is unquieter yet than 
thou art. 
Does a thought in thee still as a 
thorn’s wound smart? 
Does the fang still fret thee of hope de- 
ferred ? 
What bids the lips of thy sleep dispart ? 
Only the song of a secret bird. 


The green land’s name that a charm en- 
closes, 
It never was writ in the traveller’s 
chart, 
And sweet on its trees as the fruit that 
grows is, 
It never was sold in the merchant’s 
mart. 
The swallows of dreams through its 
dim fields dart, 
And sleep’s are the tunes in its tree-tops 
heard ; 
No hound’s note wakens the wild- 
wood hart, 
Only the song of a secret bird. 


ENVOIL 


In the world of dreams I have chosen 
my part, 
To sleep for a season and hear no word 
Of true love's truth or of light love’s art, 
Only the song of a secret bird. 
September, 1876. 


A BALLAD OF FRANCOIS VILLON, 
PRINCE OF ALL BALLAD-MAKERS 


Birp of the bitter bright gray golden 
morn, 
Scarce risen upon the dusk of dolorous 
years, 
First of us all and sweetest singer born, 
Whose far shrill note the world of 
new men hears 
Cleave the cold shuddering shade as 
twilight clears ; 
When song new-born put off the old 
world’s attire 
And felt its tune on her changed lips ex- 
ire, 
Writ foremost on the roll of them that 
came 
Fresh girt for service of the latter lyre, 
Villon, our sad bad glad mad brother's 
name ! 


Alas, the joy, the sorrow, and the scorn, 
That clothed thy life with hopes and 
sins and fears, 
And gave thee stones for bread and tares 
for corn 
And plume-plucked gaol-birds for thy 
_ starveling peers, 
Till death clipt close their flight with 
shameful shears ; 
Till shifts came short and loves were 
hard to hire, 
When lilt of song nor twitch of twang- 
ling wire 
Could buy thee bread or kisses ; when 
light fame 
Spurned likea ball and haled through 
brake and briar, 
Villon, our sad bad glad mad brother’s 
name ! 


Poor splendid wings so frayed and soiled 
and torn! 
Poor kind wild eyes so dashed with 
light quick tears! 
Poor perfect voice, most blithe when 
most forlorn, 
That rings athwart the sea whence no 
man steers, 
Like joy-bells crossed with death-bells 
in our ears! 
What far delight has cooled the fierce 
desire 
That, like some ravenous bird, was 
strong to tire 
On that frail flesh and soul consumed 
with flame, 
But left more sweet than roses to respire, 
Villon, our sad bad glad mad brother’s 
name ? 


ENVOI 


Prince of sweet songs made out of tears 
and fire, 

A harlot was thy nurse, a God thy sire ; 

Shame soiled thy song, and song as- 

soiled thy shame. 

But from thy feet now death has washed 
the mire, 

Love reads out first at head of all our 


quire, 
Villon, our sad bad glad mad brother’s 
name. September, 1877. 


TO LOUIS KOSSUTH 


LiGHT of our fathers’ eyes, and in our 
own 

Star of the unsetting sunset! for thy 
name, 


892 


That on the front of noon was as a flame 

In the great year nigh twenty years agone 

When all the heavens of Europe shook 
and shone 

With stormy wind and lightning, keeps 
its fame 

And bears its witness all day through 
the same ; 

Not for past days and great deeds past 
alone, 

Kossuth, we praise thee as our Landor 
praised, 

But that now too we know thy voice up- 

_ raised, 
Thy voice, the trumpet of the truth of 
d 


God, 
Thine hand, the thunder-bearer’s, raised 
to smite. 
As with heaven’s lightning for a sword 
and rod 
Men’s heads abased before the Muscovite. 
February, 1878. 


CHILD’S SONG 


Wuat is gold worth, say, 
Worth for work or play, 
Worth to keep or pay, 
Hide or throw away, 
Hope about or fear ? 
What is love worth, pray? 
Worth a tear? 


Golden on the mould 

Lie the dead leaves rolled 

Of the wet woods old, 

Yellow leaves and cold, 
Woods without a dove; 

Gold is worth but gold ; 
Love’s worth love. 1878. 


TRIADS 


iF 


The word of the sun to the sky, 

The word of the wind to the sea, 

The word of the moon to the night, 
What may it be? 


The sense of the flower to the fly, 
The sense of the bird to the tree, 
The sense of the cloud to the light, 
Who can tell me? 


The song of the fields to the kye, 
The song of the lime to the bee, 
The song of the depth to the height, 

Who knows all three? 


BRITISH POETS 


II 


The message of April to May, 
That May sends on into June 
And June gives out to July 
For birthday boon ; 


The delight of the dawn in the day, 
The delight of the day in the noon, 
The delight of a song in a sigh 
That breaks the tune ; 


The secret of passing away, 
The cast of the change of the moon, 
None knows it with ear or with eye, 
But all will soon. 


Ti 


The live wave’s love for the shore, 
The shore’s for the wave as it dies, 
The love of the thunder-fire 
That sears the skies— 


We shall know not though life wax 
hoar, 
Till all life, spent into sighs, 
Burn out as consumed with desire 
Of death’s strange eyes ; 


Till the secret be secret no more 
In the light of one hour as it flies, 
Be the hour as of suns that expire 


~ 


Or suns that rise. 1878. 


ON THE CLIFFS 
imepodawvos andwv (SAPPHO) 


BETWEEN the moondawn and the sun- 
down here 

The twilight hangs half starless ; half 
the sea 

Still quivers as for love or pain or fear 

Or pleasure mightier than these all may 
be. 

A man’s live heart might beat 

Wherein a God’s with mortal blood 
should meet 

And fill its pulse too full to bear the 
strain 

With fear or love or pleasure’s twin-born, 
pain. 

Fiercely the gaunt woods to the grim 
soil cling 

That bears for all fair fruits 

Wan wild sparse flowers of windy and 
wintry spring 

Between the tortive serpent-shapen roots 

Wherethrough their dim growth hardly 
strikes and shoots 

And shows one gracious thing ; 


SWINBURNE 


Hardly, to speak for summer one sweet 
word 

Of summer’s self scarce heard. 

But higher the steep green sterile fields, 
thickset 

With flowerless hawthorn even to the 
upward verge 

Whence the woods gathering watch new 
cliffs emerge, 

Higher than their highest of crowns 
that sea-winds fret, 

Holds fast, for all that night or wind can 
say, 

Some pale pure color yet, 

Too dim for green and luminous for gray. 

Between the climbing inland cliffs above 

And these beneath that breast and break 
the bay, 

A barren peace too soft for hate or love 

Broods on an hour too dim for night or 
day. 

O wind; O wingless wind that walk’st 
the sea, 

Weak wind, wing-broken, wearier wind 
than we, 

Who are yet not spirit-broken, maimed 
like thee, 

Who wail not in our inward night as 
thou 

In the outer darkness now, 

What word has the old sea given thee 
for mine ear 

From thy faint lips to hear? 

For some word would she send me, know- 
ing not how. 


Nay, what far other word 

Than ever of her was spoken, or of me 

Or all my winged white kinsfolk of the 
sea 

Between fresh wave and wave was ever 
heard, 

Cleaves the clear dark enwinding tree 
with tree 

Too close for stars to separate and to see 

Enmeshed in multitudinous unity ? 

What voice of what strong God hath 
stormed and stirred 

The fortressed rock of silence, rent apart 

Even to the core Night’s all maternal 
heart ? 

What voice of God grown heavenlier in 
a bird, 

Make keener of edge to smite 

Than Bebining 70m thou knowest, O 
mother Night, 

Keen as that cry from thy strange chil- 
dren sent } 


1JIn Aeschylus’ Eumenides. 


893 


Wherewith the Athenian 
shrine was rent, 

For wrath that all their wrath was vainly 
spent, 

Their wrath for wrong made right 

By justice in her own divine despite 

That bade pass forth unblamed 

The sinless matricide and unashamed ? 

Yea, what new cry is this, what note 
more bright 

Than their song’s wing of words was 
dark of flight, 

What word is this thou hast heard, 

Thine and not thine or theirs, O Night, 
what word 

More keen than lightning and more 
sweet than light? 

As all men’s hearts grew godlike in one 
bird 

And all those hearts cried on thee, cry- 
ing with might, 

Hear us, O mother Night! 


judgment- 


Dumb is the mouth of darkness as of 
death : 

Light, sound and life are one 

In the eyes and lips of dawn that draw 
the sun 


‘To hear what first child’s word with 


glimmering breath 
weak wan weanling 
twilight saith ; 

But night makes answer none. 


Their child the 


God, if thou be god,—bird, if bird thou 
be,— 

Do thou then answer me. 

For but one word, what wind soever 
blow, 

Is blown up usward ever from the sea. 

In fruitless years of youth dead long 

ago [and snow 

And deep beneath their own dead leaves 

Buried, | heard with bitter heart and sere 

The same sea’s word unchangeable, nor 
knew 

But that mine own 
changeless too, 

And sharp and salt with unshed tear on 
tear, 

And cold and fierce and barren; and 
my soul, 

Sickening, swam weakly 
breath 

In a deep sea like death, 

And felt the wind buffet her face with 
brine 

Hard, and harsh thought on thought in 
long bleak roll 


life-days were 


with bated 


894 


BRITISH POETS 


Blown by keen gusts of memory sad as -wal 


thine 

Heap the weight up of pain, and break, 
and leave 

Strength scarce enough to grieve 

In the sick heavy spirit, unmanned with 
strife 

Of waves that beat at the tired lips of 
life. 


Nay, sad may be man’s memory, sad 
may be 

The dream he weaves him as for shadow 

. of thee, 

But scarce one breathing-space, 
heartbeat long, 

Wilt thou take shadow of sadness on thy 
song. 

Not thou, being more than man or man’s 
desire, 

Being bird and God in one, 

With throat of gold and spirit of the 


one 


sun ; 

The sun whom all our souls and songs 
call sire, 

Whose godhead gave thee, chosen of all 
our quire, 

Thee only of all that serve, of all that 
sing 

Before our sire and king, 

Borne up some space on time’s world- 
wandering wing, 

This gift, this doom, to bear till time’s 
wing tire— 

Life everlasting of eternal fire. 


Thee only of all; yet can no memory say 

How many a night and day 

My heart has been as thy heart, and my 
life 

As thy life is, a sleepless hidden thing, 

Full of the thirst and hunger of winter 
and spring, 

That seeks its food not in such love or 
strife 

As fill men’s hearts with :passionate 
hours and rest. 

From no loved lips and on no loving 
breast 

Have I sought ever for such gifts as bring 

Comfort, to stay the secret soul with 
sleep. 

The joys, the loves, the labors, whence 
men reap 

Rathe fruit of hopes and fears, 

I have made not mine; the best of all 
my days 

Have been as those fair fruitless summer 
strays, 


Those water-waifs that but the sea-wind 
steers, 

Flakes of glad foam or flowers on foot- 
less ways 

That take the wind in season and the 
sun, 

And when the wind wills is their season 
done. 


For all my days as all thy days from 
birth 

My heart as thy heart was in me as 
thee, 

Fire; and not all the fountains of the 
sea 

Have waves enough to quench it, nor on 
earth 

Is fuel enough to feed, 

While day sows night, and night sows 
day for seed. 


We were not marked for sorrow, thou 
nor I, 

For joy nor sorrow, sister, were we made, 

To pe delight and grief to live and 

ie, 

Assuaged by pleasures or by pains af- 
frayed 

That melt men’s hearts and alter; we 
retain 

A memory mastering pleasure and all 
pain, 

A spirit within the sense of ear and eye, 

A soul behind the soul, that seeks and 
sings 

And makes our life move only with its 
wings 

And feed but from its lips, that in re- 
turn 

Feed of our hearts wherein the old fires 
that burn 

Have strength not to consume 

Nor glory enough to exalt us past our 
doom. 


Ah, ah, the doom (thou knowest whence 
rang that wail) 

Of the shrill nightingale ! 

(From whose wild lips, thou knowest, 
that wail was thrown) 

For round about her have the great gods 


cast 

A wing-borne body, and clothed her close 
and fast 

With a sweet life that hath no part 1 an 
moan. 

But me, for me(how hadst thou heart to 
hear ?) [ spear. 


Remains a sundering with the two-edged 


SWINBURNE 


Ah, for her doom! so cried in presage 


then 

The bodeful bondslave of the king of 
men, 

And might not win her will. 

Too close the entangling dragnet woven 
of crime, 

The snare of ill new-born of elder ill, 

The curse of new time for an elder 

- time, 

Had caught and held her yet, 

Enmeshed intolerably in the intolerant 
net, 

Who thought with craft to mock the 
God most high, 

And win by wiles his crown of prophecy 

From the sun’s hand sublime, 

As God were man, to spare or to forget. 


But thou,—the gods have given thee and 
forgiven thee 

More than our master gave 

That strange-eyed,  spirit-wounded, 
strange-tongued slave 

There questing houndlike where the 
roofs red-wet 

Reeked as a wet red grave. 

Life everlasting has their strange grace 
given thee, 

Even hers whom thou wast wont to sing 
and serve 

With eyes, but not with song, too swift 
to swerve ; 

Yet might not even thine eyes estranged 
estrange her, 

Who seeing thee too, but inly, burn and 
bleed 

Like that pale princess-priest of Priam’s 
seed, 

For stranger service gave thee guerdon, 
stranger 

If this indeed be guerdon, this indeed 

Her mercy, this thy meed— 

That thou, being more than all we born, 
being higher 

Than all heads crowned of him that only 
gives 

The light whereby man lives, 

The bay that bids man moved of God’s 
desire 

Lay hand on lute or lyre, 

Set lip to trumpet or deflowered green 
reed— 

If this were given thee for a grace in- 


deed, 

That thou, being first of all these, thou 
alone 

Shouldst have the grace to die not, but 
to live, 


895 


And loose nor change one pulse of song, 


one tone 

Of all that were thy lady’s and thine 
own, 

The lady’s whom thou criedst on to for- 
give 

Thou, priest and sacrifice on the altar- 
stone 

Where none may worship not of allthat ~ 
live, 

Love’s priestess, errant on dark ways 
diverse ; 


If this were grace indeed for Love to 


give, 
If this indeed were blessing and no 
curse. 


Love’s priestess, mad with pain and joy 
of song, 

Song’s priestess, mad with joy and pain 
of love, 

Name above all names that are lights 
above, 

We have lov’d, prais’d, pitied, crown’d, 
and done thee wrong, 

O thou past praise and pity; thou the 


sole 

Utterly deathless, perfect only and 
whole 

Immortal, body and soul, 

For over all whom time hath overpast 

The shadow of sleep inexorable is cast, 

The implacable sweet shadow of perfect 
sleep 

That gives not back what life gives death 
to keep ; 

Yea, all that liv’d and lov’d and sang 
and sinn’d 

Are all borne down death’s cold, sweet, 
soundless wind 

That blows all night and knows not 
whom its breath, 

Darkling, may touch to death : 

But one that wind hath touch’d and 
changed not,—one 

Whose body and soul are parcel of the 
sun ; 

One that earth’s fire could burn not, nor 
the sea 

Quench; nor might human doom take 
hold on thee ; 

All praise, all pity, all dreams have done 
thee wrong, 

All love, with eyes love-blinded from 
above ; 

Song’s priestess, mad with joy and pain 
of love, 

Love’s priestess, mad with pain and joy 
of song. 


896 


Hast thou none other answer then for 
me 

Than the air may have of thee, 

Or the earth’s warm woodlands girdling 
with green girth 

Thy secret, sleepless, burning life on 
earth, 

Or even the sea that once, being woman 

crown’d 

And girt with fire and glory of anguish 
round, 

Thou wert so fain to seek to, fain to 
crave 

If she would hear thee and save 

And give thee comfort of thy great 
green grave? 

Because I have known thee always who 
thou art, 

Thou knowest, have known thee to thy 
heart’s own heart, 

Nor ever have given light ear to storied 
song 

That did thy sweet name sweet unwit- 
ting wrong, 

Nor ever have called thee nor would call 
for shame, 

Thou knowest, but inly, by thine only 
name, 

Sappho-—because I have known thee 
and loved, hast thou 

None other answer now? 

As brother and sister were we, child 
and bird, 

Since thy first Lesbian word 

Flamed on me, and I knew not whence 
I knew 

This was the song that struck my whole 
soul through, 

Pierced my keen spirit of sense with 
edge more keen, 

Kven when I knew not—even ere sooth 

. Was seen— 

When thou wast but the tawny sweet 
winged thing 

Whose cry was but of spring. 


And yet even so thine ear should hear 
me—yea, 

Hear me this nightfall by this northland 
bay, 

Even for their sake whose loud good 
word I had, 

Singing of thee in the all-beloved clime 

Once, where the windy wine of spring 
makes mad 

Our sisters of Majano, who kept time 

Clear to my choral rhyme. 

Yet was the song acclaimed of these 
aloud 


BRITISH POETS 


Whose praise had made mute humble- 
ness misproud, 

The song with answering song ap- 
plauded thus, 

But of that Daulian dream of Itylus. 

So but for love’s love haply was it—nay, 

How else?—that even their song took 
my song’s part, 

For love of love and sweetness of sweet 
heart, 

Or god-given glorious madness of mid 
May 

And heat of heart and hunger and 
thirst to sing, 

Full of the new wine of the wind of 


spring. 


Or if this were not, and it be not sin 

To hold myself in spirit of thy sweet 
kin, 

In heart and spirit of song ; 

If this my great love do thy grace no 
wrong, 

Thy grace that gave me grace to dwell 
therein ; 

If thy gods thus be my gods, and their 
will 

Made my song part of thy song—even 
such part . 

As man’s hath of God’s heart— 

And my life like as thy life to fulfil ; 

What have our gods then given us? 
Ah, to thee 

Sister, much more, much happier than 
to me, 

Much happier things they have given, 
and more of grace 

Than falls to man’s light race ; 

For lighter are we, all our love and pain 

Lighter than thine, who knowest of 
time or place 

Thus much, that place nor time 

Can heal or hurt or lull or change 


again 

The singing soul that makes his soul 
sublime 

Who hears the far fall of its fire-fledged 
rhyme 


Fill darkness as with bright and burning 


rain, , 
Till all the live gloom inly glows, and 
light 
Seems with the sound to cleave the core 
of night. 


oi tSPOED. Fin 
The singing sov';Shat moves thee, and 
that mo ved 
Wuen thou wast woman, and their 
songs divine 


SWINBURNE 


Who mixed for Grecian mouths heav- 
en’s lyric wine 

Fell dumb, fell down reproved 

Before one sovereign Lesbian song of 
thine. 

That soul, though love and life had fain 
held fast, 

Wind-winged with fiery music, 
and past 

Through the indrawn hollow of earth 
and heaven and hell, 

As through some strait sea-shell 

The wide sea’s immemorial song,—the 


rose 


sea 

That sings and breathes in strange men’s 
ears of thee 

How in her barren bride bed, void and 
vast, 

Even thy soul sang itself to sleep at last. 


To sleep? Ah, then, what song is this, 
that here 

Makes all the night one ear, 

One ear fulfilled and mad with music, 

, one 

Heart kindling as the heart of heaven, 

to hear 

A song more fiery than the awakening 
sun 

Sings, when his song sets fire 

To the air and clouds that build the 
dead night’s pyre ? 

O thou of divers-colored mind, O thou 

Deathless, God’s daughter, subtle-souled 
—lo, now, 

Now to the song above all songs, in flight 

Higher than the day-star’s height, 

And sweet as sound the moving wings 
of night! 

Thou of the divers-colored seat—behold, 

Her very song of old!— 

O deathless, O God’s daughter, subtle- 
souled ! 

That same cry through this boskage 
overhead 

Rings round reiterated, 

Palpitates as the last palpitated, 

The last that panted through her lips 
and died 

Not down this gray north sea’s half 
sapped cliff-side 

That crumbles toward the coastline, 
year by year 

More near the sands and near ; 

The last loud lyric fisry cry she cried, 

Heard once on heigiu. Teuckdian,— 
heard not here. 


Not here: for this that Ride our nortlt: - 


land night, 


57 


897 


This is the song that made 

Love fearful, even the heart of love 
afraid, 

With the great anguish of its great de- 
light. 

No swan-song, no far-fluttering half- 
drawn breath, 

No word that love of love’s sweet nature 
saith, 

No dirge that lulls the narrowing lids of 
death, 

No healing hymn of peace-prevented 
strife,— 

This is her song of life. 


I loved thee,—hark, one tenderer note 


than all— 

Atthis, of old time, once—one low long 
fall, 

Sighing—one long low lovely loveless 
call, 

Dying—one pause in song so flamelike 
fast— 


Atthis, long since in old time overpast—- 

One soft first pause and last, 

One,—then the old rage of rapture’s 
fieriest rain 

Storms all the music-maddened night 
again. 


Child of God, close craftswoman, I be- 
seech thee 

Bid not ache nor agony break nor mas- 
ter, 

Lady, my spirit— 

O thou her mistress, might her cry not 
reach thee ? 

Our Lady of all men’s loves, could Love 
go past her, 

Pass, and not hear it? 

She hears not as she heard not: hears 
not. me, 

O trebled-natured mystery—how should 
she 

Hear, or give ear?—who heard and 
heard not thee ; 

Heard and went past, and heard not; 
but all time 

Hears all that all the ravin of his years 

Hath cast not wholly out of all men’s 


ears 

And dulled to death with deep dense 
funeral chime 

Of their reiterate rhyme. 

And now of all songs uttering all her 


praise, 
All hers who had thy praise and did thee 
wrong, 


$98 


BRATS EL enOE TS . 








Abides one song yet of her lyric days, 
Thine only, this thy song. 


O soul triune, woman and god and 
bird, 

Man, man at least has heard. 

All ages call thee conqueror, and thy 
cry 

The mightiest as the least beneath the 

Whose heart was ever set to song, or 
stirred 

With wind of mounting music blown 
more high 

Than wildest wing may fly, 

Hath heard or hears,—even Atschylus 
as I. 

But when thy name was woman, and 
thy word 

Human,—then haply, surely then me- 
seems 

This thy bird’s note was heard on earth 
of none, 

Of none save only in dreams. 

In. all the world then surely was but 

one 

as in heaven at highest one 

sceptred sun 

Regent, on earth here surely without fail 

One only, one imperious nightingale. 

Dumb was the field, the woodland mute, 
the lawn 

Silent ; the hill was tongueless as the 
vale 

Even when the last fair waif of cloud 
that felt 

Its heart beneath the coloring moonrays 
melt, 

At high midnoon of midnight half with- 
drawn, 

Bared all the sudden deep divine moon- 
dawn. 

Then, unsaluted by her twin-born tune, 

That latter timeless morning of the 
moon 

Rose past its hour of moonrise ; clouds 
gave way 

To the old reconquering ray, 

But no song answering made it more 
than day ; 

No cry of song by night 

Shot fire into the cloud-constraining 
light. 

One only, one AXolian island heard 

Thrill, but through no bird’s throat, 

In one strange manlike maiden’s godlike 
note, | 

The song of all these as a single bird ; 

Till the sea’s portal was as funeral gate 


Song ; 


For that sole singer in all time’s ageless 
date 

Singled and signed for so triumphal 
fate, 

All nightingales but one in all the world 

All her sweet life were silent ; only 


then, 

When her life’s wing of womanhood was 
furled, 

Their cry, this cry of thine was heard 
again, 


As of me now, of any born of men. 


Through sleepless clear spring nights 
filled full of thee, 

Rekindled here, thy ruling song has 
thrilled 

The deep dark air and subtle tender sea 

And breathless hearts with one bright 
sound fulfilled. 

Or at midnoon to me 

Swimming, and birds about my happier 
head 

Skimming, one smooth soft way by 
water and air, 

To these my bright born brethren and to 


me 

Hath not the clear wind borne or seemed 
to bear 

A song wherein all earth and heaven 
and sea 

Were molten in one music made of thee 

To enforce us, O our sister of the shore, 

Look once in heart back landward and 
adore? 

For songless were we sea-mews, yet had 


we 

More joy than all things joyful of thee— 
more, 

Haply, than all things happiest; nay, 
save thee, 

In thy strong rapture of imperious joy 

Too high for heart of sea-borne bird or 
boy, 

What ane things were happiest if not 
we? 

But knowing not love nor change nor 
wrath nor wrong, 

No more we knew of song. 


Song, and the secrets of it, and their 
might, 

What blessings curse it and what curses 
bless, 

I know them since my spirit had first in 
sight, 

Clear as thy song’s words or the live 
sun’s light, 

The small dark body’s Lesbian loveliness 


SWINBURNE 


That held the fire eternal ; eye and ear 

Were as a god’s to see, a god's to hear, 

Through all his hours of daily and night- 
ly chime, 

The sundering of the two-edged spear of 
time : 

The spear that pierces even the seven- 
fold shields 

Of mightiest Memory, mother of allsongs 
made, 

And wastes all songs as roseleaves kissed 
and frayed 

As here the harvest of the foam-flowered 
fields ; 

Butt thine the spear may waste not that 
he wields 

Since first the God whose soul is man’s 
live breath, 

The sun whose face hath our sun’s face 
for shade, 

Put all the light of life and love and 
death 

Too strong for life, but not for love too 
strong, 

Where pain makes peace with pleasure 
in thy song, 

And in thine heart, where love and song 
make strife, 

Fire everlasting of eternal life. 1880. 


ON THE DEATHS OF THOMAS CAR- 
LYLE AND GEORGE ELIOT 


TwoO souls diverse out of our human sight 

Pass, followed one with love and each 
with wonder : 

The stormy sophist with his mouth of 
thunder, 

Clothed with loud wordsand mantled in 
the might 

Of darkness and magnificence of night ; 

And one whose eye could smite the night 
in sunder, 

Searching if light or no light were there- 
under, 

And found in love of loving-kindness 
light. ; 

Duty divine and Thought with eyes of 
fire 

Still following Righteousness with deep 
desire 

Shone sole and stern before her and 
above— 

Sure stars and sole to steer by ; but 
more sweet 

Shone lower the loveliest lamp for earth- 
ly feet,— 

The light of little children, and their 
love. April, 1881. 


899 


SONG FROM MARY STUART 


AND ye maun braid your yellow hair, 
And busk ye like a bride ; 

Wi’ sevenscore men to bring ye hame, 
And ae true love beside: 

Between the birk and the green rowan 
Fw blithely shall ye ride. 


O ye maun braid my yellow hair, 
But braid it like nae bride ; 

And I maun gang my ways, mither, 
Wi nae true love beside ; 

Between the kirk and the kirkyard 
Fw’ sadly shall I ride. 1881. 


HOPE AND FEAR 


BENEATH the shadow of dawn’s aerial 


cope, 

With eyes enkindled as the sun’s own 
sphere, 

Hope from the front of youth in god- 
like cheer 

Looks Godward, past the shades where 
blind men grope 

Round the dark door that prayers nor 
dreams can ope, 


‘And makes for joy the very darkness 


dear 

That gives her wide wings play ; nor 
dreams that fear 

At noon may rise and pierce the heart of 
hope. 

Then, when the soul leaves off to dream 
and yearn, 

May truth first purge her eyesight to 
discern 

What once being known leaves time no 
power to appal ; 

Till youth at last, ere yet youth be not, 
learn 

The kind wise word that falls from 
years that fall— 

‘* Hope thou not much, and fear thou 
not at all.” 1882, 


WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE 


Not if men’s tongues and angels’ all in 
one 

Spake, might the word be said that 
might speak Thee. 

Streams, winds, woods, flowers, fields, 
mountains, yea, the sea, 

What power is in them all to praise the 
sun? 

His praise is this,—he can be praised of 
none. 


goo 


BRITISH POETS 





Man, woman, child, praise God for him ; 
but he 

Exults not to be worshipped. but to be. 

He is; and, being, beholds his work well 
done. 

All joy, all glory, all sorrow, all strength, 
all mirth, 

Are his: without him, day were night 
on earth. 

Time knows not his from time’s own 
period. 

All lutes, all harps, all viols, all flutes, 
all lyres, 

Fall dumb before him ere one string 


suspires. 
All stars are angels; but the sun is God. 
1882. 
CHILDREN 


OF such is the kingdom of heaven. 
No glory that ever was shed 

From the crowning star of the seven 
That crown the north world’s head, 


No word that ever was spoken 
Of human or godlike tongue, 
Gave ever such godlike token 
Since human harps were strung. 


No sign that ever was given 
To faithful or faithless eyes 
Showed ever beyond clouds riven 
So clear a Paradise. 


Earth’s creeds may be seventy times 
seven 
And blood have defiled each creed : 
If of such be the kingdom of heaven, 
It must be heaven indeed. 1882. 


A CHILD’S LAUGHTER 


All the bells of heaven may ring, 
All the birds of heaven may sing, 
All the wells on earth may spring, 
All the winds on earth may bring 
All sweet sounds together ; 
Sweeter far than all things heard, 
Hand of harper, tone of bird, 
Sound of woods at sundawn stirr’d, 
Welling water’s winsome word, 
Wind in warm wan weather, 


One thing yet there is, that none 
Hearing ere its chime be done 
Knows not well the sweetest one 
Heard of man beneath the sun, 
Hoped in heaven hereafter ; 


Soft and strong and loud and light, 
Very sound of very light 
Heard from morning’s rosiest height, 
When the soul of all delight 

Fills a child’s clear laughter. 


Golden bells of welcome roll’d 
Never forth such notes, nor told 
Hours so blithe in tones so bold, 
As the radiant mouth of gold 
Here that rings forth heaven. 
If the golden-crested wren 
Were a nightingale—why, then 
Something seen and heard of men 
Might be half as sweet as when : 
Laughs a child of seven. 1882, 


THE SALT OF THE EARTH 


IF childhood were not in the world, 
But only men and women grown ; 
No baby-locks in tendrils curled, 
No baby-blossoms blown ; 
Though men were stronger, women 
fairer, 
And nearer all delights in reach, 
And verse and music uttered rarer 
Tones of more godlike speech ; 


Though the utmost life of life’s best 
hours 
Found, as it cannot now find, words ; 
Though desert sands were sweet as 
flowers 
And flowers could sing like birds, 


But children never heard them, never 
They felt a child’s foot leap and run: 

This were a drearier star than ever 
Yet looked upon the sun. 1882. 


CHILD AND POET 


You send me your love in a letter, 
I send you my love ina song: 

Ah child, your gift is the better, 
Mine does you but wrong. 


No fame, were the best less brittle, 
No praise, were it wide as earth, 

Is worth so much as a little 
Child’s love may be worth. 


We see the children above us 
As they might angels above : 

Come back to us, child, if you love us, 
And bring us your love. 1882. 


SWINBURNE 


“A CHILD’S FUTURE 


Wuat will it please you, my darling, 
hereafter to be? 

- Fame upon land will you look for, or 
glory by sea ? 

Gallant your life will be always, and all 
of it free. 


Free as the wind when the heart of the 
twilight is stirred. 

Eastward, and sounds from the springs 
of the sunrise are heard: 

Free—and we know not another as in- 
finite word. 


Darkness or twilight or sunlight may 
compass us round, 

Hate may arise up against us, or hope 
may confound ; 

Love may forsake us ; 
spirit be bound. 


yet may not the 


Free in oppression of grief as in ardor of 
JOY 

Still may the soul be, and each to her 
strength as a toy: 

Free in the glance of the man as the 
smile of the boy. 


Freedom alone is the salt and the spirit 
that gives 

Life, and without her is nothing that 
verily lives: 

Death cannot slay her: she laughs upon 
death and forgives. 


Brightest and hardiest of roses anear 
and afar 

Glitters the blithe little face of you, 
round as a star: 

Liberty bless you and keep you to be as 
you are, 


England and liberty bless you and keep 
you to be 

Worthy the name of their child and the 
sight of their sea ; 

Fear not at all; for a slave, if he fears 
not, is free. 1882. 


ETUDE REALISTE 
. I 


A BABY’S feet, like sea-shells pink, 
Might tempt, should Heaven see meet, 
An angel’s lips to kiss, we think, 
A baby’s feet. 


Like rose-hued sea-flowers toward the 
heat 
They stretch and spread and wink 
Their ten soft buds that part and meet. 


No flower-bells that expand and shrink 
Gleam half so heavenly sweet 
As shine on life’s untrodden brink 
A baby’s feet. 


II 


A baby’s hands, like rosebuds furl’d, 
Whence yet no leaf expands, 
Ope if you touch, though close upcurl’d 
A baby’s hands. 


Then, even as warriors grip their brands 
When battle’s bolt is hurl’d, 
They close, clench’d hard like tighten- 
ing bands. 


No rosebuds yet by dawn impearl’d 
Match, even in loveliest lands, 
The sweetest flowers in all the world— 
A baby’s hands. 


Ill 


A baby’s eyes, ere speech begin, 
Kre lips learn words or sighs, 
Bless all things bright enough to win 
A baby’s eyes. 


Love, while the sweet thing laughs and 
lies, 
And sleep flows out and in, 
Lies perfect in them Paradise. 


Their glance might cast out pain and sin, 
Their speech make dumb the wise, 
By mute glad godhead felt within 
A baby’s eyes. 1883. 
IN GUERNSEY 
(TO THEODORE WATTS) 


I 


THE heavenly bay, ringed round with 
cliffs and moors, 
Storm-stained ravines, and crags that 
lawns inlay, 
Soothes as with love the rocks whose 
guard secures 
The heavenly bay. 


O friend, shall time take even this away, 

This blessing given of beauty that en- 
dures, 

This glory shown us, not to pass but stay ? 


go2 


BRITISH /POETS 





Though sight be changed for memory, 
love ensures 
What memory, changed by love tosight, 
would say— 
The word that seals for ever mine and 
yours, 
The heavenly bay. 


II 


My mother sea, my fostress, what new 
strand, 
What new delight of waters, may this be, 
The fairest found since time’s first 
breezes fanned 
My mother sea? 


Once more I give me body and soul to 


thee, 

Who hast my soul for ever: cliff and 
sand 

Recede, and heart to heart once more 
are we, 


My heart springs first and plunges, ere 
my hand 
Strike out from shore: 
brings to me, 
More near and dear 
fatherland, 
My mother sea. 


more close it 


than seems my 


III 


Across and along, as the bay’s breadth 
opens, and o’er us 
Wild autumn exults in the wind, swift 
rapture and strong 
Impels us, and broader the wide waves 
brighten before us 
Across and along, 


The whole world’s heart is-uplifted, and 
knows not wrong ; 

The whole world’s life is a chant to the 
sea-tide’s chorus ; 

Are we not as waves of the water, as 
notes of the song? 


Like children unworn of the passions and 
toils that wore us, 

We breast for a season the breadth of the 
seas that throng, 

Rejoicing as they, to “be borne as of old 
they bore us 

Across and along. 1883. 
A SINGING LESSON 


FAR-FETCHED and dear 
proverb rehearses, 


bought, as the 


Is good, or was held so, for ladies; but 
nought 
In a song can be good if the turn of the 


verse is . 
Far-fetched and dear bought. 


As the turn of a wave should it sound, 
and the thought 

Ring smooth, and as light as the spray 
that disperses 

Be the gleam of the words for the garb 
thereof wrought. 


Let the soul init shine through the 
sound as it pierces 
Men’s hearts with possession of music 
unsought ; 
For the bounties of song are no sea 
god’s mercies, 
Far-fetched and dear bought. 1883. 


THE ROUNDEL 


A Roundel is wrought as a ring or a 
starbright sphere, 
With craft of delight and with cunning 
of sound unsought, 
That the heart of the hearer may smile 
if to pleasure his ear 
A roundel is wrought. 


Its jewel of music is carven of all or of 
aught— 

Love, laughter, or mourning—remem- 
brance of rapture or fear— 

That fancy may fashion to hang in the 
ear of thought. 


As a bird’s quick song runs round, and 
the hearts in us hear— 


| Pause answers to pause, and again the 


same strain caught, 
So moves the device whence, round as a 
pearl or tear, 
A roundel is wrought. 
1883. 


A SOLITUDE 


SEA beyond sea, sand after sweep of 

sand, 

ivory smooth, 

ridged with flow 

Of channelled waters soft as rain or 
snow, 

Stretch their lone length at ease beneath 
the bland 

Gray gleam of skies whose smile on 
wave and strand 

Shines weary like a man’s who smiles to 
know 


Here here cloven and 


SWINBURNE 


That now no dream can mock his faith 
with show, 

Nor cloud for him seem living sea or 
land. 

Is there an end at all of all this waste, 

These crumbling cliffs defeatured and 

~ defaced, 

These ruinous heights of sea-sapped 
walls that slide 

Seaward with all their banks of bleak 
blown flowers 

Glad yet of life, ere yet their hope sub- 
side 

Beneath the coil of dull dense waves 
and hours? June, 1884. 


ON A COUNTRY ROAD 


ALONG these low pleached lanes, on such 
a day, 

So soft a day as this, through shade and 
sun, 

With glad grave eyes that scanned the 
glad wild way 

And heart still hovering o'er a song 
begun, 

And smile that warmed the world with 

benison, 

Our father, lord long since of lordly 

rhyme, 

Long since hath haply ridden, when the 
lime 

_Bloomed broad above him, flowering 
where he came. 

Because thy passage once made warm 
this clime, 

Our father Chaucer, here we praise thy 
name. 


Each year that England clothes herself 
with May, 


She takes thy likeness on her. Time 
hath spun 

Fresh raiment all in vain and strange 
array 


For earth and man’s new spirit, fain to 


shun 

Things past for dreams of better to be 
won, 

Through many a century since thy fun- 
eral chime 

Rang, and men deemed it death’s most 
direful crime 

To have spared not thee for very love or 
shame ; 

And yet, while mists round last year’s 
memories climb, 

Our father Chaucer, here we praise thy 
name, ° 


ORS 


Each turn of the old wild road whereon 
we stray, 

Meseems, might bring us face to face 
with one 

Whom seeing we could not but give 
thanks, and pray 

For England’s love our father and her 


son 

To speak with us as once in days long 
done 

With all men, sage and churl and monk 
and mime, 

Who knew not as we know the soul sub- 
lime 


That sang for song’s love more than 
lust of fame. 

Yet, though this be not, yet, in happy 
time, 

Our father Chaucer, here we praise thy 
name. 


Friend, even as bees about the flower- 
ing thyme, 

Years crowd on years, till hoar decay 
begrime 

Names once beloved; but seeing the 
sun the same, 

As birds of autumn fain to praise the 


prime, 
Our father Chaucer, here we praise thy 
name. June, 1884. 


THE SEABOARD 


THE sea is at ebb, and the sound of her 
utmost word 

Is soft as the least wave’s lapse in a still 
small reach. 

From bay unto bay, on quest of a goal 
deferred, 

From headland ever to headland and 
breach to breach 

Where earth gives ear to the message 
that all days preach 

With changes of gladness and sadness 
that cheer and chide, 

The lone way lures me along by achance 
untried 

That haply, if hope dissolve not and 
faith be whole, 

Not all for nought shall I seek, with a 
dream for guide, 

The goal that is not, and ever again the 
goal. 


The trackless ways are untravelled of 
sail or bird ; 

The hoar wave hardly recedes from the 
soundless beach. 


904 


BRITISH POETS 





The silence of instant noon goes nigh to 
be heard, 

The viewless void to be visible: all and 
each, 

A closure of calm no clamor of storm 
can breach 

Concludes and confines and absorbs them 
on either side, 

All forces of light and of life and the 
live world’s pride. 

Sands hardly ruffled of ripples that 
hardly roll 

Seem ever to show as in reach of a swift 
brief stride [goal. 

The goal that is not, and ever again the 


The waves are a joy to the seamew, the 
meads to the herd, 

And a joy to the heart is a goal that it 
may not reach. 

No sense that for ever the limits of sense 
engird, 

No hearing or sight that is vassal to 
form or speech, 

Learns ever the secret that shadow and 
silence teach, 

Hears ever the notes that or ever they 
swell subside, 

Sees ever the light that lights not the 
loud world’s tide, 

Clasps ever the cause of the lifelong 
scheme’s control 

Wherethrough we pursue, till the waters 
of life be dried, [goal. 

The goal that is not, and ever again the 


Friend, what have we sought or seek we, 
whate’er betide, 

Though the seaboard shift its mark from 
afar descried, 

But aims whence ever anew shall arise 
the soul? 

Love, thought, song, life, but show for 
a glimpse and hide 

The goal that is not, and ever again the 
goal. 1884. 


THE CLIFFSIDE PATTI 


SEAWARD goes the sun, and homeward 
by the down 

We, before the night upon his grave be 
sealed. 

Low behind us lies the bright steep 
murmuring town, 

High before us heaves the steep rough 
silent field. 
Breach by ghastlier breach, the cliffs 

collapsing yield ; 


Half the path is broken, half the banks 
divide ; 

Flawed and crumbled, riven and rent, 
they cleave and slide 

Toward the ridged and wrinkled waste 
of girdling sand 

Deep beneath, whose furrows tell how 
far and wide 

Wind is lord and change is sovereign of 
the strand. 


Star by star on the unsunned waters 
twiring down, 

Golden spear-points glance against a 
silver shield. 

Over banks and bents, across the head- 
land’s crown, 

As by pulse of gradual plumes through 
twilight wheeled, 

Soft as sleep, the waking wind awakes . 
the weald. 

Moor and copse and fallow, near or far 
descried, 

Feel the mild wings move, and gladden 
where they glide: 

Silence uttering love that all things un- 
derstand, 

Bids the quiet fields forget that hard 
beside 

Wind is lord and change is sovereign of 
the strand. 


Yet may sight, ere all the hoar soft 
shade grow brown, 

Hardly reckon half the rifts and rents 
unhealed 

Where the scarred cliffs downward 
sundering drive and drown, 

Hewn as if with stroke of swords in 
tempest steeled, 

Wielded as the night’s will and the 
wind’s may wield. 

Crowned and zoned in vain with flowers 
of autumn-tide, 

Life and love seek harborage on the land- 
ward side ; 

Wind is lord and change is sovereign of 
the strand. 


Friend, though man be less than these, 
for all his pride, 

Yet, for all his weakness, shall not hope 
abide ? 

Wind and change can wreck but life and 
waste but land : 

Truth and trust are sure, though here 
till all subside 

Wind is lord and change is sovereign of 
the strand. 1884. 


SWINBURNE 


95 





IN THE WATER 


THE sea is awake, and the sound of the 
song of the joy of her waking is rolled 

From afar to the star that recedes, from 
anear to the wastes of the wild wide 
shore. 

Her call is a trumpet compelling us 
homeward: if dawn in her east be 
acold, 

From the sea shall we crave not her 
grace to rekindle the life that it kin- 
dled before, 

Her breath to requicken, her bosom to 
rock us, her kisses to bless as of yore ? 

For the wind, with his wings half open, 
at pause in the sky, neither fettered 
nor free, 

Leans waveward and flutters the ripple 
to laughter: and fain would the twain 
of us be 

Where lightly the wave yearns forward 
from under the curve of the deep 
dawn’s dome, 

And, full of the morning and fired with 
the pride of the glory thereof and the 
glee, 

Strike out from the shore as the heart 
in us bids and beseeches, athirst for 
the foam. 


Life holds not an hour that is better to 
live in: the past is a tale that is told, 
The future a sun-flecked shadow, alive 
and asleep, with a blessing in store. 
As we give us again to the waters, the 
rapture of limbs that the waters en- 

fold 

Is less than the rapture of spirit whereby, 
though the burden it quits were sore, 

Our souls and the bodies they wield at 
their will are absorbed in the life they 
adore— 

In the life that endures no burden, and 
bows not the forehead, and bends not 
the knee— 

In the life everlasting of earth and of 
heaven, in the laws that atone and 
agree, 

In the measureless music of things, in the 
fervor of forces that rest or that roam, 

That cross and return and reissue, as I 
after you and as you after me 

Strike out from the shore as the heart in 
us bids and beseeches, athirst for the 
foam. 


For, albeit he were less than the least of 
them, haply the heart of a man may 
be bold 


To rejoice in the word of the sea, asa 
mother’s that saith to the son she bore, 

‘* Child, was not the life in thee mine, 
and my spirit the breath in thy lips 
from of old? 

Have I let not thy weakness exult in my 
strength, and thy foolishness learn of 
my lore? 

Have I helped not or healed not thine 
anguish, or made not the might of thy 
gladness more ? ” 

And surely his heart should answer, ‘‘ The 
light of the love of my life is in thee.” 

She is fairer than earth, and the sun is not 
fairer, the wind is not blither than she: 

From my youth hath she shown me the 
joy of her bays that I crossed, of her 
cliffs that I clomb, 

Till now that the twain of us here, in 
desire of the dawn and in trust of the 
sea, 

Strike out from the shore as the heart in 
us bids and beseeches, athirst for the 
foam. 


Friend, earth is a harbor of refuge for 
winter, a covert whereunder to flee 
When day is the vassal of night, and the 
strength of the hosts of her mightier 
than he ; 

But here is the presence adored of me, 
here my desire is at rest and at home. 

There are cliffs to be climbed upon land, 
there are ways to be trodden and rid- 
den: but we 

Strike out from the shore as the heart 
in us bids and beseeches, athirst for 
the foam. 1884. 


THE SUNBOWS 


SPRAY of song that springsin April, light 
of love that laughs through May, 

Live and die and live for ever: nought 
of all things far less fair 

Keeps a surer life than these that seem 
to pass like fire away. 

In the souls they live which are but all 
the brighter that they were ; 

In the hearts that kindle, thinking what 
delight of old was there. 

Wind that shapes and lifts and shifts 
them bids perpetual memory play 

Over dreams and in and out of deeds 
and thoughts which seem to wear 

Light that leaps and runs and revels 
through the springing flames of spray. 


Dawn is wild upon the waters where we 
drink of dawn to-day : 


906 


Wide, from wave to wave rekindling in 
rebound through radiant air, 

Flash the fires unwoven and woven again 
of wind that works in play, 

Working wonders more than heart may 
note or sight may wellnigh dare, 

Wefts of rarer light than colors rain 
from heaven, though this be rare. 

Arch on arch unbuilt in building, reared 
and ruined ray by ray, 

Breaks and brightens, laughs and les- 
sens, even till eyes may hardly bear 
Light that leaps and runs and revels 

through the springing flames of*spray. 


Year on year sheds light and music 
rolled and fiashed from bay to bay 

Round the summer capes of time and 
winter headlands keen and bare 

Whence the soul keeps watch, and bids 
her vassal memory watch and pray, 

If perchance the dawn may quicken, or 
perchance the midnight spare. 

Silence quells not music, darkness takes 
not sunlightin her snare ; 

Shall not joys endure that perish ? Yea, 
saith dawn, though night say nay: 

Life on life goes out, but very life en- 
kindles everywhere 

Light that leaps and runs and revels 
through the springing flames of spray. 


Friend, were life no more than this is, 
well would yet the living fare. 

All aflower and all afire and all flung 
heavenward, who shall say 

Such a flash of life were worthless ? This 
is worth a world of care— 

Light that leaps and runs and revels 
through the springing flames of spray. 

1884, 


ON THE VERGE 


HERE begins the sea that ends not till 
the world’s end. Where westand, 

Could we know the next high sea-mark 
set beyond these waves that gleam, 

We should know what never man hath 
known, nor eyeof man hath scanned. 

Nought beyond these coiling clouds that 
melt like fume of shrines that steam 

Breaks or stays the strength of waters 
till they pass our bounds of dream. 

Where the waste Land’s End leans west- 
ward, all the seas it watches roll 

Find their border fixed beyond them, 
and a worldwide shore’s control : 

These whereby we stand, no shore be- 
yond us limits: these are free. 


BRITISH POETS 


Gazing hence, we see the water that 
grows iron round the Pole, 

From the shore that hath no shore be- 
yond it set in all the sea. 


Sail on sail along the sea-line fades and 
flashes: here on land 

Flash and fade the wheeling wings on 
wings of mews that plunge and scream. 


_Hour on hour along the line of life and 


time’s evasive strand 

Shines and darkens, wanes and waxes, 
slays and dies: andscarce they seem 

More than motes that thronged and 
trembled in the brief noon’s breath 
and beam. 

Some with crying and wailing, some 
with notes like sound of bells that toll, 

Some with sighing and laughing, some 
with words that blessed and made us 
whole, 

Passed, and left us, and we know not 
what they were, nor what were we. 

Would we know, being mortal? Never 
breath of answering whisper stole 

From the shore that hath no shore be- 
yond it set in all the sea. 


Shadows, would we question darkness ? 
Ere our eyes and brows be fanned 

Round with airs of twilight, washed 
with dews fromsleep’s eternal stream, 

Would we know sleep’s guarded secret ? 
Ere the fire consume the brand, 

Would it know if yet its ashes may re- 
quicken ? yet we deem 

Surely man may know, or ever night 
unyoke her starry team, 

What the dawn shall be, or if the dawn 
shall be not : yea, the scroll 

Would we read of sleep’s dark scripture, 
pledge of peace or doom of dole. 

Ah, but here man’s heart leaps, yearning 
toward the gloom with venturous glee, 

Though his pilot eye behold nor bay nor 
harbor, rock nor shoal, 

From the shore that hath no shore be- 
yond it set in all the sea. 


Friend, who knows if death indeed have 
life or life have death for goal? 

Day nor night can tell us, nor may seas 
declare nor skies unroll 

What has been from everlasting, or if 
aught shall alway be. 

Silence answering only strikes response 
reverberate on the soul 

From the shore that hath 
beyond it set in all the sea. 


no shore 
1884. 


SWINBURNE 


ON THE MONUMENT ERECTED 
TO MAZZINI AT GENOA 


ITaLia, mother of the souls of men, 
Mother divine 
Of allthat serv’d thee best with sword 
or pen, 
All sons of thine, 


Thou knowest that here the likeness of 
the best 
Before thee stands : 
The head most high, the heart found 
' faithfulest, 
The purest hands. 


Above the fume and foam of time that 
flits, 
The soul, we know, | 
Now sits on high where Alighieri sits 
With Angelo. 


Nor his own heavenly tongue hath heay- 
enly speech 
Enough to say 
What this man was, whose praise no 
thought may reach, 
No words can weigh. 


Since man’s first mother brought to 
mortal birth ° 
Her first-born son, 
Such grace befell not ever man on earth 
As crowns this One. 


Of God nor man was ever this ee 
said : 
That he could give 
Life back to her who gave him, that his 
dead 
Mother might live. 


But this man found his mother dead and 
slain, 
With fast-seal’d eyes, 
And bade the dead rise up and live again, 
And she did rise: 


And all the world was bright with her 
through him : 
But dark with strife, 
Like heaven’s own sun that storming 
clouds bedim, 
Was all his life. 
Life and the clouds are vanish’d; hate 
and fear 
Have had their span 
Of time te hurt and are not: He is here, 
The sunlike man. 


97 


City superb, that hadst Columbus first 
For sovereign son, 
Be prouder that thy breast hath later 
nursed 
This mightier One. 


Glory be his for ever, while his land 
Lives and is free, 
Aswith controlling breath and _ sove- 
reign hand 
He bade her be. 


Earth shows to heaven the names by 
thousands told 
That crown her fame, 
But highest of all that heaven and earth 
behold, 
Mazzini’s name. 


1884. 
THE INTERPRETERS 


I 


DAYS dawn on us that make amends for 
many 
Sometimes, 
When heaven and earth seem sweeter 
even than any 
Man’s rhymes. 


Light had not all been quenched in 
France, or quelled 
In Greece, 
Had Homer sung not, or had Hugo held 
His peace. 


Had Sappho’s self not left her word thus 
long 
For token, 
The sea round Lesbos. yet in waves of 
song 
Had spoken. 


II 


And yet these days of subtler air and 
finer 
Delight, 
When lovelier looks the darkness, and 
diviner 
The light— 


The gift they give of all these golden 
hours, 
Whose urn 
Pours forth reverberate rays or shadow- 
ing showers 
In turn— 


Clouds, beams, and winds that make the 
live day’s track 
Seem living—— 


gos 


BRITISH POETS 





What were they did no spirit give them 
back 
Thanksgiving? 


III 


Dead air, dead fire, dead shapes and 
shadows, telling 
Time nought ; 
Mai gives them sense and soul by song, 
and dwelling 
In thought. 


In human thought their being endures, 
their power 
Abides : 
Else were their life a thing that each 
light hour 
Derides. 


The years live, work, sigh, smile, and 
die, with all 
They cherish ; 
The soul endures, though dreams that 
fed it fall 
And perish. 


IV 


In human thought have all things habi- 
tation ; 
Our days 
Laugh, lower, and lighten past, and find 
no station 
That stays. 


But thought and faith are mightier 
things than time 
Can wrong, 
Made splendid once with speech, or made 
sublime 
By song. 


Remembrance, though the tide of change 
that rolls 
Wax hoary, 
Gives earth and heaven, for song’s sake 
and the soul’s, 
Their glory. 1885. 
A WORD WITH THE WIND 


Lorp of days and nights that hear thy 
word of wintry warning, 
Wind whose feet are set on ways that 
none may tread, 


Change the nest wherein thy wings are 


fledged for flight by morning, 
Change the harbor whence at dawn 
thy sails are spread. 





Not the dawn, ere yet the imprisoning 
night has half released her, 
More desires the sun’s full face of 
cheer, than we, 
Well as yet we love the strength of the 
iron-tongued north-easter, 
Yearn for wind to meet usas we front 
the sea. 
All thy ways are good, O wind, and all 
the world should fester, 
Were thy fourfold godhead quenched, 
or stilled thy strife: 
Yet the waves and we desire too long 
the deep south-wester, 
Whence the waters quicken shore- 
ward, clothed with life. 
Yet the field not made for ploughing 
save of keels nor harrowing 
Save of storm-winds lies unbrightened 
by thy breath : 
Banded broad with ruddy samphire 
glow the sea-banks narrowing 
Westward, while the sea gleams chill 
and still as death. 
Sharp and strange from inland sounds © 
thy bitter note of battle, 
Blown between grim skies and waters 
sullen-souled, 
Till the baffled seas bear back, rocks 
roar and shingles rattle, 
Vexed and angered and anhungered 
and acold. 
Change thy note, and give the waves 
their will, and all the measure, 
Full and perfect, of the music of their 
might, 
Let it fill the bays with 
notes of pleasure, 
Shake the shores with passion, sound 
at once and smite. 
Sweet are even the mild low notes of 
wind and sea, but sweeter 
Sounds the song whose choral wrath 
of raging rhyme 
Bids the shelving shoals keep tune with 
storm’s imperious metre, 
Bids the rocks and reefs respond in 
rapturous chime. 
Sweet the lisp and lulling whisper and 
luxurious laughter, [the sun 
Soft as love or sleep, of waves whereon 
Dreams, and dreams not of the darkling 
hours before nor after, 
Winged with cloud whose wrath shall 
bid love’s day be done. 
Yet shall darkness bring the awakening 
sea a lordlier lover. 
Clothed with strength more amorous 
and more strenuous will, 


thunderous 


SWINBURNE 


Whence her heart of hearts shall kindle 
and her soul recover 
Sense of love too keen to lie for love's 
sake still. 
Let thy strong south-western music 
sound, and bid the billows 
Brighten, proud and glad to feel thy 
scourge and kiss 
Sting and soothe and sway them, bowed 
as aspens bend or willows, 
Yet resurgent still in breathless rage 
of bliss. . 
All to-day the slow sleek ripples hardly 
bear up shore-ward, 
Charged with sighs more light than 
laughter, faint and fair, 
Like a woodland lake’s weak wavelets 
lightly lingering forward, [air. 
Soft and listless as the slumber-stricken 
Be the sunshine bared or veiled, the sky 
superb or shrouded, 
Still the waters, lax and languid, 
chafed and foiled, 
Keen and thwarted, pale and patient, 
clothed with fire or clouded, 
Vex their heart in vain, or sleep like 
serpents coiled. 
Thee they look for, blind and _ baffled, 
wan with wrath and weary, 
Blown for ever back by winds that 
rock the bird: 
Winds that seamews breast subdue the 
sea, and bid the dreary 
Waves be weak as hearts made sick 
with hope deferred. . 
Let thy clarion sound from westward, 
let the south bear token 
How the glories of thy godhead sound 
and shine: 
Bid the land rejoice to see the land- 
wind’s broad wings broken, 
Bid the sea take comfort, bid the 
world be thine. 
Half the world abhors thee beating back 
the sea, and blackening 
Heaven with fierce and woful change 
of fluctuant form: 
All the world acclaims thee shifting sail 
again, and slackening 
Cloud by cloud the close-reefed cordage 
of the storm. 
Sweeter fields and brighter woods and 
lordlier hills than waken 
Here at sunrise never hailed the sun 
and thee: 
Turn thee then, and give them comfort, 
shed like rain and shaken 
Far as foam that laughs and leaps 
along the sea. : 


909 





IN TIME OF MOURNING 


‘* RETURN,” we dare not as we fain 
Would cry from hearts that yearn : 

Love dares not bid our dead again 
Return. 


O hearts that strain and burn 
As fires fast fettered burn and strain ! 
Bow down, lie still, and learn. 


The heart that healed all hearts of pain 
No funeral rites inurn : 

Its echoes, while the stars remain, 
Return. May, 1885. 1889. 


A SEQUENCE OF SONNETS ON THE 
DEATH OF ROBERT BROWNING 


THE clearest eyes in all the world they 
read 

With sense more keen and spirit of sight 
more true - 

Than burns and thrills in sunrise, when 
the dew 

Flames, and absorbs the glory round it 
shed, 


‘As they the ight of ages quick and dead, 


Closed now, forsake us: yet the shaft 
that slew 

Can slay not one of all the works we 
knew, 

Nor death discrown that many-laurelled 
head. 

The works of words whose life seems 
lightning wrought, 

And moulded of unconquerable thought, 

And quickened with imperishable flame, 

Stand fast and shine and smile, assured 
that nought 

May fade of all their myriad-moulded 
fame, 

Nor England’s memory clasp not Brown- 
ing’s name. 


Death, what hast thou to do with one 
for whom 

Time is not lord, but servant? 
least part 

Of all the fire that fed his living heart, 

Of all the hght more keen than sun- 
dawn’s bloom 

That lit and led his spirit, strong as doom 

And bright as hope, can aught thy 
breath may dart 

Quench? Nay, thou knowest he knew 
thee what thou art, 

A shadow born of terror’s barren womb, 


What 


gio 


That brings not forth save shadows, 
What art thou, 

To dream, albeit thou breathe upon his 
brow, 

That power on him is given thee,—that 
thy breath 

Can make him less than love acclaims 
him now, 

And hears all time sound back the word 
it saith ? 

What part hast thou then in his glory, 
Death ? 


But he—to him, who knows what gift is 
thine, 

Death? Hardly may we think or hope 
when we 

Pass likewise thither where to-night is 
he, 

Beyond the irremeable outer seas that 
shine 

And darken round such dreams as half 
divine 

Some sunlit harbor in that starless sea 

Where gleams no ship to windward or 
to lee, 

To read with him the secret of thy shrine. 

There too, as here, may song, delight, 
and love, 

The nightingale, the sea-bird, and the 
dove, 

Fulfil with joy the splendor of the sky 

Till all beneath wax bright as all above : 

But none of all that search the heavens, 
and try 

The sun, may match the sovereign 
eagle’s eye. 


Among the wondrous ways of men and 
time 

He went as one that ever found and 
sought 

And bore in hand the lamplike spirit 
of thought 

To illume with instance of its fire sub- 
lime 

The dusk of many acloudlike age and 
clime. 

No spirit in shape of light and darkness 
wrought, 

No faith, no fear, no dream, no rapture, 
nought 

That blooms in wisdom, 
burns in crime, 

No virtue girt and armed and helmed 
with light, 

No love more lovely than the snows are 
white, 


nought that 


BRITISH “POETS 


No serpent sleeping in some dead soul’s 
tomb, 

No song-bird singing from some live 
soul’s height, 

But he might hear, interpret, or illume 

With sense invasive as the dawn of 
doom. 


What secret thing of splendor or of 
shade 

Surmised in all those wandering ways 
wherein 

Man, led of love and life and death and 
sin, 

Strays, climbs, or cowers, allured, ab- 
sorbed, afraid, 

Might not the strong and sunlike sense 
invade 

Of that full soul that had for aim to win 

Light, silent over time’s dark toil and 
din, 

Life, at whose touch death fades as dead 
things fade? 

O spirit of man, what mystery moves in 


thee 

That he might know not of in spirit, and 
see 

The heart within the heart that seems 
to strive, 


The life within the life that seems to be, 

And hear through all thy storms that 
whirl and drive, 

The living sound of all men’s souls alive ? 

He held no dream worth waking: so he 
said, 

He who stands now on death’ s tri- 
umphal steep, 

Awakened out of life wherein we sleep 

And dream of what he knows and sees, 
being dead. 

But never death for him was dark or 


dread : 

‘*Took forth” he bade the soul, and 
fear not. Weep, 

All ye that trust not in his truth, and 
keep 


Vain memory’s vision of a vanished head 

As all that lives of all that once was he 

Save that which lightens from his word : 
but we, 

Who, seeing the sunset-colored waters 
roll, 

Yet know the sun subdued not of the 
sea, 

Nor weep nor doubt that still the spirit 
is whole, 

And life and death but shadows of the 
soul, January, 1890. 


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LIST*OP ABB REVIRE IGE 


AND 


INDEX OF POETS 





PAGE 
ARNOLD (1822-1888) 2.0.0 cease cess > sm lep oo bse feng een 706 
BYRON (1788-1824) 2.4.0.6 sce) ons ale wen ele wuts eee 0 Oh nena 167 
COLERIDGE: (1772-1884) ©... .. w. access ele coe 2.0 010d eee 64 
CLOUGH: (1819-186P) ,0.°9. 20.073. 1.8. ee Be oo, wc cee 687 
ELIZABETH BARRETT BROWNING (1806-1861)...............2.55 seein 554 
Keats (1795-182) Pewee eaten oe ae aT atv c a glk ae eal wel whe a ele, 370 
LGANDOR (1770=16604) . eae. ate S sper Blog aetna oe eae poi ae 424 
MORRIS» (1834-1896) TRE fae eee See 823 
ROSSETTT (1828-1882)... a ceieccc ok <s< wie moje <a saaee toes es oa Weare 
ROBERT: BROWNING: “CISE2-1880) 20 3720 « seed hele sigan 565 
SOOTD, (1771-1832 ) oon eee es feet icine obese cent ee ae 104 
SHELLEY (1792-1822)... wba de bbb be auequelawcleee cue ws 4006 a ee 27 
SWINBURNE (1837 ie eine teen ns Wee Jaf ene 0 e%e.0e 5 5 2 es 865 
TENNYSON (1809-1893). Ss. eee ee Cie cnn ina cds 20s oat ee 459 
WORDSWORTH, (17°70=1850) 2.4 iy. i) Waters © sha ies lersiss sia ote eae apn sia lakoe ee 1 


gi2 


ION Witwer S 


Ablett, To Joseph, L 488 

Abt Vogler, RB 657 

Acon and Rhodope, L 450 

Adam, Lilith and Eve, RB 680 

Adonais, Sh 358 

Aeschylos and Sophocles, L 454 

_ Affliction of Margaret, The, W 43 

After dark vapors have oppressed our 
plains, K 380 

After-thought, W 57 

Agamemnon and Iphigeneia, L 445 

Agamemnon and Iphigeneia, The shades of, 

33 


4 

Age, To, L 455 

Aged aoe who loved to doze away, An, L 
45 

Agilae, Little, L 437 

Agnes and the hili-man, M 862 

Ah! yet consider it again, Cl 700 

Ailsa Rock, To, K 389 

A king lived long ago (Pippa passes), RB 586 

Alas, how soon the hours are over, L 443 

Alastor, Sh 27 

Allen-a-dale, Se 161 

Allis well, Cl 705 

All service ranks the same with God (Pippa 
passes), RB 572 

Alteram partem, Cl 694 

America, To Walt Whitman in, Sw 886 

Among the rocks (James Lee’s wife), RB 657 

Amours de voyage, From, Cl 691 

Amphibian (Fifine at the fair) RB 671 

Ancient mariner, Rime of the, C 73 

Andrea del Sarto, RB 650 

And thou art dead, as yeung and fair, B 171 

Another way of love, RB 629 

Any wife to any husband, RB 626 

Apology, An (Earthly paradise), M 842 

Appeal, An, Sw 881 

Appearances, RB 674 

April, 1814. Stanzas, Sh 275 

Arethusa, Sh 346 

Artemidora, The death of, L 436 

Arthur, Passing of, T 481 

Ask me no more, T 498 

Ask not one least word of praise (Ferish- 
tah’s fancies), RB 682 

Asolando, Epilogue to, RB 686 


Aspecta medusa, R 786 

As through the land at eve we went, T 498 
Atalanta in Calydon, choruses from, Sw 866 
Atalanta’s race, M 8438 

At the sunrise in 1848, R 778 

At the grave of Burns, W 36 

A toccata of Galuppi’s, RB 621 

August (Earthly paradise), M 855 

Augusta, Epistle to, B 210 

Augusta, Stanzas to, B 209 

Austerity of poetry, Ar 761 

Autumnal evening, Lines on an, C 66 
Autumn song, R 77 

Autumn, To, K 409 

Ave atque vale, Frater, T 550 
Ave Maria (Don Juan), B 251 
Aylmer, Rose, L 428 


Bacchanalia ; or, the new age, Ar 764 

Balder dead (III), Ar 745 

Ballad of burdens, A, Sw 875 

Ballad of dreamland, Sw 890 — . 

Ballad of Frangois Villon, Sw 891 

Ballad of the dark ladie, The, C 92 

Bards of passion and of mirth, K 406 

Barren spring, R 805 

Battle of Waterloo, B 192 

Beauty’s pageant, R 805 

Before the beginning of years (Atalanta in 
Calydon), Sw 867 

Belle dame sans merci, La, K 422 

Bethesda (A sequel), Cl 691 

Better part, The, Ar 762 

Between the sunset and the sea (Chas- 
telard), Sw 872 

Birds in the high hall garden (Maud), T 
519 

Birth-bond, The, R 796 

Bishop orders his tomb 
church, The, RB 609 

Blake, William, R 811 

Blank misgivings, Cl 688 

Blessed damozel, The, R 774 

Blot in the scutcheon, Song from, RB 602 

Blow, trumpet, for the world is white with 
May (Coming of Arthur), T 540 

Blue closet, The, M 835 

Boccaccio, The garden of, C 102 


in St. Praxed’s 


58 913 


914 


Body’s beauty, R 805 

Bonny Dundee, Se 165 

Boot and saddle, RB 593 

Border ballad, Sc 165 

Break, break, break, T 417 

Bridal birth, R 793 

Bride of Abydos, The, B 172 

Bright star ! would I were steadfast as 
thou art, K 423 

Brignall Banks, Sc 161 

Brook, The, T 518 

Browning, Sonnets on the death of Robert, 
Sw 909 

Browning, to Robert, L 443 

Buonaparte, I grieved for, W 30 

Buonaparte, Ode to Napoleon, B 184 

Burden of Nineveh, The, R 683 

Burdens, Ballad of, Sw 875. 

Burghers’ battle, The, M 862 

Buried life, The, Ar 723 

Burns, At the grave of, W 36 

Burns, On, R 811 

‘By the sea-side, Composed, W 31 


Cadyow Castle, Sc 108 
Calais, Composed by the sea-side near, W 
31 


Callicles’ song, Ar 719 

Card-dealer, The, R 777 

Carlyle and George Eliot, On the deaths 
of, Sw 899 

Castled crag of Drachenfels, The, B 196 

Cauteretz, In the valley of, T 539 

Cavalier song, Sc 163 

Cavalier tunes, RB 592 

Celandine, Tothe small (two poems), W 27 

Chamouni, In the vale of, C 96 

Chapel in Lyoness, M 826 

Chapman’s ‘Homer, On first looking into, 
K 373 

Character of the happy warrior, W 47 

Charge of the Heavy Brigade, Epilogue to 
the, T 550 

Charge of the Light Brigade, The, T 518 

Chastelard, Songs from, Sw 871 

Chatterton, Thomas, R 811 

Chaucer, Invocation to (Life and death of 
Jason), M 842 

Chaucer (On a country road), Sw 903 

Child and Poet, Sw 900 

Child of a day, thou knowest not, L 430 

Childe Harold, Canto III, B 189 

Childe Harold, Canto IV, B 234 [641 

Childe Roland to the dark tower came, RB 

Child’s future, A, Sw 901. 

Children, Sw 900 

Child’s laughter, A, Sw 900 

Child’s song, Sw 892 

Chillon, The prisoner of, B 206 

Chillon, Sonnet on, B 206 

Chimes, R 809 

Choice, The, R 803 

Choric song (Lotos-eaters), T 472 

Choruses from Atalanta, Sw 866 

Choruses from Hellas, Sh 366, 367 

Christabel, C 81 


BRITISH POETS 


Chrysolites and rubies Bacchus _ brings, 
The, L 455 

Circassian love-chant (Lewti), C 68 

Claribel, T 461 

Clarion, Se 163 

Cleone to Aspasia, L 437 

Cliffside path, The, Sw 904 

Cliffs, On the, Sw 892 

Cloud, The, Sh 343 

Cloud confines, The, R 808 

Coleridge, 8S. T., R 812 

Coleridge, To, Sh 275 

Coliseum, The (Manfred), B 231 

Coliseum, The (Childe Harold), B 237 

rears ae come back (Songs in absence), 

7 
ene HOT: come home (Songs in absence), 
( 

Come into the garden, Maud (Maud), T 521 

Come not when I am dead, T 514 

Come poet, come, Cl 704 

Coming of Arthur, Songs from the, T 540 

Coming of Dian, The (Endymion), K 383 

Composed a few miles above Tintern Abbey, 
Lines, W 9 

Composed by the sea-side, near Calais, W 31 

Composed upon an evening of extraor- 
dinary splendor, W 55 

Composed upon Westminster Bridge, Sept. 
3, 1802, W 31 

Confessions, RB 666 

Consider it again, Cl 700 

Cor cordium, Sw 888 

Corinna to Tanagra, from Athens, L 436 

Coronach, Sc 160 

County Guy, Se 165 

Cristina, RB 594 

Crossing the bar, T 553 

Cuckoo, To the, W 42 

Cupid and Psyche, Song from the story 
of, M 854 

Currente calamo (Mari magno) Cl 703 

Cyclamen, Toa, L 442 


Daffodils, W 43 

Daisy, To the (Three poems), W 34, 35 

Dark glass, The, R 798 

Dark ladie, Ballad of the, C 92 

Darkness, B 212 

Dark wood, The, M 857 

Day is coming, The, M 860 

Day of days, The, M 861 

Day of love, The (Love is enough) : M 858 

Day returns, my natal day, The, L 448 

Days that were, The, (House of the Wolf- 
ings) M 861 

Death-in-love, R 799 

Death of Artemidora, The, L 436 

Death of James Hogg, Extempore effusion - 
upon the, W 61 

Death of Meleager (Atalanta in Calydon), 
Sw 869 

Death of Southey, On the, L 456 

Death, On Southey’s, L 457 

Death of the Duke of Wellington, Ode on . 
the, T 514 


INDEX OF TITLES 


Deaths of Thomas Carlyle and George 
Eliot, On the, Sw 899 

Death, Sonnets on the thought of, Cl 705 

Death stands above me, L 456 

Dedication (Don Juan), B 240 

Dedication (Poems and ballads, first series), 
Sw 879 

Dedication (Ring and the Book) RB 668 

Dedication, A, T 539 

Dedication of the Revolt of Islam, (To 
Mary —-) Sh 291 

Defence of Guenevere, The, M 828 

Defence of Lucknow, The, T 546 

De gustibus, RB 626 

Dejection, an ode, C 94 

Peon, Stanzas written in, near Naples, 

296 


Destruction of Sennacherib, The, B 187 
Development, RB 684 

Dian, The coming of (Endymion), K 383 
Dian, The feast of (Endymion), K 387 
Dipsychus, From, Cl 694 

Dirce, L 4387 

Dirge, A, Sh 369 

Donald Dhu, Pibroch of, Se 163 

Don Juan, B 240 

Dora, T 484 

Dover beach, Ar 763 

Do you remember me? or are you proyd? 


L 441 
Drachenfels, The castled crag of, B 196 
Dramatis persone, Epilogue to, RB 668 
Dreamland, Ballad of, Sw 890 
Dream of fair women, A, T 474 
Duchess, My last, RB 595 
aan of Wellington, Ode on the death of, 
514 
Duty, Ode to, W 44 


Eagle, The, T 514 

Earthly Paradise, From the, M 842 

Earth’s immortalities, RB 605 

East and west, Ar 762 

Easter day, Naples, 1849, Cl 696 

Easter day, II, Cl 697 

East London, Ar 761 

Echetlos, RB 679 

Echo song (Prometheus unbound), Sh 314 

Effusion upon the death of James Hogg, 
Extempore, W 61 

Elaine’s song (Lancelot and Elaine), T 525 

Elegiac stanzas, W 45 

Elgin marbles, On seeing the, K 380 

Empedocles, Lyric stanzas of, Ar 715 

Endymion, From, K 381 

England, An appeal to, Sw 881 

England and America in 1782, T 542 

England in 1819, Sonnet, Sh 297 

Enid’s song (Marriage of Geraint), T 524 

En route (Amours de voyage), Cl 691 

Envoi (Amours de voyage), Cl 693 

Envoi (Earthly paradise), M 856 i 

Epilogue to Asolando, RB 686 

Epilogue to the charge of the Heavy Brig- 
ade, T 550 

Epilogue to Dramatic Idyls, RB 680 


58 


oe 


Kpilogue to Dramatis Personz, RB 668 

Epilogue (Fifine at the fair), RB 671 

Epilogue to the Pacchiarotto volume, RB 
674 


Epilogue (Two poets of Croisic), RB 678 

Epipsychidion, Sh 348 

Epistle to Augusta, B 210 

Epitaph at Fiesole, For an, L 432 

Equal troth, R 798 

Error and loss, M 857 

Etude réaliste, Sw 901 

Euganean Hills, Lines written among the, 
293 


Evelyn Hope, RB 618 

Evening ode, W 55 

Eve of Crecy, The, M 834 

Eve of St. Agnes, The, K 398 

Eve of St. John, The, Sc 108 

Eve of St. Mark, The, K 404 

Expostulation and reply, W 8 

Extempore effusion upon the death of 
James Hogg, W 

Extinction of the ay auetiat republic, On 
the, W 31 


Face, A, RB 667 

Faded violet, On a, Sh 293 

Fame (Earth’s immortalities), RB 605 
Fame, On, K 423 

Fancy, K 390 


‘ Fare-thee-well, B 188 


Farewell, A, T 494 

Farewell to Italy, L 440 

Farewell to the glen, R 806 

Far, far away, T 553 

Fate (Atalanta in Calydon), Sw 869 

Fears and scruples, RB 673 

Feast of Dian, K 387 

Ferishtah’s fancies, Songs from, RB 681 
Fiesolan idyl, L 481 

Fiesole, For an epitaph at, L 482 

Fifine at the fair, RB 671 

Final chorus (Atalanta in Calydon), Sw 871 
Final chorus (Hellas), Sh 367 

Final chorus (Love is enough), M 859 

Fire is in the flint (Ferishtah’ s fancies), RB 


First love remembered, R 787 
Firwood, A young, R 779 

Five English poets, R 811 

Flower, The, T 539 

Flower in the crannied wall, T 541 
For an epitaph at Fiesole, L 482 
For a Venetian pastoral, R 779 
Forsaken garden, The, Sw 889 
Forsaken merman, The, Ar 708 
Fountain, The, W 17 

Fra Lippo Lippi, RB 644 

France, an ode, C 88 

Francois Villon, Ballad of, Sw 891 
Frater ave atque vale, T 550 
French revolution, WwW 46 

From Amours de voyage, Cl 691 
From Dipsychus, Cl 694 

From Endymion, K 381 

From Mater triumphalis, Sw 887 


916 


BRITISH POETS 





From Switzerland, Ar 756 

From the Coming of Arthur, T 540 

From the Earthly Paradise, M 842 

From the Life and Death of Jason, M 8389 
From the Ring and the Book, RB 668 
Frost at midnight, C 90 

Future, The, Ar 724 


Galahad, Sir, T 498 

Garden by the sea, A (Nymph’s song to 
Hylas), M 839 

Garden of Boccaccio, The, C 102 

Garden of Proserpine, The, Sw 877 

Gebir, L 425 

Genius in beauty, R 796 

ane corel To a (William Wordsworth), 

> 99 

George Eliot and Thomas Carlyle, On the 
deaths of, Sw 899 

Gilliflower of gold, The, M 8382 

Give a rouse, RB 593 

Give her but the least excuse to love me 
(Pippa passes), RB 582 

Give me the eyes that look on mine, L 442 

Gleam, Merlin and the, T 551 

Godiva, T, 492 

Gold-hair (Rapunzel), M 827 

Go not, happy day, (Maud), T 520 

Grammarian’s Funeral, A, RB 635 

Grande Chartreuse, Stanzas from the, Ar 
754 

Grasshopper and cricket, On the, K 374 

Grave of Burns, At the, W 36 

Great men have been among us, W 33 

oo spirits now on earth are sojourning, 
C 373 

Grecian urn, Ode on a, K 407 

Green fields of England, Cl 700 

Green linnet, The, W 35 

Growing old, Ar 763 

Guardian angel, The, RB 631 

Guenevere, The defence of, M 828 

Guernsey, In, Sw 901 

Guinevere, T 525 


Haidee (Don Juan), B 244 

Hail to the chief who in triumph advances, 
Se 159 

Hamadryad, The, L 446 

Hands (Rapunzel), M 827 

Hands all round, T 517 [543 

Hapless doom of woman (Queen Mary), T 

Happy warrior, Character of, W 47 

Harp of the north, farewell, Sc 160 

Hartley Coleridge, To, W 33 

Hast thou seen with flash incessant, W 55 

Haydon, To B. R., W 55 

Haystack in the floods, The, M 836 

Heap cassia, sandal buds (Paracelsus), RB 
568 

Health to King Charles, Here’s a, Sc 166 

Heart of the night, The, R 802 

Heart’s compass, R 797 

Heart’s hope, R 794 

Heine (from Heine’s grave), Ar 768 

Hellas, Choruses from, Sh 366, 367 





Hellas, Song from, Sh 367 

Hellenics, On the, L 444 

Here pause, the poet claims at least this 
praise, W 51 

Here’s a health to King Charles, Sc 166 

Her gifts, R 798 

Her heaven (True woman), R 801 

Her love (True woman), R 801 

Herself (True woman), R 801 

Hertha, Sw 882 

Hervé Riel, RB 669 

Hesperus, Sappho to, L 487 

Hidden love, The, Cl 704 

Hie away, hie away, Sc 162 

Higher Pantheism, The, T 540 

Highland girl, Toa, W 37 

Hill summit, The, R 803 

His own Iphigeneia and Agamemnon, On, L 
440 

Hoarded joy, R 805 

Hogg, Extempore effusion on the death of 
James, W 61 

Homer, On first looking into Chapman’s, K 
373 

Homer, To, K 389 

Home thoughts from abroad, RB 605 

Home thoughts from the sea, RB 605 

Home they brought her warrior dead (The 
Princess), T 498 

Honeysuckle, The, R 788 

Hope and fear, Sw 899 

Hope evermore and believe, Cl 698 

Hounds of Spring, The (Atalantain Caly- 
don), Sw 

House, RB 672 

Householder, The, (Fifine at the Fair), © 
RB 671 

House of Life, R 793 

House of the Wolfings, Motto of, M 861 

How many bards gild the lapses of time, K 
373 

How many voices gaily sing, L 443 

How they brought the good news. from 
Ghent to Aix, RB 603 

Human seasons, The, K 389 

Hunting song, Se 113 

Husbandman, The, R 804 

Hymn before sunrise in the vale of Cha- 
mouni, C 96 

Hymn of Pan, Sh 346 

Hymn to intellectual beauty, Sh 287 

Hymn to Pan (Endymion), K 3882 

Hymn to Proserpine, Sw 872 

Hyperion, K 410 


Ianthe, Lyrics to, L 430, 441 

Ianthe, you are called to cross the sea, L 
431 

Iceland first seen, M 863 

I fear thy kisses, Sh 345 ; 

If this great world of joy and pain, W 61 

If thou indeed derive thy light from heaven, 
W 61 

I grieved for Buonaparte, W 30 

I have led her home (Maud), T 520 

I have seen higher, holier things, Cl 688 


INDEX” OF “FI TEES 


927 





I held her hand, the pledge of bliss, L 431 

I know not whether Tam proud, L 443 

Imitation of Spenser, K 372 

Immortality, Ar 762 

Impromptus, B 270 

In a drear-nighted December, K 389 

In a gondola, RB 596 

In a lecture-room, Cl 688 

In a London square, Cl 705 

Incident of the French camp, RB 594 

Inconstancy, L 450 

Indian serenade, Sh 299 

Indolence, Ode on, K 405 

Influence of natural objects, W 13 

In Guernsey, Sw 901 

In memoriam, T 499 

In memory of the author of Obermann, 
Stanzas, Ar 725 

Inmemory of Walter Savage Landor, Sw 876 

In prison, M 839 

Inside of King’s College chapel, Cambridge, 
W 57 


Insomnia, R 809 

Intellectual beauty, Hymn to, Sh 287 

Interpreters, The, Sw 907 

In the depths, Cl 694 

In the vale of Chamouni, C 96 

In the valley of Cauteretz, T 539 

In the water, Sw 905 

In the white-flowered hawthorn brake, M 855 

In three days, RB 631 

Intimations of immortality, W 39 

In time of mourning, Sw 909 

In time of order, A song, Sw 866 

Introduction to the Earthly Paradise, M 842 

Invasion, The (Gebir), L 425 

Invocation to Chaucer (Life and Death of 
Jason), M 842 

Invocation to the power of love (Endy- 
mion), K 385 

Iphigeneia and Agamemnon, On his own, 
L 440 


Iphigeneia and Agamemnon, L 445 
Iphigeneia, The shades of Agamemnon and, 
L 


433 
Isabella, K 391 
Is it not better atan early hour, L 4438 
Isles of Greece, The (Don Juan), B 249 
Isolation, To Mar guerite, Ar 756 
Italian in England, The, RB 606 
Italy, Farewell to, L 440 
Ite domum saturae, venit Hesperus, Cl 702 
It is a beauteous evening, W 31 
It is not to be thought of, W 33 
I travelled among unknown men, W 15 
I wandered lonely as a cloud, W 48 
I wonder not that youth remains, L 455 


James Hogg, Extempore effusion upon the 
death of, W 61 

James Lee’s wife, RB 657 

Jason, The life and death of, M 8389 

Jock 0’ Hazeldean, Sc 162 

John Bull, B 271 

Joseph Ablett, To, L 488 

June (Earthly Paradise), M 854 


Kate the queen (Pippa passes), RB 582 

Keats, R 812 

Keen fitful gusts are whispering here and 
there, K 373 

Kensington Gardens, Lines written in, Ar 
724 


King Charles, Here’s a health to, Sc 166 
King’s College Chapel, Cambridge, W 57 
King’s Tragedy, The, R 812 

Known in vain, R 802 

Kossuth, To Louis, Sw 8$1 

Kubla Khan, C 72 


La belle dame sans merci, K 422 

Labuntur anni (Don Juan), B 242 

Lachin y Gair, B 170 

Lady of Shalott. The, T 462 

La Fayette, C 69 

Lake Leman, Sonnet to, B 214 

Lamb, To Mary, L 440 

Lament, A, Sh 358 

Lancelot and Elaine, Song from, T 525 

Landmark, The, R 802 

Landor, In memor y of Walter Savage, Sw 
876. 


meen W 51 

La Saisiaz, Prologue, RB 677 

Last duchess, My, RB 595 

Last ride together, The, RB 634 

Last sonnet, Keats’, K 423 

Late, late, so late (Guinevere), T 525 

Lately our songsters loitered in green 
lanes, L 457 

Latest decalogue, The, Cl 694 

Lecture-room, In a, Cl 688 

Leech-gatherer, The, W 28 

Left upon a seat in a yew-tree, Lines, W 4 

Leigh Hunt, Esq., To, K 880 

Leman, Sonnet to Lake, B 214 

Lenore, Se 105 

L’Envoi (Earthly paradise), M 856 

Lewti, C 68 

Life, C 66 

Life, Sc 165 

Life and death of Jason, From the, M 839 

Life in a love, RB 630 

Life is struggle, Cl 705 

Life may change, butit may fly not, Sh 366 

Life of life (Prometheus unbound), Sh 320 

Life of man (Atalanta in Calydon), Sw 867 

Life the beloved, R 807 

Light Brigade, The charge of the, T 518 

Light woman, A, RB 633° 

Lilith, R 805 

Lime-tree bower my prison, This, C 70! 

Lines composed a few miles above Tintern 
Abbey, W 9 

Lines left upon a seat in a yew-tree, W 4 

Lines on an autumnal evening, C 66 

Lines on the Mermaid Tavern, K 390 

Lines, When the lamp is shattered, Sh 369 

eee da among the Euganean Hills, 

293 

Lines written in early spring, W 7 

Lines written in Kensington Gardens, Ar 
724 


918 


Lines written in the album at Elbingerode, 


Lippo Lippi, Fra, RB 644 

Little Aglae, L 437 

Little while, A, R 788 

Lochinvar, Young, Sc 141 

Loch na Garr, B 170 

Locksley Hall, T 488 

London, W 33 

London literature and society (Don Juan), 

253 

London square, Ina, Cl 705 

Lost days, R 806 

Lost Leader, The, RB 603 

Lost on both sides, R 806 

Lotos-eaters, The, T 472 

Louis Kossuth, To, Sw 891 

Love, C91 

Love (Earth’s immortalities) RB 605 

Love among the ruins, RB 618 

Love and Love’s Mates (Atalanta in Caly- 
don) Sw 868 

Love at ebb (Chastelard), Sw 872 

Love at. sea, Sw 878 

Love enthroned, R 793 

Love in a life, RB 630 

Love, Invocation to the power of, (Endy- 
mion), K 385 

Love is enough, From, M 858 

Love-letter, The, R 795 

Love-lily, R 792 

Lover’s walk, The, R 795 

Lovesight, R 794 

Love’s last gift, R 801 

Love’s lovers, R 794 

Love’s nocturn, R 786 

Loves of Tamar and the sea-nymph, The, 
L 42 

Love’s philosophy, Sh 299 

Love-sweetness, R 797 

Love’s testament, R 793 

Love thou thy land, T 480 

Low, lute, Jow (Queen Mary), T 543 

Lucknow, The defence of, T 546 

Lucretia Borgia’s hair, On, L 438 

Lucy, W 14, 15 

Lucy Gray, W 18 

Lyrics from Maud, T 519 

Lyrics from Queen Mary, T 543 

Lyrics from the coming of Arthur, T 540 

Lyrics from the Princess, T 497 

Lyric stanzas of Empedocles, Ar 715 

Lyrics, to Ianthe, L 430, 441 


Magical nature, RB 674 

Maid of Athens, B 170 

Maid of Neidpath, Sc 108 

Maid’s Lament, The, L 433 

Maisie, Proud, Se 164 

Manfred, B 214 

Marching along, RB 592 

Margaret, The affliction of, W 43 
Marguerite (Isolation), Ar 756 
Marguerite, To (continued), Ar 757 
Marmion, Sc 114 

Marriage of Geraint, Song from, T 524 


BRIPISHS PORTS 





Mary———.,, To (Revolt of Islam), Sh 291 

Mary Beaton’s song (Chastelard), Sw 871 

Mary Lamb, To, L 440 

Mary Magdalene at the door of Simon the 
Pharisee, R 785 

Mary’s girlhood, R 778 

Mary Stuart, Song from, Sw 899 

Match, A, Sw 874 

Mater triumphalis, From, Sw 887 

Matthew, W 16 

Maud, Lyrics from, T 519 

Mazzini, On the monument to, Sw 907 

Medusa, Aspecta, R 786 

Meeting at night, RB 605 

Meeting of Gebir and Charoba, The, L 426 

Melancholy, Ode on, K 409 

Meleager, Death of. (Atalanta in Calydon), 
Sw 869 

Memorabilia, RB 6382 

Memorial thresholds, R 805 

Memorial verses, Ar 713 

Memory, W 58 

Memory of Walter Savage Landor, In, Sw 

76 

Menelaus and Helen at Troy, L 452 

Merlin and the gleam, T 551 

Merlin and Vivien, Song from, T 524 

Merlin’s riddle (Coming of Arthur), T 540 

Mermaid Tavern, Lines on the, K 390 

Michael, W 19 

Michelangelo’s kiss, R 807 

Mid-rapture, R 797 

Mild is the parting year, L 481 

Milkmaid’s song (Queen Mary), diy 543 

Miller’s daughter, The, T 463 

Milton, T 536 

Mirror, The, R 779 

Misconceptions, RB 629 

Misgivings, Blank, Cl 688 

Mont Blane, C 96 

Mont Blanc, B 215 

Mont Blanc, Sh 288 

Montenegro, T 543 

Montorio’s Height, On, Cl 692 

Moore, To Thomas, B 234, 271 

Morality, Ar 721 

Morte d’Arthur, T 481 

Most sweet itis with unuplifted eyes, W 61 

Mother, I cannot mind my wheel, L 440 

Mountain echo, Yesit was the, W 48 

Muckle-mouth Meg, RB 6838 

Muse of the north, The, M 864 

Music, On, L 455 

Music, when soft voices die, Sh 358 

Mutability, W 55 

Mutability, Sh 358 

My heart leaps up when I behold, W 46 

My hopes retire, L 443 

My last duchess, RB 595 

My Murray, B 270, 271 

My sister’s sleep, R 774 

My star, RB 626 





Napoleon Buonaparte, Ode to, B 184 
Natural magic, RB 674 
Nature (Atalanta in Calydon), Sw 868 


INDEX .OF TITLES 





Nay, but you who do not love her, RB 605 

Near Avalon, M 888 

Near Dover, W 32 

Neidpath, The maid of, Se 113 

Never the time and the place, RB 681 

New age, The (Bacchanalia), Ar 764 

Newborn death, R 807 

New Sinai, The, Cl 689 

Night, To, Sh 357 

Night and morning, RB 605 

Nightingale, Ode to a, K 408 

Night-piece, A, W 5 

No master, M 860 

No more, no more (Don Juan), B 242 

No, my own love of other years, L 441 

*“‘Non dolet” Sw 889 

Northern farmer (old style), T 538 

Northern farmer (new style), T 541 

Not as these, R 804 

Noveniber, 1806, W 50 

November, 1, W 55 

Nuns fret not at their convent’s narrow 
room, W 48 

Nutting, W 13 

Nymph’s song to Hylas, 
Death of Jason), M 839 


Oak, The, T 553 

Obermann, Stanzas 
author of, Ar 725 

Obermann once more, Ar 768 

O bitter sea (Life and Death of Jason) M 889 

Oblation, The, Sw 889 

Ocean, The (Childe Harold), B 239 

Octogenarian, Toan, W 63 

Ode (Bards of passion), K 406 

Ode composed upon an evening of extra- 
ordinary splendor, W 55 

Ode, Dejection, An, C 94 

Ode, France, An, C 88 

Ode, Intimations of immortality, W 39 

Ode on a Grecian urn, K 407 

Ode on indolence, K 405 

Ode on melancholy, K 409 

Ode on the death of the Duke of Welling- 
ton, T 514 

Ode to a nightingale, K 408 

Ode to duty, W 44 

Ode to Napoleon Buonaparte, B 184 

Ode to Psyche, K 406 

Ode to tranquility, C 94 

Ode to the west wind, Sh 297 

Oenone, T 464 

Of old sat Freedom on the heights, T 479 

Of such is the kingdom of heaven, Sw 900 

Ogier the Dane, Song from, M 855 [186 

Oh ! snatched away in beauty’s bloom: B 

Oh that ’twere possible (Maud), T 523 

Old and new art, R 804 

Old pictures in Florence, RB 622 

O, let the solid ground (Maud), T 519 

Ona country road, Sw 903 

On a faded violet, Sh 293 

On a Grecian urn, Ode, K 407 

On an autumnal evening, Lines, C 66 

On a picture of Leander, K 380 


The (Life and 


in memory of the 





OX9 


On a poet’s lips I slept, Sh 310 

On Burns, R 811 

One hope, The, R 808 

One way of love, RB 629 

One word is too often profaned, Sh 368 

One word more, RB 654 

One year ago my path was green, L 441 

On Fame, K 423 

On first looking into Chapman’s Homer, K 
373 

On his own Iphigeneia and Agamemnon, 
L 440 


On his seventy-fifth birthday, L 456 

On Lucretia Borgia’s hair, L 438 

On melancholy, Ode, K 409 

On Montorio’s Height, Cl 692 

On music, L 455 

On refusal of aid between nations, R 778 

On seeing the Elgin marbles, K 3880 

On Southey’s death, L 457 

On the cliffs, Sw 892 

On the death of Robert Browning, Sonnets, 
Sw 909 

On the death of Southey, L 456 

On the deaths of Thomas Carlyle and 
George Eliot, Sw 899 

On the extinction of the Venetian republic, 
W 31 

On the grasshopper and cricket, K 374 

On the Hellenics, L 444 

On the Mermaid Tavern, Lines, K 390 

On the monument erected to Mazzini at 
Genoa, Sw 907 

On the sea, K 380 

On the smooth brow and clustering hair, L 
443 

On the verge, Sw 906 

On this day I complete my thirty-sixth year, 
B 272 

Orpheus and the Sirens, Songs of (Life and 
death of Jason), M 840 

Orpheus’ song of triumph (Life and death 
of Jason) M 840 

O ship, ship, ship, Cl 702 

Osorio, Song from, C 73 

O swallow, swallow, flying, 
498 

O that ’twere possible (Maud), T 523 

Our gaieties, our luxuries, Cl 695 

Overhead the tree-tops meet (Pippa passes), 
RB 591 . 

Over the sea our galleys went ( Paracelsus), 
RB 568 

Ozymandias, Sh 293 


flying south, T 


Pacchiarotto volume, Epilogue to the, RB 
674 


Pains of sleep, The, C 98 

Palace of Art, The, T 468 
Palladium, Ar 765 

Pan, Hymn of, Sh 346 

Pan, Hymn to (Endymion), K 382 
Pantheon, The, Cl 692 
Paracelsus, Songs from, RB 568 
Parting at morning, RB 605 
Passion and worship, R 794 


920 


BRITISH *POBTS 





Past ruin’d Illion Helen lives, L 431 

Patriot, The, RB 633 

Pearl, A girl, A, RB 683 

Peele Castle, W 45 

Penumbra, R 780 

Perché pensa ? 
704 

Personal talk, W 49 

Peschiera, Cl 693 

Phantom or fact, C 103 

Philomela, Ar 741 

Pibroch of Donald Dhu, Se 163 

Pictor ignotus, RB 606 

Pied piper of Hamelin, The, RB 598 

Pilgrims, The, Sw 884 

Pippa passes, RB 570 

Pis-aller, Ar 764 

Pleasure! why thus desert the heart, L 481 

Plighted promise, R 788 

Poet! he hath put his heart to school, A, 
NV 62 

Poet, The, T 461 

Poetical commandments (Don Juan), B 242 

Poetics, RB 688 

Poet’s epitaph, A, W 15 

Poet’s song, The, T 497 

Political greatness, Sonnet, Sh 358 

Popularity, RB 6382 

Porphyria’s lover, RB 569 

Portrait, The, R 776 

Portrait, The (House of Life), R 794 

Pot of basil, The, K 391 

Pray but one prayer for me, M 827 

Prelude to the Earthly Paradise, M 842 

Pride of youth, R 797 

Primrose of the rock, The, W 59 

Princess, Lyrics from the, T 497 

Prisoner of Chillon, B 206 

Proem (Endymion), K 3881 

Prologue (Fifine at the fair), RB 677 

Prologue (La Saisiaz), RB 677 

Prologue (Two poets of Croisic), RB 677 

Prometheus, B 213 

Prometheus unbound, Sh 299 

Proserpine, Hymn to, Sw 872 

Proserpine, The garden of, Sw 877 

Prospice, RB 667 

Proud Maisie, Sc 164 

Proud word you never spoke, L 443 

Psyche, Ode to, K 406 

Psyche, Song from the story of Cupid and, 
M 854 


Pensando s’invecchia, Cl 


Qua cursum ventus, Cl 688 

Quatrains, L 443 

Queen Mary, Lyrics from, T 548 
Queen’s song, The (Chastelard), Sw 872 
Question, The, Sh 347 

Questioning spirit, The, Cl 690 

Quiet work, Ar 708 

Qui laborat, orat, Cl 698 


Rabbi ben Ezra, RB 659 

Rain, rain and sun (Coming of Arthur), T 
540 

Rapunzel, Songs from, M 827 


Rarely, rarely, comest thou, Sh 347 

Real question, The, Cl 693 

Rebecca’s hymn, Se 164 

Reflections on having left a place of retire- 

ment, C 69 

Refusal of aid between nations, On, R 7 

Regeneration, L 429 

Remain, ah not in youth alone, L 442 

Requiescat, Ar 727 

Resolution and independence, W 28 

Respectability, RB 630 

Retro me, Sathana, R 806 

Revenge, The, T 543 

Reverie of poor Susan, The, W 5 

Revolt of Islam, Dedication of, Sh 291 

Riding together, M 825 

Rime of the ancient mariner, C 73 

Ring and the book, From the, RB 668 

Ring out wild bells (In memoriam), T 510 

Rivulet crossing my ground (Maud), T 521 

Rizpah, T 548 

Robert Browning, To, L 448 

ada Browning, Sonnets on the death of,, 

w 9 

Robin Hood, K 388 

Rome (Childe Harold), B 236 

Rome, Cl 692 

Rondel, Sw 876 

Rose Aylmer, L 428 

Rose Aylmer’s hair, given by her sister, 
L 456 

Rosny, RB 682 

Roundel, The, Sw 902 

Roundelay (Endymion), K 386 

Round us the wild creatures (Ferishtah’s: 
fancies), RB 681 

Rudel to the lady of Tripoli, RB 602 

Rugby Chapel, Ar 766 


Sailing of the sword, The, M 834 

Sailor boy, The, T 536 

Saint Agnes’ eve, T 479 

Saint Agnes’, The eve of, K 398 

Saint John, The eve of, Sc 108 

Saint Luke the painter, R 804 

Saint Mark, The eve of, K 404 

Salt of the Earth, the, Sw 900 

Same flower, To the (celandine), W 27 

Same flower, To the (daisy), W 35 

Sapphics, Sw 878 

Sappho (On the cliffs), Sw 892 

Sapphe to Hesperus, L 437 

Saul, 23 611 

Saul before his last battle, Song of, B 197 

Say not the struggle nought availeth, Cl: 
695 

Sceptic moods, Cl 693 

Scholar gipsy, The, Ar 741 

Scorn not the sonnet, W 58 

Seaboard, The, Sw 903 

Sea, On the, K 3886 

Sea, To the (Life and death of Jason), M 839» 

Sea-limits, The, R 779 

Sea-shell, The (Gebir), L 427 

Seasons, The, M 857 

Second best, The, Ar 714 


INDEX OF TITLES 


See what a lovely shell (Maud), T 522 

Self-deception, Ar 714 

Self-dependence, Ar 721 

Sensitive plant, The, Sh 338 

September, 1819, W 55 

Sequence of Sonnets on the death of Robert 
Browning, Sw 909 ~ 

Serenade, Indian, Sh 299 

Seventy-fifth birthday, On his, L 456 

Severed selves, R 799 

Shades of Agamemnon and Iphigeneia, L 
483 

Shakespeare, Ar 708 

Shakespeare, William, Sw 899 

Shakespeare and Milton, L 454 

Shameful death, M 833 

Shame upon you Robin (Queen Mary), T 
543 

She dwelt among the untrodden ways, W 
14 

Shelley, R 812 

Shelley (Cor cordium), Sw 888 

She walks in beauty, B 186 

She was a phantom of delight, W 42 

Shipwreck, The (Don Juan), B 243 

Sibylla palmifera, R 804 

Silent noon, R 796 

Simon Lee, W 6 

Simplon Pass, The, W 12 

Singing lesson, A, Sw 902 

Sir Galahad, T 493 

Sir Giles’ war-song, M 838 

Sister Helen, R 780 

Sisters, The, T 467 

Sister’s sleep, My, R 774 

Sisters, Song from the, T 549 

Skylark, To a, W 45 

Skylark, To a, W 58 

Skylark, To a, Sh 344 

Sleep, To, W 50 

Sleep, To, K 423 

Sleep and poetry, K 374 

Slumber did my spirit seal, A, W 15 

Small celandine, To the, W 27 

So fair, so sweet, withal so sensitive, W 62 

Sohrab and Rustum, Ar 728 

Soldier rest, thy warfare o’er, Se 159 

Solitary reaper, The, W 38 

Solitude, W 18 

Solitude, A, Sw 902 

Solitude, To, K 372 

Some future day, Cl 701 

Song, Sh 347 

Song, Child’s, Sw 892 

Song, Mary Beaton’s (Chastelard), Sw 871 

Song, Nay, but you who do not love her, 
RB 605 

Song, The Queen’s (Chastelard), Sw 872 

Song from Charles the first, Sh 369 

Song from Hellas, Sh 367 

Song from Mary Stuart, Sw 899 

Song from Ogier the Dane, M 855 

Song from Osorio, C 73 

Song from the Sisters, T 549 

Song from the story of Acontius and Cy- 
dippe, M 855 


92. 


Bane ron the story of Cupid and Psyche, 

854 

Song from Zapolya, C 101 

Song in time of order, Sw 866 

Song of Saul before his last battle, B 187 

Song of spirits (Prometheus unbound), Sh 
317 

Song of the echoes (Prometheus unbound), 
Sh 314 

Songs from Chastelard, Sw 871 

Songs from Ferishtah’s fancies, RB 681 

Songs from Paracelsus, RB 568 

Songs in absence, Cl 700 

Songs of Orpheus and the sirens (Life and 
death of Jason), M 840 

Song-throe, The, R 802 

Song, The miller’s daughter, T 463 

Song, Where shall the lover rest, Se 125 

Sonnet, The, W 48, 58 

Sonnet, The, R 793 

Sonnet, England in 1819, Sh 297 

Sonnet on Chillon, B 206 

Sonnet, Political greatness, Sh 358 

Sonnet, Scorn not the, W 58 

Sonnets from the Portuguese, EBB 555 

Sonnets on the death of Robert Browning, 
Sw 909 

Sonnets on the thought of death, Cl 705 

Sonnet, To an octogenarian, W 63 

Sonnet to Lake Leman, B 214 

Soon, O Ianthe! life is o’er, L 442 

Soothsay, R 810 

So then, I feel not deeply, L 455 

Soul’s beauty, R 804 

Southey, On the death of, L 456 

Southey’s death, On, L 457 

So we'll go no more a-roving, B 271 

Sparrow’s nest, The, W 26 

Splendor falls on castle walls, The, T 498 

Stanzas, April, 1814, Sh 27 

Stanzas for music (There be 
beauty’s daughters), B 189 

Stanzas for music (There’s not a joy), B 187 

Stanzas for music (They say that hope is 
happiness), B 212 

Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse, Ar 754 

Stanzas in memory of the author of Ober- 
mann, Ar 725 

Stanzas to Augusta, B 209 

Stanzas written in dejection near Naples, 
Sh 296 

Stanzas written on the road between Flor- 
ence and Pisa, B 271 

Statue and the bust, The, RB 637 

Stepping westward, W 38 

Stillborn love, R 800 

Strange fits of passion have I known, W 14 

Strayed reveller, The, Ar 710 

Stream of life, The, Cl 702 

Stream’s secret, The, R 789 

Sudden light, R 788 

Summer dawn, M 827 

Summer-night, A, Ar 721 

Summum bonum, RB 683 

Sunbows, The, Sw 905 

Sunrise in 1848, At the, R 778 


none of 


22 BRITISH POETS 


Sun upon the Weirdlaw Hill, The, Sc 164 

Superscription, A, R 807 

Surprised by joy, impatient as the wind, 
W 55 


Swallow, swallow, flying, flying south, T 
498 

Sweet and low, T 498 

Sweet-briar, Upon a, L 482 

Switzerland, From, Ar 756 

Switzerland, Thought of a Briton on the 
subjugation of, W 50 


Tables turned, The, W 9 

Tamar and the seannymph, Loves of, L 426 

Tears, idle tears, T 497 

‘There is no God,” the wicked saith, Cl 694 

There ! said a stripling, W 61 

There’s a woman like a dewdrop, RB 602 

There was a boy, W 13 

Theseus and Hippolyta, L 457 

This lime-tree bower my prison, C 7 

This world is very odd, we see, Cl 695 

Thomas Carlyle and George Eliot, On the 
deaths of, Sw 899 

Thomas Moore, Te, B 234, 271 

Thought of a Briton on the subjugation of 
Switzerland, W 50 

Thought of death, Sonnets on the, Cl 705 

Thrasymedes and Eunoe, L 444 

Three Roses, The, L 457 

Three shadows, R 809 

wee years she grew in sun and shower, 
W 15 

Throstle, The, T 253 

Through a glass darkly, Cl 699 

Through death to love, R 799 

Thr ough the Metidja to Abd- el-Kadr, RB 
593 

Thyrsis, Ar 757 

Thy voice is heard through rolling drums, 
T 498 

Time, Sc 163 

Time, Sh 357 

Time long past, Sh 348 

Time real and imaginary, C 70 

Time’s revenges, RB 606 

Time to be wise, L 441 

Tintern Abbey, Lines composed a few 
miles above, W 9 

Tithonus, T 535 

To—(I fear thy kisses), Sh 345 

To—( Music when soft voices die), Sh 358 

sawe one word is too often profaned), Sh 
36 

To a bride, L 441 

To a cyclamen, L 442 

Toa friend, Ar 708 

To age, L 455 

To a gentleman, C 99 

To a Highland girl, W 37 

To Ailsa Rock, K 389 

To a lady, Sc 108 

Toa nightingale, Ode, K 408 

To a sky-lark, W 45 

To a sky-lark, W 58 

To a skylark, Sh 344 


To Augusta, Stanzas, B 209 

To Augusta, Epistle, B 210 

To autumn, K 409 

To a young lady, W 46 

To B. R. Haydon, W 55 

To Chaucer, Invocation (Life and death of 
Jason), 1 M 842 

To Coleridge, Sh 275 

To Hartley Coleridge, W 33 

To Hesperus, Sappho, L 4387 

To Homer, K 389 

To Ianthe, Lyrics, L 480, 441 

To Jane, With a guitar, Sh 368 

To Joseph Ablett, L 438 

TO Kadov, Cl. 688 

To Leigh Hunt Esq., K 380 

To Louis Kossuth, Sw 891 

To Marguerite, Ar 756, 757 

To Mary (Revolt of Islam), Sh 291 

To Mary Lamb, L 440 

To-morrow, Sh 368 

To Mr. Murray, B 270, 271 

To my ninth decade, L 458 

Tomy sister, W 8 

To-night, Sh 357 

To one who has been long in city pent, K 
373 

To Psyche, Ode, K 406 

To Robert Browning, L 443 

To sleep, W 50 

To sleep, K 423 

To solitude, K 3872 

To the cuckoo, W 42 

To the daisy (three poems), W 34, 35 

To the moon, Sh 348 

To the Queen, T 513 

To the sea (Life and death of Jason), M 839 

To the same flower (celandine), W 27 

To the same flower (daisy), W 35 

To the small celandine, W 27 

To the west wind, Ode, Sh 297 

To Thomas Moore, B 234, 271 

To Toussaint ?POuverture, W 32 

To Tranquility, Ode, C 94 

Touch him ne’er so lightly, RB 680 

Toussaint POuverture, W 32 

To Virgil, T 550 

To William Wordsworth, C 99 

To Wordsworth, L 488 

To Wordsworth, Sh 603n. 

To Youth, L 454 

Tranquillity, Ode to, C 94 

Transfigured life, R 802 

Tray, RB 679 

Trees of the garden, The, R 806 

Triads, Sw 892 

Trosachs, The, W 60 

Troy Town, R 789 

True-love, an thou be true, Sc 164 

True woman, R 801 

Trumpet song (Coming of Arthur), T 540 

Twenty years hence, L 442 

Twist ye, twine ye, even so, Sc 162 

Two April mornings, The, W 17 

Two in the Campagna, RB 628 

Two poets of Croisic, The, RB 677 


INDEX ORCC TLES 


Ulysses, T 487 

bpvocg avuvoc, Cl 699 

Unremitting voice of nightly streams, The, 
W 63 

Up at a villa—down in the city, RB 619 

Upon a sweet-briar, L 482 


Vale of Chamouni, In the, C 96 

Valley of Cauteretz, In the, T 539 

Various the roads of life, L 448 

Vastness, T 550 - 

Venetian pastoral, For a, R 779 

Venice (Childe Harold), B 234 

Venus victrix, R 798 

Verse-making was least of my virtues (Fer- 
ishtah’s fancies), RB 681 

Villon, Ballad of Frangois, Sw 891 

Violet, On a faded, Sh 293 

Violet, The, Sc 108 

Virgil, To, T 550 

Vision of judgment, The, B 257 

Vision of sin, The, T 494 

Vivien’s song (Merlin and Vivien), T 524 

Voice and the peak, The, T 542 

Voice by the cedar-tree, A (Maud), T 519 

Voice of Toil, The, M 859 

Voyage, The, T 537 


Wages, T 540 [876 

Walter Savage Landor, In memory of, Sw 

Walt Whitman in America, To, Sw 866 

Wanting is—What, RB, 680 

Wasted, weary, wherefore stay, Sc 162 

Waterloo, Battle of, B 192 

We are seven, W 6 

Weirdlaw Hill, The sun upon the, Se 164 

Wellington, Ode on the death of the Duke 
of, T 514 

Well I remember how you smiled, L 458 

Were you with me (Songs in absence), Cl 
702 


West London, Ar 762 

Westminster Bridge, Composed upon, W 31 

West wind, Ode to the, Sh 297 

When a man hath no freedom, B 271 

When Helen first saw wrinkles in her face, 
L 430 

When I have borne in memory, W 33 

When I have fears that I may cease to be, 
K 381 ‘ 

When the enemy is near thee, Cl 695 

When the lamp is shattered, Sh 369 . 

When we two parted, B 171 

Where are the great, Cl 695 

Where lies the land (Songs in absence), Cl 
7 


Where shall the lover rest (Marmion), Sc 


126 

Whirl-blast from behind the hill, A, W 8 

Whitman, To Walt, Sw 886 

Who kill’d John Keats, B 271 

Why from the world (Ferishtah’s fancies), 
RB 682 

Why I am a Liberal, RB 682 

Why, why, repine, L 440 


965 





Will, T 524 

William and Helen, Se 105 

William Shakespeare, Sw 899 

William Wordsworth, To, C 99 

Willowwood, R 799 

Wind, A word with the, Sw 908 

Wind, Ode to the west. Sh 297 

Winter Weather, M 824 

Wish no word unspoken (Ferishtah’s fan- 
cies), RB 681 

With a guitar, To Jane, Sh 368 

With flowers from a Roman wall, Sc 108 

Without her, R 800 

ee seek hand a little girl pressed down, 

2 

With whom is no variableness, Cl 702 

Woman’s last word, A, RB 617 

Woodspurge, The, R 788 

Wordsworth, To, Sh 276 

Wordsworth, To, L 488 

Wordsworth, To William, C 99 

Word with the wind, A, Sw 908 

Work without hope, C 101 

World is a bundle of hay, The, B 271 

World is too much with us, The, W 50 

Worldly place, Ar 761 

World’s great age begins anew, The, Sh 367 

Worlds on worlds are rolling ever, Sh 366 

World’s wanderers, The, Sh 348 

Wrestling-match, The (Gebir), L 427 

Written among the Euganean Hillis, Sh 293 

Written in dejection near Naples, Sh 296 

Written in early spring, W 7 

Written in Kensington Gardens, Ar 724 

Written in London, W 32 

Written in March, W 26 

Written in the album at Elbingerode, C 93 

Written on the road between Florence and 
Pisa, B 271 


Yarrow revisited, W 59 

Yarrow unvisited, W 39 

Yarrow visited, W 54 

peat at the spring, The (Pippa passes), RB 
76 


Years, many parti-colored years, L455 * 

Yes, I write verses now and then, L 441 

Yes, it was the mountain echo, W 48 

Yew-trees, W 36 

You ask me why, tho’ ill at ease, T 479 

You'll love me yet (Pippa passes), RB 588 

Young lady, To a, W 46 

Young Lochinvar (Marmion), Se 141 

You smiled, you spoke, L 442 

Youth, to, “L 454 

Youth and age, C 101 

Youth and art, RB 666 

Youth and calm, Ar 761 

Youth of nature, The, Ar 719 

Youth of the year, The (Atalanta in Caly- 
don), Sw 866 

Youth’s antiphony, R 795 

Youth’s spring-tribute, R 795 


Zapolya, Song from, C 101 


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